cannibalfromhannibal
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Well, Saturday I get a call from my newbie apprentice Sean that he probed out a hole but all he had found was some metal and a few tiny specks of pottery. He didn't sound too positive about the hole, but said he wasn't all that deep in it yet. So we set up for the next day around noon to go and see what was going on. We arrived and there looked like a pretty clean clay cap, and the metal looked 1920's or 30's sheet metal. I took a closer look at the metal and decided it could be older, likely toc. I very gently probed the hole from where he had dug it to about 3-4foot using the 4 footer, and just barely touched a use layer about the 7-8 foot level! Nothing in-between! This could be a long dig for nothing, I was thinking, but beats lounging on the couch. Though with 94% humidity and 90 degree heat, I was questioning my thought processes before we started! It was in an old part of the town and was a large (for around here) ovoid stone liner. I decided to get in and dig one of my famous post hole type test holes using only a small 2 foot shovel. It's amazing how deep one can dig this way, esp. if you have good distance from shovel tip-to-armpit! So I digress....so sue me! Ha! I began thinking there must have been just a pocket the probe hit, and suddenly there it was! Poopage on the shovel tip and glass in the hole! Hooray! So we get to gettin' serious about it and start widening out the hole. The heat was now really hitting us hard, even in the normally cool depths of a hole, and my decision making became seriously defective. I decided it a good? idea to open up half the hole to see what was there and then follow the glass. Which usually is ok but as it turned out, most of the use layer ran right under the half we left in place, creating an obvious (usually) hazard. My first thought was, "This side isn't going anywhere, it is pretty solid." Which was correct, for awhile. Problem is, in the heat it was easy to get a bit disoriented and fail to realize how far back under we were getting. So I decided we needed to dig out the side we opened up but there was a boring amount of glass or anything else on that side. It is funny but many privy holes are as if someone came and tipped the entire pit to one side and all the glass slid over there. That's how this one was. Turns out we hit solid clay bottom at 11 foot. We cut back the top of the remaining clay cap a couple feet, but due to the thickness and extreme weight, decided to leave it at that. And there was the problem. Fortunately, I sort of recognized the problem and began digging around from the opposite side and discovered a fraction of use layer that we had been into. After pulling out a couple nuthin' bottles and about to give up on it, the entire side came straight down with a silence that even surprised me! No warning, no nuthin! I was clear of any danger the entire time I was on that side but if I had still be poking at it from the opposite edge, it could have been bad news. So I guess it was a good lesson for both the newbie and the experienced digger to be careful at all times but especially in times when one's thought processes may be affected by other factors like heat, cold, etc. I'm just glad I had enough instinct in reserve to avoid disaster. I am making it sound worse than it probably was, but the simple fact is we all at times underestimate the extreme weight of dirt. Just ask any digger how often he thinks he can move that tarp with so little dirt on it when filling the hole back in and finds he can't budge it? So, on to the finds. Most was toc though at the bottom a smattering of early 1890's stuff. First keeper out of the hole was a Peoria Il. bottle embossed Reid's German Cough & Kidney Cure, with kidney spelled kidndy! Next one was a sample or nipper whiskey embossed Old Kentucky Whiskey with sharply beveled corners. Never seen one like this before. Then a nice cobalt blue Carter's cone ink. There were some local pharms and about a dozen hutch sodas, all but one from the same company. We managed to gitter done and filled in about 6 hours.
