Pete from Mi , where to from

[thompy]

the U.P. did you use to hunt, presently i live in menominee, but originally from the marquette area, i enjoy hunting up their, just know the area better. any good locations up here you might suggest

 

[thompy]

n/t

 

[Mike from MI "Iron Brigade"]

Lansing. There are a few more of us in SW MI and central lower MI, and such!

 

[Pete in MI]

near Gwinn. Did detecting in the Gwinn, Little Lake, Marquette, Negaunee - even did a little wondering about Ropes Gold Mine (but didn't have the detector with me at the time. Did a lot of detecting just on the base itself. Lots of goodies to be found all over up there since the base closed.

Not familiar with the Menominee area. Check where ever people got together for - fishing - picnics - swimming - sledding - outside concerts - any 'annual' event for that area - certainly all the kid's playgrounds at the schools - playgrounds at the local parks (city, county and any state ones that aren't posted no detecting).

Do some research at the library and online for the history of your area and for any events that sounds like a lot of people attended. Imagine having the time to detect Woodstock's Algood's farm (?) - I know it isn't in Menominee but you get the idea of large crowds. Each city seems to have its 'festival' like Traverse City's Cherry Festival.

Lumber camps. People cut lumber and had money to spend but few places to spend it so the company store and playing poker was probably where they spent their money (unless there happened to be a house of ill-repute somewhere within distance of the camp. Then some of the money will be lost there. How about trains in the area that moved the trees they cut - saw mills - rivers that floated the trees to the mills - 'landings' across rivers so equipment and such could move from one side of the river to the other on a 'barge' across the river.

Any natural disasters that made people leave things behind - like uncontrolled fires? Not everyone ever made it back to their homesteads.
Any abandoned homes deteriorating with age. Or things like a T shaped clothes pole for a clothes line with nothing else around - there had to have been a house there once.

Check any construction projuect - like sidewalks in town - I found a nice Indian Head penny under one of those projects (and when talking to people who lived on that block they aid they got Mercury dimes and other old coins - without a detector - after it rained.

Just a few thoughts to get your imagination going.
Good hunting to you Thompy and keep in touch with how you are doing up there. Will be glad to hear of your finds. And also you can probably talk to police officers and let them know you detect and you're willing to help them in evidence recovery. Let the local insurance companies know you will help recover lost jewelry. They'd rather pay you a finders fee than to fork over big bucks to pay for an insured lost ring, etc.

 

[thompy]

never thought of the base, i lived there when my father was stationed there,in the early 70's .last sumer i started exploring for some of the gold mine on the dead river basin range about 10 miles east of the ropes, there are about 25 gold mines in this area, thats why I'm looking at the t-2 or a mxt' some of negaunee's old caving grounds are suppose to open back up for redevelopment this summer, where the houses where relocated.this started back in the 20's through the 70's, but don't know what kind of depth ill get with the iron ore, did some last year but found little including trash, using a qxt, logging camps and saw mills, haven't done this yet , suppose to be a big one 2 miles up the road from my folks place, what Ive concentrated on mostly are the old charcoal kilns from the 1860's to 1900, talk about old iron and steel, the made charcoal for the blast furnaces for the iron mines. thanks for the response Pete oh ya talking about fire the great peshtigo fire happened here at the same time as the great Chicago fire ,but they lost more people up here

 

[Pete in MI]

and where you find black sand you are likely to find some gold. Time to dig out a pan and hit some of those small streams and rivers.

Don't forget looking for the old outhouses and those fruit cellars sticking up out of the ground with no houses around them. I've seen some just driving up US-41 into Marquette. I never wanted to leave Sawyer back in 1973. I wanted to get out of the service then and set up a detecting store in the Marquette area. I got orders for England and it was hard to not want to go there to detect. Did some detecting there and sold some detectors too.

Hope you have some great finds up there to tell us about. I know of a detectorist in the Escanaba area and she is always having some nice finds.

Keep in touch and let us know of your finds.