HEY, TV Production Companies! How about a change?

Reality TV has touched on the antiques and collectibles business, but TV production companies are missing a huge market that they should have long since realized exists.

There is obviously a large market for vintage themed reality TV shows such as American Pickers, Storage Wars, and a long list of vintage related shows that are running on assorted networks, not to mention another long list of shows which have come and gone (though some have reached temporary immortality by way of re-runs).

But, we are growing tired of all this "reality"...

Now, it has been established that a substantial market for a vintage themed shows exists, that is obvious.

 But we vintage themed folks also enjoy more than "reality" themed shows. 

We all watch fictional productions, from legal dramas, assorted romantic comedies, other dramas of all sorts, action shows, and on and on...

We are part of the general viewing public, after all.

So, I pose a question to TV production companies out there....

How about a FICTIONAL show about the antiques business? 

Or are we stuck with trying to find and watch reruns of Lovejoy ?

And while we are on the topic of Lovejoy...

Being the writer and general creative sort I am, I have several ideas, including a fairly fleshed out one that is essentially a modernized cross between (now imagine this).....

 Lovejoy and Dexter.  

It would be good my friends, very good...just like the antiques business itself, it would have unique characters galore, twists, turns, shocks, and surprises, not to mention inside information, jokes, etc geared to those in the world of vintage. 


It will be one of those shows where there are times you want to turn away, but just can't.  

So how about it, all you TV execs out there? When do we get our own truly fictional shows?

Future of Collecting - Vintage Tech Hunters

One of the questions on people's minds in the antiques & collectibles biz is what the future holds for the business. 

It is a business that relies on new blood to come to it, and if the same people are the only market, the market gets thin, values plummet. 

Well, change is the way of the world, and changing is what you have to do.

It is adapt or die, really.

One of the areas of collecting that has come in to its own is technology. 

Interest in vintage technology has increased and risen from what could have been considered a niche market for electronics nerds to a mainstream audience.  This rise has been made even more evident by the appearance of a new reality TV show in the marketplace called Vintage Tech Hunters. (Promo reel here)

This Canadian produced show is in the Canadian market (soon to the US market?), and at the time of this blog has had a half dozen episodes aired already. 

The show does keep its premise pretty simple, with hosts Shaun Hatton & Bohus Blahut travelling many miles across the US and Canada searching for vintage tech at flea markets, at garage sales, in old warehouses, etc. 

It is a familiar formula, that seems at first was borrowed from American Pickers. It is far from the first show to utilize a version of the formula, and I doubt is going to be the last, as a successful formula is not something production companies are going to sit and ignore.  It is cut back a little in comparison to American Pickers, resulting in a more streamlined show, which is "lighter" and as a result actually does seem more palatable & appealing in its content to those who are not necessarily into vintage tech.

So, the next time you walk by a vintage video game system, some ancient electric gadget, or that video disc player, think about the money you could well be leaving on the table.

Too Little Too Late - Treasure Found!!

Guess what?

One of the treasures I mentioned in previous blogs has been essentially located...or, rather, there are some researchers/treasure hunters already ahead of me, hot on the trail of the cache.

I mentioned this lead in my posting here.

I can give more details now that there is someone else on the case, and are advanced in their seeking what is literally a mass of over 200 antique weapons, including antique guns, knives, trade axes, etc.!!!

This is a historic find, and literally is a part of Western Canadian History.  Now, due to the location of this find, should I have gone after it and gotten there before the current researchers, I would have been only the finder, not the keeper of this historic weapons find.

Instead of me simply regurgitating information, I suggest you read the article here.

And that is what can happen when you do not follow up your leads in a timely fashion!

Treasure VS Treasure

Treasures.

We all seek them.

As they say, treasure is in the eye of the beholder.

If you don't see an item as treasure, it is not treasure....at least to you.

So, what do you view as treasure?

The Holy Grail?

A childhood toy?

Which would you recognize as treasure?

Would you know the Grail if you did see it in a pile of junk?

Considering no one really knows what the Grail looks like, probably not.

But that toy, laying amongst trash, you would spot it right away.

Maybe lying next to the Grail itself!

The point I am making, if you haven't already figured it out, is that knowledge; the ability to recognize what is "treasure" makes all the difference in succeeding in finding treasure.

Did you know that gold smugglers would melt gold and cast it into day to day utilitarian items?

Horse bits were one of the choices smugglers supposedly used, for example.

In one old treasure magazine I remember reading that a treasure hunter had found what he thought was a gray, painted, cast iron spittoon in an old gold rush town bar...a scratch revealed it was actually solid gold!  A fortune in gold, sitting in plain sight for years!

