# Oddities and tragedies....



## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

No,...Nothing really awful happened,[] Just an interesting mix of locations and digs and attempted digs today. Earlier this morning, Fred, Tom and I met up at the bakery for some breakfast and hoped to find some possible privy pits in the vicinity that Doug (applied lips) helped probe out for us on his second visit last week. The first and second ones had some glass shards,...but no defined walls...One seemed to be an ash pit. Anyhow the third was at the old row house Doug and I crawled under. Tom called me after the permission came through but it was late in the day...We had just enough daylight to open up a hole, although we were along what seemed to be the outside edge of the privy...It was very wet and soupy about 3-4 feet down and we managed to find a few bottles before dark.

 At about 3 1/2" feet I spotted the first bottle laying on it's side... A _Texas _hutch....?? [8D]
 "GEO. E. VALLADE BOTTLER BEAUMONT, TEXAS"

 Sorry but no dig pics...Had the camera this morning but hurried out without it later.  
 Here's the bottle cleaned up....Anyone know this one?


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## epackage (May 27, 2012)

Odd find in PA for sure...


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## Penn Digger (May 27, 2012)

Texas bottle guy says it is rather rare and a $150 to 200 bottle. 

 PD


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## epackage (May 27, 2012)

Fantastic..[]


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Earlier when we were at the bakery for breakfast, our old pal Joe the baker came out to say hello, and returned shortly from the back with some rather strange items that were found by the excavator while doing a repair on his foundation...wanted to know what they were,...Heck, _we_ didn't even know....He said the excavator operator thought maybe they were used for fill...because there were so many of them....They seem to be made from reddish clay, like a giant clay marble? Anyone ever seen one of these oddities? Here's one with the hutch for scale.


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## epackage (May 27, 2012)

Bocce balls? Fake Meatballs??...LOL


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

COOL! Penn Digger has been doing some homework while I was cleaning bottles...He let me know that he found and contacted a Texas collector who says this bottle is pretty  rare...May have some value...
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




  Thank you Tom! By the way, since it's not my main area of collecting, (Meds) I wouldn't be against selling it. [] Food for thought....


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Oops...Didn't see Tom's post above...Sorry for the redundant info.


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

There were a few of the usual suspects throughout the day....Here's a little dinged up Trasks magnetic ointment we found while filling our hole earlier....


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Since it's late, I'll be brief and post a few pics of the Tragedy part of the dig....

 This pic shall be titled "The dangers of probing!" [] [] [] [:'(]

 Any other time it would be a "plain jane" slick med or whatever....of course the first bottle the probe found was this cobalt beer? Murphy's law of digging, I guess.
 I cleaned and reconstructed it for the post.


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Nice looking window bottle...


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## epackage (May 27, 2012)

ouch...


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Entrance and exit wound...[8|]


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

*


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Thanks for looking everyone....That's about it for tonight..We're going to try and finish digging it out tomorrow....


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## Penn Digger (May 27, 2012)

Casualty of probing...Not the first, not the last.

 PD


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## THE BADGER (May 27, 2012)

THAT BITES WITH THE COBALT BOTTLE BUT WE'VE ALL DONE IT.HOPEFULLY YOU CAN MAKE UP FOR THAT ONE WITH SOMETHING ELSE NICE. BADGER


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## appliedlips (May 27, 2012)

Sweet digs guys, I knew the lot on that double would be a soupie mess as water squirted out of the hole on my probe. I believe that ball was used for some type of mixing in an industrial setting. Oil? Its neat you dug the cobalt beer which was made in Belleville Il., right here in my back yard and a city I have dug a good bit. It held a a product made by Anheiser Busch called Liquid Yeast. The Texas hutch is very nice and hope you get a good price for it. We dug until 3 a.m. last night and found a few goodies but nothing great.


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## RICKJJ59W (May 27, 2012)

Cool hutch Joe Id rather have the hutch over the blue beer any day.[]
 Texas is a long way to travel back in the days when that hutch was made.

 Me and Dave went to Lititz near Lancaster  to dig a pit. Long story short the pit was full of chit.[8D] no bottles just chitski. Then we got permission to do the neighbors  and Dave hit a power line when he was digging and knocked the power out of the whole house. LOL Gotta love it. I beginning to see a pattern here.[8D]


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Thanks for the comments everyone...

 It _is_ a long way for that hutch to travel Rick...First thing I thought when I wiped it off!

 Doug...Thanks for the info on the liquid yeast...I had a vague recollection of that when I was still trying to figure out what bottle the pieces were to. Thanks again for the help and fun visit....Tom may have found a second privy over in the other corner of that lot..

 Badg..Thanks for the encouraging words...Hope you weren't TOO shocked when you hit that line...[]

 E...we were joking about them being Bocce balls too, never considered the industrial mixing angle...? Weird.

 Tom,...thanks again for the info and forward on the Texas guy...also wrangling the permssion! 

 P.S. Doug...The only other partial bottle I dug earlier tonight was a crude black glass ale with a single centered bottom dot....Maybe there's a whole one in there![]


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## cacarpetbagger (May 27, 2012)

I know the feeling.


