Look What I found Buried in the Backyard (tubes?)

tryrrthg · May 2005

Yesterday my wife and I were doing some yard work. We found what might be the leftovers of a small garden pond so we thought we'd dig it out and see what was left of it. We'd been digging up rocks and roots all morning when we started finding random things buried in the dirt. Old shoes, marbles, screen from a screen door or window, random metal pieces, I could go on and on. Then we found what looked like a light bulb. I looked at it closer and it looked like a tube. we kept digging and found the thing you see in the pictures below. It looks like tube electronics but I have no idea what. I just want to know who buries old electronics. and I'm really surprised the tubes didn't break!

Anybody have any idea what this thing might have been? I can't find a name plate or anything, everything is too rusty.

The thing on the top in the first picture looks like it fits in the open space on the thing in the bottom.

disneyjoe7 · May 2005

Take a hose to it wash off some dirt, it can't hurt any more.;)

BTW I hate trash people buried in the yard it's disgusting.

tryrrthg · May 2005

Originally posted by disneyjoe7
Take a hose to it wash off some dirt, it can't hurt any more.;)

That picture was taken right after I hosed it off. It's in pretty bad shape (obviously). I just wonder I how long it's been buried.

We kept thinking we were going to find a dead body in there with the shoes and everything.

disneyjoe7 · May 2005

Are you going to find Jimmy Huffer

:eek:

brettw22 · May 2005

Originally posted by disneyjoe7
Are you going to find Jimmy Huffer

:eek:

Um......Hoffa?

avelanchefan · May 2005

No Brett, Huffer was Hoffa's cousin who liked gold paint a little too much!:D

disneyjoe7 · May 2005

Hoffa....

Ok English isn't my forte. :rolleyes:

reeltrouble1 · May 2005

Pretty sure it can be repaired, put it on E-Bay with the story and a super BIN price!!!!!!!!!!!1

janmike · May 2005

Nice time capsule. So much for the environment.

BlueMDPicker · May 2005

It looks like the chassis and tuner section of an old console AM radio.

Back in the "good old days" (and, BTW, I'm old enough to remember them), there was no one to come around and pick up your trash and garbage. You fed the dog your table scraps, threw the coffee grounds outside to cultivate earthworm activity (fish bait), burned everything else, buried what wouldn't burn, and hauled anything with scrap value to the junkyard for pocket change. That sounds pretty "non green" in an age with slightly more interest in recycling and potential hazzards of air pollution. But, at least there weren't mountains of toxin filled trash and non-destructible solids accumulating in landfills.

If you have an abandoned rainwater collection cistern, it can often prove to be an interesting urban archeological dig. When municipal and rural water supplies became more common, the old cistern became the place to toss the non-burnables. I've found a lot of antique bottles, silverware, and tins in old cistern digs. Here's a clutch of "patent medicine" and food extract bottles I found in a cistern on Summit Street, above the Country Club Plaza area of Kansas City, MO:

tryrrthg · May 2005

Originally posted by BlueMDPicker
It looks like the chassis and tuner section of an old console AM radio.

We did find some left overs of a piece of material that said something about tuning into stations, so that's probably what it was. Any idea what the thing that stands up like a tower is, or what it did? (in the first picture at the top)

We did find some neat little bottles that my wife is going to clean up. We just kept hoping we'd find someone's buried stash of cash or something, still plenty of digging to do so maybe we'll get lucky yet.

I should send this off to ebay, some people will buy anything. I should carve a Virgin Mary in it first though.

BlueMDPicker · May 2005

Originally posted by tryrrthg
Any idea what the thing that stands up like a tower is, or what it did? (in the first picture at the top)

It looks like a 3-gang tuning capacitor (sometimes called a condensor) and its shielding chassis. That's what was used to set the input frequency of the desired station. If there is a small, brass pulley on one end of the shaft running through it, that was tied to the tuning knob via a (usually) piece of waxed cord. The 3-gang tuning section indicates the radio probably picked-up shortwave bands as well -- very common in circa 1930's parlor radios.

Yeah, who knows, someone on eBay may want it. I wouldn't hold my breath, though.

tryrrthg · May 2005

Very cool, thanks for the info!

Too bad someone buried it, it would probably be a pretty cool looking piece.

hotwheelman · June 2005

Blue, I have been trying for years to get my grandmother to let me sift the cistern at their 100 plus year old farmhouse to see what treasures are there. She just will not give in as she's worried that I will fall in and kill myself or something. Maybe I can get her to before to long.

BlueMDPicker · June 2005

hotwheelman,

Most rainwater cisterns are not deep (6 feet is the deepest I've ever encountered.) If the cistern on your Grandmother's place is that old, it's probably brick that's been parged with sand and portland cement on the interior. There's a greater danger of the bricks potentially falling on you than you falling in. Just remove the bricks in the top and any that form the vertical sides that look loose, and dive in!

BTW - many old bricks have very cool kiln identifying stamps. Try to save any that do, there are people who actually collect bricks and will pay handsomely for certain ones. If none of the bricks have stampings, they were probably made on site from area clay deposits. But, if the cistern is still intact after 100 years, I suspect the bricks were kiln fired somewhere in the area.

Have fun, if you get permission, and let us know wat treasure you unearth.

Look What I found Buried in the Backyard (tubes?)

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