Found A Gun Buried In My Backyard!

[Golden_Republic]

Sorta.

My house was built in the late 40's (1947-48). We are the third owners of the property. The original family was here probably from the late 40's to early 70's, then another family lived here in the 70's and 80's and then another two families lived here together in the 90's and early 2000's. My wife bought the home in 2004.

Our neighbor tells us stories of when she moved in to her home (1975) and that the family living in our home was a rambunctious crowd, the boys especially... fights in the front yard, always working on cars in the back yard, parties, etc. She also says that when the family left, they threw a whole heap of trash into a below ground pool and covered it with dirt.

I've been randomly scanning the yard for the past few weeks, getting to know my MD (Quest X10 Pro) and all the varying target ID's and sounds. I've found tons of nails, some small car parts, Zincolns and pull tabs. I even dug up a crushed beer can from about 9" down. My brother in law once told me story, which kind of confirms the neighbor's tale, as my brother in law says that shortly after my wife purchased the home, he had to help her trench a line for a replacement sewage pipe, and while he was doing that, he was pulling out whole car doors and crowbars from 6 inches down all the way to 6 feet plus.

Fast forward to this week, I go out back to meddle around with my MD. I go to check a new area of the yard and my MD pinged with what I figured was another Zincoln. I wasn't going to dig it, but decided what the heck...

Ended up digging up a 1950's era metal cap pistol. In researching, this is a knock-off of the Old Smoky cap pistol made by Hubley. This particular model was made by a company called Greencraft Products Inc. out of Jersey City, New Jersey. It was nice finding a piece of history here - something that belonged to one of the original children of the home, long ago forgotten.

[jim tn]

Nice find and the piece appears to be in very good condition. Good hit! HH jim tn

[RickUK]

Interesting find,i bet it gave a 'Banging signal' and bit the bullet to dig it out,i guess it was always in your sights to find such a gun 🤣🤣🤣

[F350Platinum]

That's one of the nicest guns I've seen in a while, usually ya find parts and bits, sometimes you can make a whole one or of them. Great find! 🏆

Just don't shoot your eye out... 😏

[JCR]

That's a fancy one.

[Rick N. MI]

Wow, that cool toy gun!

[markinswpa]

Very cool find, congrats. I found the same one a few years ago. One side of the end of the barrel is missing, never the less its in my display case. Yours looks to be close to perfect. Great save. Mark

[TampaBayBrad]

I remember caps! Used to smash a whole roll of caps at a time with a hammer on the cement for a really loud BANG!

After caps came WASP pistols which used little small red plastic cylinders filled with gun powder that you loaded like real bullets. Twice as loud as caps. YAY!

Great find from when kids used to play cowboys and it cleaned up nicely too.

 

[CPT_GhostLight]

Very nice find, G_R, and it's in great shape, well done!

[Cascade Steven]

Very nice find! Congratulations.  I am curious as to what method you used to clean it to remove dirt without damaging the surface?