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## cordilleran (May 27, 2012)

Amerindian gaming balls. Common find at campsites. Come in various sizes and generally igneous composition, although fire-hardened clay has also been used to fashion the gaming stones. If blackened, could have been used as cooking stones. Some folks also point to ceremonial uses for these strange orbicular oddities as well. Mill balls tend to be ceramic or steel as they take quite a beating in the mix.


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

> Then we got permission to do the neighbors and Dave hit a power line when he was digging and knocked the power out of the whole house. LOL Gotta love it. I beginning to see a pattern here.


 


 BOOM!!!!  (Baby) [sm=lol.gif][sm=lol.gif][sm=lol.gif][sm=lol.gif]


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

> ORIGINAL: cordilleran
> 
> Amerindian gaming balls. Common find at campsites. Come in various sizes and generally igneous composition, although fire-hardened clay has also been used to fashion the gaming stones. If blackened, could have been used as cooking stones. Some folks also point to ceremonial uses for these strange orbicular oddities as well. Mill balls tend to be ceramic or steel as they take quite a beating in the mix.


 

 Cord!  Long time....No see,...That would be vr. cool if that's what they are.


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## RICKJJ59W (May 27, 2012)

> ORIGINAL:  JOETHECROW
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 

 Dam ! I forgot to use the tag line [8D]


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## Poison_Us (May 27, 2012)

That really blows.  I have never seen a cobalt beer like that before.....well, before Bud Light Platinum... and of course, plenty of squats, but those were mostly mineral waters.


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## lexdigger (May 27, 2012)

From what I've seen, Texas bottles do really well. I dug a druggist here in Ky from Sherman, Texas. Put it up for auction just to see how it would do, and it ended up bringing Way more than I expected. 

 The clay ball does have the Look of a game stone, but to find THAT MANY in one location suggests otherwise (to me). If they are indeed native american, there should be MANY other artifacts found in association with them. Would have been interesting to actually SEE where they came from and what all else was buried in the ground WITH them. 

 Don't sweat the cobalt... you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs! With that being said, I TRY to never bust THROUGH glass while probing. Especially if the pit has already been located and established.


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## Wheelah23 (May 27, 2012)

Great hutch Joe! I love it. Think of a story about how it made its way to PA... []


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

> ORIGINAL: cacarpetbagger
> 
> I know the feeling.


 
 My god....That bottle is cool Steve,...probe hole or not....I really feel your pain on that one! I'll bet it's sharp cleaned up...Anyone have a pic of another one?


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

> ORIGINAL: Wheelah23
> 
> Great hutch Joe! I love it. Think of a story about how it made its way to PA... []


 

 Connor....Perhaps it started something like this...? Here's a steam boat near Uncertain, Texas....


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Only were able to dig a short time this a.m. ....Didn't turn up too much. Is this a fruit jar lid?


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

cool color.


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## Dugout (May 27, 2012)

I want to see the color better on this lid.


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## Dugout (May 27, 2012)

ooops....PLEASE!


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

Here's some better pics of it...


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## JOETHECROW (May 27, 2012)

*


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## madman (May 27, 2012)

cool finds and story always cool to find a hutch!


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## downeastdigger (May 28, 2012)

Nice post Joe,  how cool to find a rare hutch on you dig.  I'll bet that was the last bottle you expected to find.  If that amber thing is a jar lid, it has to be super valuable. Hard to tell the size etc from that picture.  Nice finds


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## downeastdigger (May 28, 2012)

Joe , could that amber disk be a curtain holder, or whatever they are called?  like one on each side of the window, where they hooked the curtains around them to hold them back?


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## downeastdigger (May 28, 2012)

maybe like this?  (not sure if pic will come through)

 http://www.accesstoretail.com/uploads/partimages/644324_250.jpg


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## JOETHECROW (May 28, 2012)

Hey Bram! Thanks for weighing in and the suggestion too! From the looks of your pic, it most certainly could be, as it's quite attractive and ornamental...I only thought fruit jar due to it being close to the size of a lid..Penn Digger actually exposed it while fighting thru some roots to try and locate a second hole on the property...Fun dug item to puzzle over.


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## RED Matthews (May 28, 2012)

Hi Joe,  I have to agree with the curtain holder.  I have one u-p north (somewhere  - hacwn't seen it for years).  RED M.


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## JOETHECROW (May 28, 2012)

Hi Red! Good to hear from you,...by your comment I figure you're at your "other" pad down in Florida? [] Hope your up and around and feeling better each day....


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## JOETHECROW (May 28, 2012)

Texas hutch is sold.... Thank you everyone!


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## JOETHECROW (May 28, 2012)

oops...too late to edit....Just was thinking that it's going home again, but will probably travel by MUCH different conveyences this time....[]


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## JOETHECROW (Jun 3, 2012)

The Texas hutch is home again....[] I posted it elsewhere but things get buried fast around here....  []


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## kastoo (Jun 4, 2012)

I keep seeing those at the side of the road now...only with updated crown tops.....   




> ORIGINAL:  JOETHECROW
> 
> Thanks for looking everyone....That's about it for tonight..We're going to try and finishÂ digging it outÂ tomorrow....


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