Redding Relic Hunter - Metal Detectorist

06/19/2026

I really enjoy getting out with my metal detector and trying to identify the things I dig up. The challenge, of course, is figuring out what to do with everything afterward — especially when you live in a small house without much room to store or display it. I like to keep the coins, jewelry, and the more interesting relics, but I’ve also accumulated a growing pile of horseshoes, horseshoe fragments, ox shoes, miscellaneous iron pieces, nails, and even some old glass bottles that tend to show up alongside the metal finds.

I reached out to the Redding Historical Society to see if they might be interested in any of it, but I never heard back. Since a lot of these items are farm‑related, I’ve also considered asking the Grange if they’d want anything for display. I know I could haul the scrap to a metal recycling center, but that feels like a waste considering the age of some of these pieces and the time spent recovering them.

Another idea is to offer the items to local Redding craftspeople who could turn them into something new — cleaned‑up horseshoes mounted on plaques, small art pieces, or whatever their creativity leads them to. The only thing I’d ask in return is a photo of the finished piece.

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06/19/2026

Nails and Screws - As a metal detectorist, I have a love‑hate relationship with them. On a bad day, they feel like the universe’s way of punishing me, endless iron signals, bent bits of nothing, the kind of junk that fills your pouch and tests your patience. But over time, I’ve learned that these little pieces of metal are more than trash. They’re clues. They’re breadcrumbs. They’re the fingerprints of whatever once stood, worked, or lived on that ground.

When I dig a nail, I don’t just toss it aside. I study it. The material, the shape of the head, the length, the taper, whether it’s straight or bent, hand‑forged or machine‑made. Every detail tells me something. Even the quantity matters. One nail is nothing. Ten nails, especially of the same type, in a tight cluster? That’s a story.

From these details, I can usually estimate the nail’s age and purpose. And once I know that I can start reconstructing the past in my head. It’s not an exact science; it’s more like archaeology mixed with intuition, but it’s surprisingly effective.

Take horseshoe nails. They’re usually short, slightly curved, and often have their tips filed off. If they’re iron with a rectangular head, they can be quite old, sometimes older than the trees standing above them. Finding one deep in the woods is a quiet revelation: these woods weren’t always woods. They might have been pasture, a wagon path, or a farm field long before the forest reclaimed the land.

If I start finding a concentration of horseshoe nails in a small area, that’s a different signal entirely. That suggests a stable or a hitching point — a place where horses were repeatedly worked, shoed, or tied. And where there was a stable, there was almost always a homesite, a barn, or a working farmstead nearby. Nails become a map. They point you toward the human activity that left them behind.

Square nails, cut nails, wire nails, each type marks a different era of construction. A scatter of hand‑forged square nails might indicate an 18th‑century structure. A mix of cut nails and early screws might point to a 19th‑century renovation. Modern wire nails? That’s 20th century and usually not worth chasing unless the site has other promise.

Even bent nails tell a story. A pile of bent, discarded nails can mark a work area — a place where boards were pulled apart, a structure was dismantled, or repairs were made. A burned nail, oxidized in a particular way, might indicate a fire. A cluster of nails with charcoal in the soil can reveal a building that burned down long before anyone alive remembers it existed.

Metal detecting isn’t just swinging a coil and hoping for silver. It’s observation. It’s pattern recognition. It’s making educated guesses based on tiny details that most people would never notice. Nails and screws may not be glamorous finds, but they’re often the first hints that you’re standing on forgotten history, and in the right place.

For now this post is mostly a placeholder. I plan to return and add photos of different types of nails and screws, along with what each style can reveal about a site’s age, purpose, and past life.

