AOPA Pilot Magazine - October 2021 - 67

sort of hooked him up with Eads, whom
I knew to have a passion for Civil War
history. Eads in turn introduced metal
detecting to his wife, Sherri, who has taken
to the hunt with even more passion than
the two Chrises.
" It humbles you. You realize you
are just a tiny spec in the big picture of
life. Flying and metal detecting make
me think about life. How other people
lived before us, how the sky makes me
feel small, but I see so much of the world.
It's a great escape and it regrounds us, "
said Sherri.
in 1958 who used a metal detector to map
the site of the Battle of the Little Bighorn.
My brother begged my parents for one in
the 1970s, and he embarrassed me on the
beach for several summers but found lots
of coins with which to play pinball.
So what are my seemingly not-embarrassing
colleagues doing out here in the
hot sun, black flies buzzing around their
heads, and snakes surely only inches away
(this, of course, is an idle threat presumably
but I hate snakes and can imagine
them anywhere, especially outside). I
watch my friends as they spread out across
Coins and buttons from a bygone era are
some of the classic finds when metal
detecting, especially in areas in the
mid-Atlantic where battlefields, farmhouse
foundations, and other historic areas can hide
treasure. Chris Eads pilots the 172, Chris Rose
steals Eads' wife Sherri's usual place in the
co-pilot's seat (she's smiling from the back).
Various finds-including the " Hooker's Heel "
(bottom left). Rose detects along the river.
And here I only thought of metal
detecting as that weird thing my teenage
brother did at the beach or what old men
in black socks and sandals did when they
retired.
Metal detectors have an odd history-the
first metal detector was used
to find and remove bullets from people.
Alexander Graham Bell is said to have
tried to use a metal detector to find the
bullet in President James A. Garfield when
he was shot by an assassin in 1881. Didn't
work. During World War II, metal detectors
were used to find land mines. The
patent for a portable metal detector was
awarded to Gerhard Fisher in 1925 and the
first historian to use one was Don Rickey
a newly planted soybean field, delicately
sidestepping the new growth, swinging
their detectors across the ground, heads
down, until one hears that chirping sound,
and cries, " I have something! "
Digging up history
Rose has found coins, buttons, and bullets.
His most remarkable find is a Roman coin
he was able to determine was more than
800 years old. Sherri found a 1774 King
George coin, and Eads is most proud of a
Civil War eagle breastplate from a soldier's
uniform. " The brass plate on their cartridge
sash was shiny and gold-a perfect
target. So many soldiers tore them off their
uniform. I found it in a neighbor's yard. "
The couple keep their finds on the
counter in their kitchen. They have three
jars of finds: the Bucket of Shame (beer
can tabs and other items not very treasurable);
the Bucket of Huh? (items that
appear to have worth but that they have
been unable to identify); and the Bucket
of Know (the good stuff). An odd-shaped
metal piece Sherri found in Tennessee
and threw in the Bucket of Huh? revealed
itself on a YouTube show. What Sherri
thought might have been a piece from
a horse bridle is a " Hooker's Heel. " The
piece has a heart carved in the middle. It's
a " Hooker's Heel " because a woman in the
nineteenth century would have affixed it
to the heel of her shoe and as she walked,
AOPA PILOT / October 2021
67
AOPA Pilot Magazine - October 2021

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