 Anyway, knowing these bits of information and many more tid bits of information you will learn over the years could be your key to finding true treasure.

If a Picker Quit Pickin', What Would a Picker Do?

What to do.

That is a question that has been on my mind lately. 

Why?

Well, if I couldn't be in this business for some reason or other, what would I do?

How would I make a living?

I would definitely scale down my expenses, which I strive to do as it is. I have higher expenses simply because I am limited as to my selection on places to live, because I need to set up my business somewhere appropriate, somewhere with lots of traffic.

Setting up in some little town in the middle of no-where is not really conducive to long term success, in general.

After the property I am on now is sold, my next location will be visible from #1 highway, pure and simple. The Trans Canada is "the" highway, especially when it comes to the prairie provinces. Traffic going anywhere is likely going to be travelling down the #1.

Thousands of vehicles travel that route daily. It is the busiest thoroughfare in the prairie provinces.

So, establishing a store on #1 is the goal.

But, back to the question, if I couldn't be in this business, what would I do?

I have things I'd like to do.....but what would I do, in the way of making a living?

The scary thing is, I really don't know.

Could I make a living doing the other things I'd like to do?

Perhaps.

I am a writer, so if I had a writing gig of some sort that would actually pay real money, then that is a possibility.

I do have some ideas for screenplays, IE: cable-type shows.

Anyone know of a producer looking for some truly fresh ideas?

What is a picker to do?

Picking Vehicles Over The Years

A picker's vehicle is one of the most important tools he/she has.  These have been my "pickermobiles" over the years.

Late 1980s - early 1990s

(1) late 70s/Early 1980s 4 door Chevette

&

(2) 1980s 4 Door Pontiac Acadian 

(Essentially a Pontiac badged Chevette)

I fit 5 to 6 eight foot banquet tables worth of inventory into this car, and even then the inventory was crammed on my show tables.  

Even managed to haul a 12' long Texaco sign and a gas pump in these cars!

Acadian is shown wrecked after an accident. Walked away from it, luckily, with just bruises...some big bruises, but just bruises.

1990s

Late 1980 Dodge Ram Half Ton

With a cap on the back, this vehicle served me very well. Did lots of picking in this truck. Again, shown as it was, written off by MPIC, after a kid, driving his father's brand new truck, hit it on glare ice....marooning me & my girlfriend at the time in Shoal Lake for the better part of a week!

1980s Ford E150 Van

The first van I bought, and which hooked me on Ford full size vans.

Reliable, durable, but rust prone as they age..... But, "pretty" is not what a picker should be after when it comes to a vehicle!

Had another full size passenger van that I used temporarily inbetween these two.  

2000s

Another late 1980s E150

Put the back mounts of the leaf springs through the rusted out floor by hauling too heavy of scrap metal loads...couldn't close the back doors by the time I took it off the road.

Early 1990s Ford E250

A 3/4 ton van, this one cost me a fair bit in repairs, etc, but overall served me well.

1990s GMC Sierra

Used this as a temporary measure, but the 3/4 size box wasn't very utilitarian. The crew cab was ok for hauling stuff you didn't want to get dusty, but overall the truck was limited as far as using it for serious picking went.

2017-2018

1998 Ford E350

As of this posting, I am using a 1 ton Ford passenger van with the rear passenger seats, carpeted flooring, and assorted plastic interior trim removed. It was what I was able to find when I needed a van. The gutting took a bit of time, but it now serves its purpose. This one is a little more expensive when it comes to repairs, but it handles weight just fine. Has the usual Ford body rust issues, but it will have to do for awhile.   It isn't pretty, but it does the job.

I should note, I owned all these vehicles outright. No leases, bank loans, etc. They also were my "daily drivers", not just my picking vehicles.  

So, what is/was/were your pickermobile(s)?

A Treasure - Currier and Ives Print

Once and awhile you pick an item that makes your heart skip a beat, a real treasure. This garage sale find was one of those.

What was the item?  Only a Currier & Ives hand tinted print, titled AMERICAN EXPRESS TRAIN.

I've since sold the print, so I can only offer you a photo of a photograph I have, as seen below.

It was impressive, being quite large, roughly 3' wide, and it had been matted and framed. The frame was a modern one, with holes drilled in the edges. That does raise a red flag, as it usually indicates it was screwed to the wall of a restaurant or hotel room, and that would scream that it was likely  a reproduction. 

