Discovering Buried Treasure

Who doesn't get excited at the thought of discovering buried treasure? Can you imagine the thrill of finding a cache of coins, jewelry, or rare artifacts in a field?

Well, you are not alone. Legends of buried treasure have fascinated us for centuries. From pirate galleons loaded with ‘booty,' to tales of treasure scattered along pioneer trails and times of Cortez.

Many years ago when my father was young man, he was walking in his grandparent's field and kicked something up with his foot. He picked it up and put it in his pocket. He had just come home from the war, married my mother, and they were living with his grandparents on an old farm. He came in from the field and told my mother he had found something he wanted her to look at. Well. At the time they really did not know what they had. They asked around and no one knew of anyone that had lost anything, even his grandparents were puzzled. Some months later, they had a jeweler look at. Turned out it was a horseshoe shaped stickpin with diamonds all around the surface set in gold. It was appraised at over 10,000 dollars. It has stayed in the family and will be passed down to our children and grandchildren. This happened in 1947. There is hardly a memory I do not have of my father's father without that stickpin on. He wore a suit everyday to work and always wore that pin on his tie.

My husband used to hunt for treasure using a metal detector. He has found gold rings, silver, old coins and a few pieces of silver flatware. Whether it is luck like with my father or skill with a metal detector like my husband, the thrill is the same. Once you make a discovery, you will never be the same. You will catch treasure-hunting fever and the more you find, the higher your temperature goes!

There is an incredible amount of still hidden, buried treasure, and relics just waiting to be discovered. Anything from old Civil War bullets, dog tags, bridle rosettes, WWI and WWII dog tags, rare coins, Medieval coins to - my personal favorite - jewelry.

Some tips to ensure a safer, more efficient hunt, are, first of all, never go onto someone's private property without permission to treasure hunt. You might start in your own back yard, and besides it will give you some practice on using your metal detector. Have a good pair of gloves, shovel or trowel, ground cloth and a pouch or something to put your treasures in, knife and some sort of tool for probing.

On July 20, 1985, the renowned treasure hunter, Mel Fisher found over 40 tons of gold and silver that included 100,000 Spanish silver "pieces of eight (coins), emeralds, gold, and over 1000 silver bars. It was a 450 million dollar treasure from the Spanish galleon that sank on September 6, 1622 near Key West, Florida in a hurricane. Every day Mel Fisher would say to himself, "Today's the Day!"

Let today be your day! Start treasure hunting today and who knows, you might discover something in your own back yard!