Treasures from Trash

Folks have lived on our Dogcorner property for hundreds of years. As was the custom in those old days, people just shamelessly threw their trash in the woods. Thankfully, my grandparents were the last to add to our huge bottle dump just over the stone wall in the woods. They probably tossed their trash up until the early 50s when our local town dump opened, now called a transfer station. Over the years I have poked in the pile a bit and recycled old jam jars for juice glasses and cool bottles for vases. many people have wanted to dig.

This season we decided to hire someone to mow our lawn. We have a large area to be mowed and the old ride-on John Deere we share with my brother is not really friendly to my back anymore. The woman we hired does an excellent job with a powerful ride-on machine.

She also has an interesting hobby, metal detecting and bottle dump digging. When I showed her our bottle dump pile in the woods, she couldn't wait to dig. She and a friend came to dig here for the second time today. They clean up the interesting finds and return them to the property owners. We have some cool things from her initial digging last month.

The first time she was here she found two enamel motorcycle license plates from 1915. They must have belonged to a previous owner, because my grandparents didn't drive or own a car, let alone a motorbike. My grandparents bought the house in 1928 from the son of the original owner who built it in 1893. In the early 1800s there was another Cape Style shingled house on the property, the owner was a cobbler. I have heard two stories about that dwelling, it was either moved, or burned, but I do have an old photo with the Shoes and Boots Repaired sign.

Today they found more enameled Massachusetts license plates from 1909, and a motorcycle plate from 1920. More cool bottles, a miraculously unbroken old Edison light bulb and a headlamp from a Model T Ford.

I started a new, smaller painting today, T worked hard and Merry ate well. She actually played with one of her toys all by herself, but is still wary and untrusting of us. I hope she will be more like herself when her pain meds finish tomorrow.

For the Record,
This day came in with weak sun and clouds. It was very humid, not my favorite weather.

All hands happy to be vaccinated.