However, this one had all the hallmarks of an original! Plus, add to the fact that many places were decorating with vintage items, and there were plenty of people who fancied themselves to be decorators at the time, who were basically pillaging some attics and using whatever they found  as decor in some restaurants. I have spotted some formerly very good pieces in some of those restaurants....and I say "formerly" because some fool drilled holes through the items, impaled them on lag bolts, etc. It is sad to see what used to be a $500 item reduced to a $25 decor piece...

Anyways, the print in question was well done, and as far as any of the knowledgeable local dealers could tell, it was the "real deal." 

Now I was getting enthused!  

Why? Well, I had been looking through a magazine, and there was an article on that very print....the last one of these that sold at auction not a year before I found mine, had sold in range of $50,000!

So, the next thing I had to do was send it to an auction house, which I did. I seem to recall it was Sotheby's in New York, I believe.

So, I sent it on its way, rolled in a tube, and awaited their assessment.

I was told it was a very high quality piece.....but they would not be interested in consigning it in their auction, as it was also a reproduction.

They sent it back to me....with a bill for professional art packing, amounting to $250 US or so!

So, my initial $15 purchase now totalled a cost of nearly $200.  It was most certain professionally packed, flat, and well protected....but I would have been happier had they sent it back to me in a tube as I had sent it to them.

On the plus side, they appraised it at $500.

In the end, I did sell it on eBay, for $350, as a high quality reproduction.

It was a learning experience, which luckily I basically broke even, between postage, eBay fees, time, etc.

Oh well, can't win them all....but winning one once and awhile would be nice, wouldn't it?

Arsenic and Old Books

We covered Arsenic and wallpaper already, but another source of Arsenic you may come across is in old books. 

Potentially, the green colouration of some of those early books could well be Arsenic based.  Though, more than likely, it is present as "Paris Green", have being applied to prevent insect damage to said books.

The article here will give you some more details.

Containers of Paris Green itself tend to pop up in many places. I have seen more containers of it than I can count, from little tins to gallon pails of the stuff.  Many people whose sheds, basements, barns, etc I have gone through realized this poison was present at all.  "Paris Green" does sound innocuous enough....but the skull and crossbones printed on some of the cans should be warning enough, you'd think.

Anyway, just another little tip to help you stay safe while picking!

Treasures Found! - An Enlightening Experience

In the early 1990s, I was picking one summer afternoon, driving east of Winnipeg, and ended up in the northern Ontario town of Kenora.

I ended up walking into the local hardware store, which still retained it's beautiful, original oak, turn-of-the-century interior, in all its glory.  My mind went to the treasures the building MUST hold...

But, as it turned out, after a good hour of scoping things out, this was not going to be the superb pick I had in my mind when I first walked in.

The aged owners, despite keeping the interior all original, had a prosperous & modern business where they kept a very up to date inventory. All new, fresh shiny inventory graved every inch and area of the place. Nothing of any real age was displayed, aside from a few store fixtures & store displays that were in use, and not a single one would they entertain selling.   It was quite a contrast, the oak cabinetry that lined the walls, and the modern inventory that it showcased. But, it was an old school, working hardware store, and it still held that magic feeling of a place time forgot.

They had made good use of the 3 story building. Even the full basement they turned into retail space for their wares.  However, despite their efforts, it turned out the place still held a few vintage trinkets.....but only on the third floor, in a tiny former storage room, frequented by only by the most curious of customers who bothered to venture up the steep worn staircase. It wasn't be retained as storage.... no, the merchandise in there was on display for sale, also!  They were certainly utilizing every inch of space in that store for inventory display! I did spot an attic door which I never did get to venture through, so who knows what it held...though, it may have been as empty and sparse as the little storage room I was in.

From the little former storage room I purchased some odd items....some NOS jockstraps from the 1970s, a bit of common depression glass, and I even pulled a couple old light bulbs from a crate on the bottom shelf. The crate was chock full of the thick-with-dust, obsolete, delicate glass & brass pieces, each carefully fitted in its own cardboard sleeve. To my surprise, each one I pulled out had a little slip of paper glued to it, with the name of the very hardware store I was standing in. Looking at the darkened brass end, it was apparent there was no way they could be used in today's Edison style sockets. The had a hole in the center, and it was apparent that they screwed onto a rod, and down into a smooth sided socket.

They would make a neat souvenir of that pick, I thought. A quaint souvenir only, because who in the their right mind would want old light bulbs?

So, then time passed....a few years of time.

eBay came into my life in the following years, and out of novelty, I decided to put one of my Victorian light bulb souvenirs up for auction.

When it hit over $140, I realized I needed to make a trip back to that hardware store!

So, I went back, and it turned out the owners had been selling the bulbs as souvenirs of the store at their front counter!

