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October, 2007 We decided to visit Covington again, to check out a little community garden plot that occupied two lots in a good old section of town. Although we had permission, we were without a key to the lock. This required some under gate crawling, and some over gate tool flinging. Once in, we went right to probing. I was able to locate a pit in short order, but I had trouble finding the walls. We cracked it open for a test hole and found it was a HUGE rectangular stone lined box. We decided it must have been some kind of filled in cellar hole, as it was 12 by 15 feet, and only 7 feet deep. It also probed to have no glass. We probed some more but to no avail. A few doors up, and right next to the place where last time we dug the pit full of pontiled sodas, was a lonely little vacant. It had a 6 foot high chain link fence blocking access from all sides. As we were standing there eyeballing it with our fingers looped through the fence, a feller walking up the alley with a weed-eater stopped and said, "excuse me". He whipped out a set of keys and began to unlock the gate into the backyard. Wow ! This was some TIMING ! As it turns out, this guy cut grass in the neighborhood. The fact that he only used a weed eater to accomplish this bears testimony to just how small these back yards really were. We struck up a conversation and explained what we were doing. He was a down to earth kind of guy, and half reluctantly agreed to let us come in and dig, as soon as he was finished cutting the grass, which took him 5 minutes.
While he was weed eating, he must have had some second thoughts, as when he turned the machine off, he said, "I don't know guys, I been thinking"... I knew I could not let him finish his sentence or even his thought. I knew what was going to pop out of his mouth, so I interrupted him and took the brakes off my own big mouth. "I swear to GOD", I started, in a slow, half whispered tone, "that we are good folks and would NEVER do you wrong". "We WILL fill in this hole like we were never even here, and PROMISE we will lock the gate when we leave". "You have absolutely NOTHING to worry about, and you are an EXCELLENT guy for letting us do this". "Whatuya-say" ? The big pause... "Well... all right I guess..., just fill it in real good and lock up when you leave". I saw him off down the alley until we were both off the site proper. I left him with a smile and a pat on the back at a place where we could put our backs to each other and move in opposite directions. Now all we had to do was dig and refill a giant hole. The pit was located immediately in the hidden corner of the yard, and we started flingin'. It was a woodliner, so we didn't even probe for anymore pits, content in the fact that the woodies in this neighborhood were the oldest of the pits. There was a layer of jumbled bricks, followed by a stiff layer of clay at about 3 feet which we had to spud bar through. Under the clay was lots of coal ash and cinder. There seems to be cinder-ash in many of the pits in this neighborhood, so like any good dork, I began to sing, "Return to cinder" in my Elvis voice.
At 7 feet or so, we hit our first sign, and it was good, being red ware and yellow ware shards. Soon a pontiled base or three popped out, stoking up our own coal fire of glassy desire. Soon we were into a pocket filled with glass, and everything was smashed to fairly small pieces. It was looking like it had been dipped. In the corner of congested tinkle and shine, a flash of cobalt gleamed out in the mid day sunshine. It was readily jerked out of the fluff and spun around to reveal the embossing "David Baker". "CRAP, a broken root beer" I moaned. More pieces of it were flipped out of the seeds, and a topside reconstruction process was initiated. An intact, pontiled, "essence of Peppermint by royal patent" was found and tossed up, along with a small hair dye. Too soon, the pocket of glass waned, and a new position of glassy goodness was located in a different corner of the pit. This pocket of glass was likewise smashed up pretty good, and a brief moment of chest aching despair was once again relived by the finding of the bottom half of a dark, moss green historical flask with an unusual Eagle on one side and a cornucopia on the other. The rest of the flask simply was not in the hole, as we filtered for it with the utmost persistence, to no good end.
Finding the bottom of a privy pit is like witnessing the end of an eclipse. Suddenly, it's just over, and you immediately begin forgetting what it was even like. There is nothing left to hope for, and plenty of work still to do.
We began and finished that work in a goodly amount of time, and as promised, we did an excellent job of restoring the yard. Mike and I started probing, and each of us found another pit. Mike had a stone liner in the other corner, and I, another woody right in the middle. Suddenly, hope blooms again, and cheerfulness once more permeates the atmosphere. Since we have permission..., we have permission..., right ? We had to lock the gate when we left, so next time, we will have to climb the fence when we arrive. It is possible, I rationalize, to have permission, and just no key. This is not any kind of impossible thing, and I will endure to set this thought within my mind, and in the of minds of my buds, until that yard has relinquished it's every secret ! Until again, I shall remain, your humble digger and big mouth, E. George Brater III.
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