Went 2 The Barbers At The Old Farm

[Valens Legacy]

19 hours ago, F350Platinum said:

I will say that at first glance that graphic looks cool, but after thinking about it the tools are reversed 🤣

Not if your a lefty they ain't.

Great finds and nice permissions to keep you going for a while, so stay away from the beach long enough to clear the fields.

[rvpopeye]

You two are in permission heaven !

Keep up the good finds!

If someone was nice enough to leave them there , guess you need to dig it all up ! 

 

[GB_Amateur]

On 2/8/2023 at 9:52 PM, F350Platinum said:

It's either an 1800, 1803 or 1808 Draped Bust half cent.

On 2/9/2023 at 9:19 AM, GB_Amateur said:

The large cent isn't 1808 since they changed the design starting that year and head faces left.  The other two dates are relatively common for the times, but still only 2 or 3 million minted.  The one I found is 1803.

Just read Chase's report of this trip and he said 'half cent'.  Then I reread yours (quoted above) and it also said 'half cent'.  My bad as I read too fast.

Half cents are much scarcer, at least in those early years.  And in fact 1808 had both designs (right facing and left facing) so 1808 is back in the running!  In chronolgical order the mintages in my 2001 Redbook are (rounded to the nearest thousand) 203k, 92k, 400k.

Too bad the reverse is obliterated as it would help dating if you can't figure out that last digit.  There were so many die varieties in the early years that the date can sometimes be deduced from those.  Still possible with yours but apparently only the obverse holds the clues now.  (Hope it's the '03 -- sub 100k coin!  Still, in the condition it's in, no monetary value but an extra feather in the detecting cap if it is.  😉)

Addendum:  Flipping through Bowers's reference work I was reminded that the official mintage numbers on these early coins wasn't based upon the date but rather just the number of coins struck during that year.   (The 1804 dollar is the classic example of the discrepancy.)  Bowers opines that the number of 1803 dated coins was likely much higher than 92k (meaning many minted in later years) but the flipside is that he also thinks the 1808 dated version of this design was much less than 100,000, the remainder of the official annual mint figure (400k) being coins dated with earlier years.

If that last digit can be brought out better, even if unresolved, the 1808 might be recognizable as its last digit was bizarrely composed of two tiny zeroes.  It is offset noticeably higher than the other three digits in the date.

[NCtoad]

Hell yeah!!   I figured you’d hit on some silver around the house area.  Way to go!   Now that you’re hitting silver, don’t be surprised if a gold ring turns up.  Congrats!!

[F350Platinum]

9 hours ago, rvpopeye said:

You two are in permission heaven !

Keep up the good finds!

If someone was nice enough to leave them there , guess you need to dig it all up ! 

 

Thanks RVP, it's good until it isn't, I'm back at some of my original permissions, finding less but still finding. 😀

[F350Platinum]

9 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

If that last digit can be brought out better

Thanks for the thorough research, GB. I'll give it a shot, since it isn't really worth anything I might be able to dust it out a bit with some fine steel wool. I hope it's an '03 too!

It's now not the last one I found, details forthcoming 😎

[F350Platinum]

1 hour ago, NCtoad said:

Hell yeah!!   I figured you’d hit on some silver around the house area.  Way to go!   Now that you’re hitting silver, don’t be surprised if a gold ring turns up.  Congrats!!

Hope I'm doing ya proud, NC. 😀 I did get a ring, brass - and Chase got a really nice ring stamped 18k, but it's brass too. Might have been plated. 

Thankfully we have until April to hit these places, many choices. 👍

[schoolofhardNox]

Great hunt! I love barbers (except the ones that want to cut my hair) 😄. Very well rounded hunt. My guess on the half cent is 1808, if not then 1800. Both those dates had the high last digit almost touching the bust. The 1803 was the flat top of the 3 style and not a rounded top, so unless the corrosion made that top part look round, but it really is not, then it can be an 1803. In that condition it will be hard to get that last digit clearly. If you are still pulling out stuff like that, then just imagine what is hiding below or right next to iron 🧐

[F350Platinum]

12 minutes ago, schoolofhardNox said:

Great hunt! I love barbers (except the ones that want to cut my hair) 😄. Very well rounded hunt. My guess on the half cent is 1808, if not then 1800. Both those dates had the high last digit almost touching the bust. The 1803 was the flat top of the 3 style and not a rounded top, so unless the corrosion made that top part look round, but it really is not, then it can be an 1803. In that condition it will be hard to get that last digit clearly. If you are still pulling out stuff like that, then just imagine what is hiding below or right next to iron 🧐

Thanks! Yeah, we are wondering what the heck the guys that hit this place 25 years ago were using, considering the stuff we found Wednesday. 🤔 Sure weren't PI's, or they would have dug it all. They should have easily got that coin spill, but the Deus 2 does have its Magicks... We're thinking faster processors and better separation. I had kicked reactivity up to 2 in that spot, it's machine gun iron. Go in the cellar hole and it's all nails. We'd have to have something that can "see" around that iron.

If I was to make a 10x20 square, we got a large cent, a Mercury dime, 2 Barbers, a buffalo nickel, at probably more than one wheat. I thought it might be the back door.

[Chase Goldman]

28 minutes ago, schoolofhardNox said:

Great hunt! I love barbers (except the ones that want to cut my hair) 😄. Very well rounded hunt. My guess on the half cent is 1808, if not then 1800. Both those dates had the high last digit almost touching the bust. The 1803 was the flat top of the 3 style and not a rounded top, so unless the corrosion made that top part look round, but it really is not, then it can be an 1803. In that condition it will be hard to get that last digit clearly. If you are still pulling out stuff like that, then just imagine what is hiding below or right next to iron 🧐

Frankly, the yard where we pulled those coins WAS mostly machine gun iron, with nails in most of the non-ferrous target plugs.  There's more there, no doubt, masked to even the Deus.  So it's going to be tough sledding.