Figuring they were asking much more for them now, and not remembering what the heck I had paid for my initial purchase of them, I casually asked how much they wanted for them...

The price was $2 each!

Keeping a stone face, but jumping inside, I went upstairs and went into the little room. I spotted the crate......Luckily for me, they obviously had been slow sellers, as there looked like there was nary a half dozen more missing from the crate since I had last seen it!

I brought the entire crate down..and when they counted them up, they ended up giving me a bulk purchase discount!

Apparently, I was now in the antique light bulb business....

I sold a few more on eBay, with the price dropping a little each time... as the niche market for this particular light bulb was slowly being saturated by my warehouse find.

Despite being still significant in number, I ended up getting about $65 a bulb from one buyer for the last of them.  You see, it turned out his immaculately restored Victorian home used the very sockets these bulbs fit into!

So, in the end, my $2-a-bulb purchase made me literally "thousands" of dollars!

So, the next time you see some item that you think it neat, but worth little, think again....educate yourself, do some research! Really, on the long list of things you would assume to be treasure, the lowly light bulb is certainly something you would have envisioned to be on that list!

Consider yourself enlightened!

Treasure Leads You Can Find

Been awhile since the last post, and being that I am in Facebook Jail (suspended until 5PM today from posting in any groups) for some unknown reason, I thought it would be a good time to blog.

Anyways, treasure leads are easy enough to find, if you know were to look, and how to go about finding them.

For example, during the fur trade era, to my understanding, every capsized canoe belonging to the HBC of bales of furs and goods was recorded.  (I am not sure about the canoes of other companies, nor independent traders.) Those bales of goods and furs are now sitting in the middle of various rivers. Due to the fast moving water in some of these rivers, the bales are sitting on rocks, as the rushing water tends to clear silt away, and the fur bales are packed thus that they remain intact. 

So, theoretically, if you were to search the HBC archives, as well as archives for the North-West company, as well as do a ton of reading of various true fur trade tales, you may well be able to find the location of those lost bales. 

Some time ago there was a Manitoba University prof who that did just that. He ended up diving for one or some of these bales, and recovered at least one, if I am recalling correctly. 

Imagine finding a bale of trade goods, all of which are highly collectible and worth some good money! Even a bale of furs would be a real find, a solid piece of history you can touch. 

So, what are you waiting for? 

Get researching!

A Canadian Prairie Treasure Lead You Can Pursue!

Was doing some digging online and tripped across this interesting bit of information. If you find the treasure you owe me a case of good beer! 

"In the early 1880’s a stagecoach was robbed and the thief not
caught until the following winter when the stagecoach driver spotted the
man watering his horses through a hole chopped in the river ice just below
Prince Albert. He confessed that he followed the river trail east of Prince
Albert looking for a place to hide his loot and finally buried it under a
boulder at The Forks. Not even he recovered the money because he had
marked the boulder with charcoal and by the time he got out of jail it had allwashed off in the rain." 

He marked the boulder with charcoal? Now that was not a very smart thief....!

Note that the stolen loot was supposedly never recovered. 'The forks' it refers to is where the north and south Saskatchewan meet.

Source:
The Voice of the People: reminisces of Prince Albert Settlement’s early citizens
(1866- 1895). Prince Albert Historical Society. 1985 p.63

Banking on Treasure - Treasure Lead #12

Got a little ahead of myself, with 13 coming before 12....but, here is treasure lead #12! 

Imagine a little town, situated along a river.

A torrential flooding like no other in recent history wipes through the town sweeping buildings and contents in its wake, including the bank.

Yes, the bank....and its contents, including two full safes.

Still lost to this day, likely on the bottom of the river, possibly buried in the banks, or possibly the surrounding field, if the river has moved position due to erosion. 

Time to get out the backhoe!

Guns, Guns, Guns - Treasure Lead #13

Imagine a great battle.

One side wins this particular battle, and seizes all the weapons of the other side.

What to do with these excess weapons?

Dump them in a river.

And the general location of all these now very antique weapons is now known,

So, #13 might be lucky for me, we shall see.

Poison Post

In light of my previous blog on arsenic in wallpaper pigments, I thought I'd do a bit of a post on a few things I come across semi-regularly on picks.  

Tins and boxes of Paris Green - Arsenic

Tins and bottles of Embalming Fluid - Formaldehyde  (Most often found in buildings formerly occupied or still occupied by funeral parlours, but watch out for the stuff in homes of former funeral parlour owners. The stuff can turn up in what seem to be the oddest of places. I picked a general store once whose second floor was the local funeral parlour.)