06/16/2026

An offshoot of my metal‑detecting hobby is a growing interest in Redding history. One part of that history that really captured my imagination is Brookside Park, the old railroad amusement park that once stood where the West Redding Post Office is today. The railroad built it as a summer destination to draw visitors out of the city — a place where people could cool off, hear a concert, dance in the pavilion, fish, swim, and stroll past fountains and a goldfish pond, all while generating revenue from train fares. Brookside Park is also tied to one of Redding’s most dramatic episodes: the robbery of Samuel Clemens’ estate. During the chase, a firearm was discharged at the old West Redding train station as deputies tried to apprehend the thieves, and one of them fled into Brookside Park, hiding under the bridge that once crossed the Saugatuck before he was finally caught. Today, the entrance arch pillars, the bridge abutment, and even the fountain bases are still there if you know where to look. I’ve been using AI to digitally recreate the park and build a virtual walk‑through, but with only two known photos of the original park and an in-person exploration, much of the reconstruction comes from research, deduction, and imagination. This was one of my early attempts — there are more on my Brookside Park page ==> https://www.facebook.com/groups/brooksidepark

06/16/2026

06/14/2026

A lot of people get into metal detecting thinking it’s easy to find interesting or valuable items. The truth is, it’s neither easy nor exact. You will dig a tremendous amount of trash, and many beginners simply don’t have the patience to sift through the junk long enough to uncover the occasional treasure. The hobby demands persistence, realistic expectations, and a willingness to be discouraged more than once.

A high‑end detector can help by giving better clues about what might be worth digging, but even the best machines can’t eliminate uncertainty. There’s far more to success than just buying expensive gear. That’s why, before making a sizable investment, it’s smart to rent a detector or borrow one from a local library (many now offer them) to see if the hobby truly fits you.

It’s also important to understand that a new detector loses value the moment you open the box — much like a new car driven off the lot. A large part of a detector’s value is its warranty, and if you decide the hobby isn’t for you, you’ll almost certainly take a loss when reselling. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of barely‑used detectors sitting on Facebook Marketplace and eBay for months or even years.

On the flip side, if you’re committed to the hobby, buying used can be a smart move — especially if the detector still has significant warranty time left and the seller isn’t asking new‑price money for used equipment.

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06/10/2026

What do I do with free time when I don't have current permission to detect? It should be obvious, I play with AI. I asked AI to use the latest scientific knowledge to design the ultimate metal detector, and it came up with the Quantum Resonance Metal Imaging (QRMI) detector. It sort of sounds like the Flux Capacitor from Back To The Future. It is a conceptual next-generation metal detector that combines advanced multifrequency metal detection, ultra-wideband radar, artificial intelligence, and potentially quantum magnetometry to create a three-dimensional image of buried objects and estimate what they are before digging. While the fully realized version shown in the concept image is beyond current consumer technology, a simplified version could be built today using existing components such as a high-end multifrequency detector, compact ground-penetrating radar, AI processing, and GPS mapping. A prototype of such a system would likely cost between $20,000 and $50,000 to develop, with an eventual commercial version selling for approximately $5,000 to $10,000. Adding true quantum magnetometer technology would increase costs substantially, with research prototypes ranging from $100,000 to $500,000 and commercial units potentially costing $20,000 to $50,000. The ultimate QRMI system—capable of accurately determining an object's shape, depth, composition, and likely identity in real time—would require technology that currently exists only in specialized scientific and military applications and could cost anywhere from $250,000 to more than $1 million today and fit on the back of a truck. As the technology matures, however, future consumer versions could eventually become available in the $2,500 to $4,000 range, potentially representing one of the most significant advances in metal detecting since the introduction of simultaneous multifrequency detectors.
In simple terms, quantum magnetometry is a technology that measures extremely tiny magnetic fields using the strange properties of atoms and quantum physics. Every metal object affects the Earth's magnetic field just a little bit. Iron objects create stronger disturbances, but even non-ferrous metals like gold, silver, and copper can sometimes be detected indirectly through their effects on electromagnetic fields. A quantum magnetometer contains a cloud of atoms—often rubidium or cesium atoms—that are illuminated by lasers. These atoms act like billions of microscopic compass needles. When a magnetic field changes, the atoms respond measurably. By monitoring the atoms with lasers and sensors, the device can detect magnetic field changes millions of times smaller than what a conventional compass could detect. It sounds like a job for my former employer ASML / Cymer. They are experts with lasers and miniaturization. If quantum computing becomes a practical reality, ASML and its subsidiary Cymer will have to evolve from a company that builds equipment for traditional chip manufacturing and advanced defense technologies to one that aligns its innovation and business model with quantum computing in order to survive. Both Quantum computing and quantum sensing (like quantum magnetometry) are based on the same core idea: you directly control and measure quantum states of matter instead of classical signals. ASML / Cymer would probably need the help of atomic physics labs, quantum sensing startups, and defense/exploration groups to make it a reality, though. If you’ve taken the time to read this, thank you for letting me indulge in this little flight of fancy.

