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River Artifacts-- Cleaning the river bottom

6K views 22 replies 19 participants last post by  threeats407 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
Just curious if anybody ever came across some any pre-pioneer artifacts, stone implements, chipping stations? Yea me either, but more than a few universities have been through my neck of the woods in my lifetime digging up all kinds of goodies. I am a sucker for any type of local history even if its only a few decades before my time. I've been cleaning oil drums, garbage cans, recycling bins, halloween/ christmas decor and all types of garbage from my stretch of river throughout my life time. Only cool things I have come across are old dairy bottles, horseshoes, and a few iron and rusted farm tools. Turns out the bottles I have been collecting are worth the most. People are really into this stuff. I plan on selling not collecting. But it just amazes me these things could sit on the river bottom for almost a century with out breaking or being lost for good.
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#3 ·
Nice finds and nice post. I haven't really paid attention to the small stuff in the water because, let's be frank, it tends to blend into the rest of the trash that can't really be called artifacts.

What I do tend to note is old structures or clues that there used to be something there. There are a few neat finds near the isle a la cache and old lemont road. I tend to find these things in other forests as well. There is an old brick foundation buried in the woods between 95th and Archer (near maple lake) that can be found if you stray from a few of the trails.
 
#5 ·
I found a small revolver in the Fox that was so corroded it broke in half when I tried to knock a clump of rust off on a tree, never found anything cool like those bottles though. Thanks for sharing, next time I step on a bottle in the river I am going to check it instead of just assuming it s a Bud Light 12-oz.
 
#7 ·
I actually pulled out a styrofoam skull that was half submerged, it really looked like a crime at first because you are not thinking Halloween in the middle of May. The bottles were definetly filled with algae and crawfish, SOS works the best. Was amazing how much info there is on old bottles and old dairys on the net.
BrookfieldAngler said:
What I do tend to note is old structures or clues that there used to be something there. There are a few neat finds near the isle a la cache and old lemont road. I tend to find these things in other forests as well. There is an old brick foundation buried in the woods between 95th and Archer (near maple lake) that can be found if you stray from a few of the trails.
I stayed up late one night watching WTTW ch 11, "Chicago Tonight" was on and that Geoffery Baer guy was on taking phone calls from viewers about local history myths or questionable structures in odd places and stuff like that. Some guy called in about Schiller Woods, where theres a section of old lanes(now covered in vegetation), old foundations, sewers and abandoned wells in the middle of nowhere. I always wondered about it myself, I was freaking out that they actually explained all the history of it on t.v.. While the woman cried "what a geek" at me. :oops:
Navy- I keep thinking I'll run into some weapons, at least a butcher knife, just a lot of spoons under the bridges. :shock: "Under the bridge downtown... is where i drew some blood"
 
#8 ·
I found an old soda bottle in the Fox just last week. Stuff was called "tru ade"...little bit of research on it and I think it's from the 40's or 50's. Not really worth anything, but kinda cool all the same. a quick search around the area and I found a half dozen more bottles, but nothing else interesting. With the rivers being so low I imagine If you were inclined, you could find all kinds of stuff.
 
#10 ·
I've never found anything cool like your bottles.

I have always been amazed at the amount of old pop tabs I see on the Fox.

I saw I guy a while ago looking for atirfacts such as arrowheads. Low water is a good time to look.
 
#11 ·
Juicebox20002 said:
Those are pretty sweet bottles, how did you find em? closer to the shore edge or in the water? ?
A little of of both, the clarity in the river is usually better in the winter, but this year with the lack of rain, clarity has been pretty good all summer as well. Most were up on sand bars or gravel bars and easy to spot. Usually its about 1/3 of a bottle sticking out through the mud, sometimes its a whole bottle in a good shape, other times is just a big piece of broken bottle.
 
#14 ·
Just plucked a 'Rawleigh's' bottle out of stream. That and molded in 'bottlemadeinusa' are only inscriptions.

One of the popular drinking water lakes here has a bunch of farmer filled ravines from before it was a lake.
Drought conditions make for good pickings. Pepsi bottles and a few coke one . Coke bottles don't survive like pepsi ones.
 
#15 ·
there are alot of places along the DPR where homes were years ago. most are old farm homes and usually there will be an area near the foundation where they would dump all the garbage...no garbage men back when. there is one just north of the Des Plaines casino on the west side of the river. LOTS of broken glass and old bottles as well as old metal containers.
 
#16 ·
With the removal of the big dam in riverside, the low water above the dam is bringing out the bottle enthusiasts...not just the drunken ones but those looking for old bottles. A yaker had a whole bunch of old bottles that surfaced once the water receded.
 
#19 ·
Years ago, my brother found what looked like a two-pronged fork (shiny) attached to a spiral metal handle (corroded) burried in the river bank mud. It was about 18" long. I'm pretty sure he foumd it near 47th and Harlem. Not sure how old it is, but I came across a picture of one just like it, in an old cookbook of colonial recipes.
As far as old bottles, we would find all sorts of them burried in the ground where the Midway Orange-line Station currently sits. SUPER COOL playground before they built it all up!
 
#21 ·
Crazy stuff in the DPR!
Anybody else encounter large numbers of range golf balls?
Here's a pic of an inhabited bowling ball my son and I found last year under a bridge near Dam 1 I think.
Usually there's a small group of treasure hunters with metal detectors at Dam 1. I talked to them a couple times. They said when Dam 1 was up people used to use the area as a swimming hole and they find old coins and jewelry.
 

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#23 ·
joetrain said:
In the past I had seen mass amounts of golf balls near Oakton St.

~JOE~
Thousands! Often wondered if they were worth anything. Could fill a five gallon bucket in 15 minutes. Stranger is just south of Central you can see grave markers in the water. Just north of Central there is a foundation on the convent property that I have always wondered about. It's only yards from the river almost as if there was a bridge there once but I never checked the opposite bank for same.
 
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