Tins of Smut Poison - Formaldehyde (farm sheds, barns, farmhouse basements)

DDT and insect poisons containing DDT 

Rat Poison - Thallium, Warfarin

Fire Extinguishers (especially the brass pump ones and glass teardrop shaped ones) - Carbon Tetrachloride

Jugs and bottles of Carbon Tetrachloride (most commonly found in old drug stores, occasionally hardware stores and general stores)

Concentrated acids (sulphuric acid, hydrochloric acid, etc) - Drug Stores commonly had these in their inventory. This is not the watered down stuff you'd use in chemistry class, either.  But, you could well find this sort of thing in old schools/educational institutions that had chemistry courses.

Asbestos - Watch for this pretty much everywhere. Cardboard impregnated with asbestos was used to wrap hot pipes, boilers, furnaces, and all sorts of other things that heated up. Was commonly used in those thin floor tiles you see in many old kitchens.  You will find it in old toasters, waffle makers, irons and other appliances.  My personal experience has taught me that there was literally tons of asbestos used on military bases, for everything from the floor tiles to entire wall panels to exterior cladding.

Paint - potential for lead 

These make up only a small and very basic list of the things I encounter often. There is a ton of other thinners, paints, chemicals, and other hazardous materials I have come across while picking. 

Use your head, and be careful when rummaging around shelves & cabinets of containers. You never know what is in those two bottles you keep banging together, or that tin that just you put your finger through. 

Pick Safe!

Arsenic and Old Wallpaper - Walls of Death

I know, the title sounds like it would be appropriate for a Halloween blog, doesn't it? 

I realize I do mention and even harp on keeping safe when picking far more than most picking related blogs. 

I do it because, frankly, it can be dangerous profession, and the better armed you are with the facts the better you can protect yourself from harm, and live to go picking another day.  I have been lucky, and have learned the hard way to take certain precautions.

One of those precautions is wearing a respirator, not just one of those flimsy white dust masks.  I will admit, I don't wear one of my respirators all the time when picking, but, frankly, I should.

I already have a type of asthma that is triggered by fine dusts, and fibreglass insulation in particular. That is a direct result of my chosen profession, not an inherited malady.

Dusts, seen and unseen can be a problem. You already likely know to be careful of lead paint, but the source of what I am about to reveal may surprise you.

Arsenic dust borne from wallpaper.

If you take a read of this article, you will see this is not just a paranoid thought. 

The fact is that "near the end of the 19th century the American Medical Association estimated that as much as 65% of all wallpaper in the United States contained arsenic."

That leaves pretty high odds for that peeling wallpaper in that old Victorian farmhouse you are picking to be a very dangerous material....and the airborne particles you are breathing in won't be just from mouse/rat droppings, bird droppings, black mould spores and fine topsoil...you can add a lethal poison to the mix. 

Go buy a respirator.

Pick safe! 

A Little Luck Goes A Long Way

For some, treasure hunting comes naturally....or, I should say "by fluke".

Those of you who have been following my blog for years, may recall reading about the Marc Chagall painting, a copy of The Declaration of Independence, and the unpublished works by Beethoven I did a post about back in May 2010.

Then there are the recent discoveries made by accident....

Like the tins of gold coins found by a Californian couple while out walking their dog....

And the 19 amphoras full of Roman coins found in Spain by construction workers digging a trench....

As well as a lost Jackson Pollock painting languishing in a guy's garage....

Plus a 1970s find of a Ferrari that kids found buried in someone's back yard...

And a search for a lost hammer revealed a multi-million dollar Roman hoard...

And an accidental capsizing a kayak made for a discovery of a gold hoard lost since the Boer war.... 

And I could go on and on.

So many treasures are found by people entirely by accident, people not even looking for treasure.

Such finds probably frustrate real treasure hunters, I'd bet. They frustrate me, I know that!

But, you still go on, and chase the treasures you know about. 

What else can you do?

Got to keep the dream alive, working to get ever closer to that treasure!

A Treasure Map Just For You

If you have been paying attention to my blogs, you will remember that I mentioned a treasure just waiting to be found.

$200,000 in gold awaits a lucky treasure hunter, sitting somewhere in south eastern Manitoba.

It is said to be somewhere between St Anne's and Harrison Creek, and under the floorboards of some old cabin.

So, I undertook the task of determining exactly where those two locations are, to narrow down your search. 

Here you go, a bona fide treasure map!

In this case, X does not mark the spot of the treasure...but they do mark the outside perimeter of where the treasure is.

Now, your job is to find the old Dawson Trail, (big hint at that link) and then see if you can find old cabins from the right period along/near the trail. There are roughly only 115 miles worth of trail to search!