06/10/2026

Four coins. Standard Jefferson nickels — 1952, 1961, 1975, and 1981. I got these back in my change from a vending machine at a laundromat. They are older and in way better shape than many of the coins I find in Connecticut soil with my metal detector. Why do I value the corroded and pitted coins I find with my metal detector so much more? You probably think I am a moron; maybe you are right. The coins I dig out of the ground carry a story, and the ones from the vending machine don’t. A coin from a vending machine is just money. A coin from the ground is a relic, and I earned it. It’s not about numismatic value. It’s about discovery value—and that’s the kind of value only a relic hunter understands. In some cases, that coin has not seen the light of day in decades, or a century or more, and I am the first human to hold it in my hand since it was lost. And I wonder about the person who lost it. Metal detectorists love finding coins because there is no question about how old they are. The year is stamped right on the front. The biggest thrill is finding a coin that reaches back in time way beyond your existence.

And here’s the sad part: with today’s electronic payments, tap‑to‑pay, and digital wallets, fewer coins are being dropped, lost, or forgotten in the ground. Future detectorists won’t have the same steady stream of pocket change sinking into the soil. The relics we’re finding now may be the last generation of true “lost money” waiting to be rediscovered. That makes every dug coin—no matter how ugly—feel even more meaningful. It’ll be a heartbreaking moment when a detectorist unearths the very last lost coin—when that familiar thrill of hearing a clean signal, cutting a plug, and revealing a piece of forgotten pocket change simply disappears. The day cash finally fades and digital payments take over, the ground will stop collecting those accidental time capsules. And when that happens, a whole chapter of discovery—the simple magic of finding a coin that someone dropped generations ago—will quietly come to an end.

06/10/2026

Minelab's Metal Detecting Competition

$250,000 in prizes. Free to enter.Join Race to the Realm and comp...

06/09/2026

The Pardue brothers, John and James, grew up in what seemed like a privileged Westport household, but beneath that respectable exterior was a long pattern of violence that shaped their descent into one of Connecticut’s most disturbing crime sprees. Raised in a home where fi****ms and aggression were routine—John was known to shoot at ducks in a pond and even at his own father, who himself had once fired shots at their mother—the brothers evolved into highly intelligent yet deeply unstable young men who embarked on a multi‑state series of robberies and murders between 1968 and 1970. Their crimes included bank robberies in Lewisboro, New York; Union, Missouri; and several in Connecticut, most notably in Georgetown and Redding. After two accomplices helped them rob the Georgetown bank, the brothers murdered both men, disposing of their bodies in remote areas of Redding and Kent. Their violence escalated further when they killed their own father and grandmother, eliminating anyone who might expose them. Their most infamous act came in February 1970, when they detonated multiple bombs across Danbury—including one at or near the police station—to divert law enforcement before robbing the Union Savings Bank on Main Street and escaping amid the chaos. The bombings caused widespread panic and injuries, marking one of the boldest criminal acts the region had ever seen. Eventually, coordinated police work and witness accounts led to their capture, ending a spree that left behind a trail of terror across western Connecticut. Over the years, the story has taken on a layer of folklore, especially in the towns they haunted; a former neighbor once told me the local rumor that some of the stolen money was stashed somewhere in Devil’s Den, adding a treasure‑hunting mystique to an already dark chapter of local history. Interest in the case has grown again recently, and a documentary is currently being made about the Pardue brothers, bringing renewed attention to a story that many residents never knew unfolded in their own backyard.

This is "The Pardue Brothers: A True Crime Documentary - (Seed & Spark)" by Blazur Films on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.