If you like old coins, you might like these pics of a coin that I recently found

[Magyar]

This is a shield nickel..variety 2 ( no rays) ...I believe it is a 1876 coin...difficult to see the entire date..so this is just a pretty good guess.

Again, the salt water was not kind over the years to this precious coin.

 

[steve in so la]

that's a nice one for sure. The salt water does a job on them all right. Sometimes I dig coins from sand only and they look sand blasted - which is what they are I guess. steve in so az

 

[Magyar]

Thank you Steve, but I wish this coin was in better condition. I would also like to find at least one "zinc" penny sometime .... I haven't found one yet;

I've been detecting for 3 yrs. now...East Coast..where are all the "zincs"?..they sure aren't around here.

 

[Joe G]

That shield nickel looks a heck of a lot better than the one I dug out of the ground last year That's a nice find!

 

[Joe G]

From '82 on, pennies have been made with zinc (copper plated). Did you mean the '43 steel pennies with the zinc coating? I don't think I've ever dug one of those. Wouldn't expect it to look to good anyway being steel and all

 

[Magyar]

Yes Joe...I meant the old steel pennies....thank you.
I want to find one of those soooooooo badly.... but I don't expect to find one anytime soon; I think maybe they were only minted in the year 1943.

 

[Joe G]

If there was a steel penny dropped, I doubt there's anything left of it now

 

[steve in so la]

but in 27 years I have dug one steel penny. steve in so az

 

[Mike from MI "Iron Brigade"]

I like finding them up here!

 

[Pete in MI]

but that is probably more me blocking out iron nails in most places I have hunted because of iron in the ground...but also now with the Explorer II I can open that area where they fall and maybe find some.

With the amount of rock salt used in the winter time in Michigan, you'd be amazed at how corroded copper pennies get. Hoping that the steel pennies are in places where the rock salt isn't at (like around parking lots where they push all the snow and rock salt into piles along the edges). Those old places that have little activity would have even less rock salt to destroy the coins.

 

[Pete in MI]

Congrats on finding that old nickel

 

[Mike Chgo area]

n/t

 

[Paul(NWO)]

because they were steel with only a zinc coating. the dies would wear out quicker and they took far more pressure to form. There are a lot of errors on these coins due to the extreme conditions. Hope you find one this year.
HH

 

[outhouseman08]

Hey yall! New to this site. Got lucky the other day and found my first "pieces of eight" silver . In the same field 2 years ago i found a 1782 spanish dollar.but i dont know if it is an 8 or a2 reale coin. will upload pics when i learn how to do it. In this place i also found railroad tags,civil war buttons,old gun parts,boot spurs, store weights,black thick glass,jewelry... Also lots of old tops to bottles.Could this have been a tavern? Just wondering if anyone might have some ideas.Later.

 

[outhouseman08]

Hey yall! New to this site. Got lucky the other day and found my first "pieces of eight" silver . In the same field 2 years ago i found a 1782 spanish dollar.but i dont know if it is an 8 or a2 reale coin. will upload pics when i learn how to do it. In this place i also found railroad tags,civil war buttons,old gun parts,boot spurs, store weights,black thick glass,jewelry... Also lots of old tops to bottles.Could this have been a tavern? Just wondering if anyone might have some ideas.Later.

 

[Mike from MI "Iron Brigade"]

Congrats on the finds. I hunt many fields. The thing we look for is brick, glass shards etc... This will tell you that there was a building of some kind there. Unless you get some type of history on the site, you can only guess what was there. I have found many of the same things at regular old farm sites, and school sites.

 

[AllenOK]

And both were part of a coin spill. I was getting a hit on the copper Wheat's, and in the process or recovering them, also recovered the Steelies. The first one was so badly rusted that I couldn't see any detail. I knew it was a Steelie, as the other two coins were both Wheat's; one was a '42, and the other was either a '41 or '44. The second coin spill had four coins in it, three copper Wheat's and a Steelie.

Pete, the only time I found crusty-corroded Wheat's and IH's in MI soil was when I was in a low-laying, "wet" area. If the soil was well-drained, the Wheat's, once washed, came out looking like the day they were dropped.

HH from Allen in OK

 

[Pete in MI]

encampment or old fort area....GIs always drink too much and throw their bottle caps where ever they sit and drink. Seriously though the items you mention sound like they come from some military area (with a bar on the base). Just a guess.

 

[warthog]

n/t