Sounds easy enough, no?

When you find the treasure, send me a piece as a souvenir, would ya?

Good luck!

A Real Heavy & Rock Solid Lead - Treasure Lead #11

I know of a barn that was built using stone hammer heads.

And I don't mean the hammers were literally used to pound in the pegs into the wood....

 I mean the heads were used as building materials for PART OF THE BARN!

Turns out the farm site chosen by the settlers was littered with countless stone hammer heads!

 So common and numerous were they on the landscape that they used them as part of the foundations for the barn they built!

Imagine, hundreds of ancient stone hammer heads, used as construction material!

Treasure, Treasure, Treasure Everywhere...

With so many treasures around, you'd think we'd all be getting rich.

However, it takes more than just knowing about leads to things; it means undertaking the work involved to go get treasures, to check out the leads, to follow up on hunches, etc.

And many of those leads, hunches, etc will be dead ends, for one reason or other. 

Disappointment has stymied more than one hopeful treasure hunter.

Cash backing is another aspect that tends to keep people from pursuing their leads, fleshing out the details, etc.   

They say "it takes money to make money," and, frankly, as a general stateme, it is correct.

Treasure hunting is not cheap.

Then comes the potential for others to claim "your" treasure once it has been found.   The folks working at Oak Island may find that items they discover may well be claimed by the Canadian government as archaeological relics.

Treasure hunters finding lost loot from robberies, shipwrecks, etc sometimes discover that there are still open insurance claims on their finds, and corporations will swoop in and lay claim to the  treasure hunter's hard earned treasure.

Some of the items that my leads are for could well be confiscated by government due to their archaeological importance, so how do you monetize your work so it is not all for naught?

These days Reality TV seems to be the way some are doing it.   For full disclosure purposes, note that yes, mongst interviews about picking that I have done for a few production companies, I have been approached by one major media corporation about one of my treasure leads. Went through 3 interviews about it, and got to the point that the "big wigs" liked it, and wanted bios of my "team members".  

But, it has since been put on the back burner. Not off the table, but not exactly active. If I came up with something significant, it may well be brought to a front burner, though.

It was said in not so many words that I pretty much need to find the items first, so that they have a "for sure" scenario of finding the stuff.  I can't afford to undertake this endeavour to those extremems myself without some sort of financial backing that allows me to pay my regular bills, as well as expenses for the hunt.

I have thought of starting a gofundme plea for cash, but I can't see that being all that successful...unless the couple hundred readers of this blog want to each toss in $100? Keep in mind, if found, the treasure would change history as it is written! 

Or are there any wealthy folks out there who want to participate in and fund a treasure hunt?

Hmmm?  I am hearing crickets....

That is usual, however. People really don't wish to take risks, or simply do not have the excess cash to take risks with.  I am not a big talker, and I don't pump things up to get people to open their wallets. I err on the side of caution. More pessimistic, I guess, but I do believe in my leads, but there is always a hitch of some sort in any treasure hunting expedition...that is part of the adventure....some adversity. You just have to work through it, or around it.  That's just the way life works. Nothing in life comes easy, to most of us.

Happy hunting folks!

Modern Buried Treasures - ET and the Boys

Can a treasure really be plastic?

I don't mean pliable or bendable, I mean actually made of PLASTIC.

Well, apparently so.

Plastic is an older material than most people think, but in this case it the treasure is of a newer plastic than you'd think.

You see, in 1983 there was a burial....

Of unsold Atari cartridges.

And in 2014 they were dug up.

Treasure found...in some people's eyes!

A Hand in the Coat - Treasure Lead #10

This lead is a bit on the breakable side...

Glassware...

But not just any glassware....

Champagne glasses belonging to Napoleon.

No nothing to do with Napoleon Dynamite....

These belonged to Napoleon Bonaparte.

These were last seen in the late 1920s in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

My trail on them has gone cold as of the 1970s, as the last living member of the family owning them passed away, leaving no known heirs.

Could them still be floating around Winnipeg? Given away? Or trashed when the estate was cleaned  up?

The photo below is an actual image of the very pieces missing. There was a set of 10 of these, with the provenance being fairly strong. There is a possibility they were commemorative pieces of some sort, but the style matches that of the period exactly.

Imagine, Napoleonic relics in Winnipeg, Manitoba of all places! 

But where could the be now?

Modern Buried Treasure Worth Billions

There is a whole new realm of lost treasure out there.

With crypto currencies making waves in the financial realm, there is digital currency access saved on hard drives across the world.

So, what happens if you forget you have your bitcoin access saved to a hard drive in a computer you decide to get rid of?

Well, this is what happens.

This gentleman tossed a laptop in the trash....unfortunately for him, there was access to 7500 bitcoin....which, at the publication of this blog is worth $136,847,625.00.

He has plans to try and find said laptop, but he has the financial ability to do so, with his own net worth being $80 million. 

Most of us would not be so lucky to have the finances to pursue such an endeavour. 

If he was smart, he might as well purchase that section of the landfill, and literally mine it for other materials while looking for his laptop; he'll at least recoup some of his investment that way.

There are over 4 million bitcoins out of circulation right now....

that translates to $74.76 BILLION dollars.

Here is the breakdown for anyone interested.

This digital age could well be opening up a whole new wild west of treasure hunting.

Pics from a Summer Pick

With the weather being cold and wintery, I figured I'd share some pics from a pick I did this past summer. It was a 2 1/2 story farmhouse, with the top 1/2 story being a walk-up attic.

I have been watching this house for quite some time. When we finally made contact with the owners, who were now ready to sell stuff, the house had been vandalized, and much of the contents rummaged through by thieves. 

They had initially had plans to do some restoration to the house, but vandals and mother nature's wrath (including a tornado taking out a corner of the house as you can partially see in the first photo,) foiled their dreams of doing something with the property.

I had previously scouted the house last year, and spotted a few things of interest, but at the time didn't have the time and cash on hand to purchase what I had wanted.  Sadly, some of the other things of interest also had disappeared by the time I got back to it this summer.

The large attic was the first stop, but the few things I remembered were there last year were in worse shape than I recalled, and a some were missing. 

 Access to the roof. There were lightning rods on the roof, but they were a common type, and the ladder up there was sketchy, to say the least. The roof itself was far from sturdy, also. Not worth risking my life for!

Sitting room view. Once a grand old house.

Kitchen

A small part of the basement. 

The basement still held a prize I had spotted the year before, this jam cupboard, with a great crackled finish. 

I bought a few other knick knacks, but the cupboard was the main purchase. The house still has some architectural bits in it I may be going back for, and some rougher things that are essentially parts, or upcycling inspiration, but that is about it. This home had previously had a full attic of antiques, but thieves had plundered it heavily prior to the current owners obtaining the property.

It is too bad the home has been looted and destroyed, but has become a fact of life in this world where respect for private property means little to some people.

Treasure - In The Eye Of The Beholder - Taking a Shot

One of the things people don't realize is that treasure, like many things, is most certainly in the eye of the beholder.

A particularly rare pinball machine ($125,000) could be treasure to one person, while a trashed car recovered from the bottom of a lake ($500,000) could be another's idea of treasure.

I generally have spent many of my days looking for treasure, and most certainly more time than the average person. I just haven't come across treasures valued in those six and seven figure ranges!

That is what I hope for, of course, but those tend to be once in a lifetime finds...if you ever find something of that sort of value.

Who knows, maybe I already own something of that sort of value, but just have not figured it out yet!

I have found things that over time have garnered me five figure amounts.

Take for example these little guys:

They are just what they look like, red, wood, bullets.

These were used in 90% of the cap gun holsters in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.

So why do I consider these treasure?

Supply and demand.

At the time I found them...oh, and wait, I forgot to mention.....I found 10 cases of these, with 1600 in each case. 

Anyway, at the time I found them, there was pretty much no supply available to collectors....

So, they sold like hot cakes.

First I sold them for $7 a dozen, then $25 a dozen, and even auctioned some off that went for upwards to $65 for two dozen.

It took a few years of sporadic selling, but it got to the point where I am pretty much sold out, save for a handful I kept as a remembrance of the find.

It still may not seem like much...until you do some math...

10 cases x 1600 per case = 16000

16000 / 12 (lots of dozen) = 1333.33

1333.33 x $25.00 per dozen (average sales price) = $33,333.25

My initial cost was $100 + taxes for all 10 cases, $10 a case.

Not too shabby for a bunch of little red bullets now, is it?

A Jumbo Type Treasure - Treasure Lead #9

This is one big treasure lead!

And I mean huge!

As big as an elephant...!

Well, actually, it IS an elephant.

Let me explain...

I got a lead on an unusual burial in Manitoba.

You see, in short, there was once a circus, and one of their elephants collided with a locomotive....and the elephant didn't make it.

And no, this is not the story of Jumbo himself...it is one of his pachyderm circus cousins who perished here in Manitoba. (Jumbo died in Ontario.)

Not sure what it with locomotives and elephants, but it seems Jumbo was not the only one who tangled with a steam locomotive here in Canada.

Anyway, this may be more of an oddity than a treasure, but it could be worth going after. 

No idea if it had tusks or not, which would have value as ivory.

One positive thing is that I believe I have narrowed down it's location. 

I figure they probably covered it in lime before burial. 

And I have located an elephant size "dead spot" in brush near where the incident occurred. 

Got a big shovel? 

Little Mysteries - Eye Spy

Picked up this photo some time ago, and it has been kicking around ever since.

What intrigues me a bit is the fact it has the words "American Spy" written across the top of it.

I'd had preferred that it said "American Outlaw" and in that there would be more chance of finding out the identity of the man.

The writing was done in ballpoint pen, so it was obviously long after the photo was taken, probably a generation or two....right?

Not so fast. Turns out the ball point pen was actually invented in 1888, and versions were in use in the early 20th century.

But, the mystery still remains as to who this guy is, and why would anyone bother to write "American Spy" on the photo in the first place?

Treasure Leads - The Cons

There should be a common thread you have noticed with all the treasure leads I have presented to you.

You hadn't already heard of them....

Or at least most of them. 

If you had heard of them, it could have been from myself, or you got a vague mention of the stories that accompany them. 

None of them are well known, unlike 1000s of other leads out there, which can be found in various books, magazines, YouTube, etc. 

I could easily present some of those more obscure ones to you as my own, and you would likely be none the wiser, unless you decide to spend an hour on Google digging into them. I prefer to be straight, on the up and up about the leads I have, and that they are unique and relatively unknown. It does add to the mystique of them, as well, no?

Plus, mine are all basically here in Manitoba, my home province. Manitoba really is under rated for treasure hunting, and has some fascinating history that is largely ignored.

One incident that falls into the category of lost treasure waiting to be found is about $380,000 worth of gold on the Dawson Trail in 1868, here in Manitoba. At the time the shipment was worth $10,000, and was the payroll for soldiers at Fort Garry.

It is not very well known, and there has been no well publicized searches for it, to my knowledge.  But, it is something that appears often enough in the public eye, and information on it is available to the general public. 

You can chase it, if it has not already been quietly found and has made someone moderately wealthy.

I believe that given time and money, most of these treasures I have listed can be found.

However, money is not always in ready supply.   

Some of the leads require heavy equipment, special permissions, significant travel, specialized skill sets, among other factors.

Some will require luck, and much time.

Others require combinations of the above. 

None of them are cheap ventures. If it is not money being spent, it is time....and, as the old adage says time is money.

I have worked on a few of these leads more than the others.  The most work has been done on the Mad Trapper case, with the Norse leads coming in a close second.

I'd love to get the railway china, which could be profitable. However, I do not scuba dive.  But, a miniature sub might work. Anyone have one handy?   If I had some sort of TV backing, I know of a company who might actually provide the use of one, in exchange for the publicity.

Digging up the locomotive would be cool, just for shits and giggles and to say I had done it.....but really,  the market for a rusty locomotive is pretty limited. I do have a couple homes for it in mind, but they are both museums, and their pockets are not going to be deep. A donation is more a museum's thing. Would be worth a pretty penny just in weight for scrap, but it is unlikely even that will outweigh the costs of going after it.  Corporate sponsorship by one particular company might be the way to go, but to get it, I'd want to have the site 100% determined, and evidence of the same to present to them.

The dugout canoe would be a significant archaeological find, but going after it could require some heavy equipment, and getting that equipment to the site would be quite the feat all on its own itself.

The James brother's artifacts would be a cool Canadian/American history crossover, but the trail is quite cold.

The airplane engines are not a 100% for sure, though I am sure other artifacts would be found that would make the dig worthwhile. There is a wild card in this lead, which is something I have not mentioned. You see, some of the materials put into the landfill site could be of a dangerous nature (IE: hazardous chemicals, potential for explosive ordnance).  I know there would be support for this venture from at least one source, but it would be support by way of knowledge and connections, not financial.


The lead most realistically to get worked on (or finished) this year, considering my current financial and time situation is the Mad Trapper case.

This one requires time, though there are a few things I'd like to do that would require travel time and cash.  There is a site he may have been, at which there will be spent ammunition, and I would like to obtain that spent ammunition. If they are 45 casings, I would also locate the one of the spent 45 shells he left behind in his battle with the RCMP and posse at his cabin. I could them compare the two to see if the Manitoba site is one he definitely was at.  Could be a neat metal detecting outing for sure! 


So, what leads shall I follow up in the New Year?   

Any wealthy benefactors or Television production companies out there that want to back a treasure hunt or 3?