July 11 2004. Today, at lunch, I took my weekly drive around downtown Pensacola to see what was shaking with new construction projects. I was checking out a lot when a fellow digger showed up I had not seen in about a year. We updated each on the usual what, where’s, why’s and when’s then started talking about some of the recent construction projects we both new about. After a few minutes we headed down to freshly cleared site in one of the oldest parts of town. There were posted no trespassing signs so I just walked around a few minutes and scanned for signs of glass and what not. In one particular spot close to the road there were about four broken stoneware bottles and some really nice shards dating to the 1870-80’s era lying on the surface. It looked like that when they pulled out the cable TV line they stirred up a trash pit. I stood there looking at the pieces pondering what great bottles lay beneath the soil. It was difficult to walk away knowing that some other bottle enthusiast might get to it before me. I jotted down the phone number of the general contractor and tried calling him several times that afternoon to obtain permission to do some digging. By the time I was ready to head home from work I had still not gotten in contact with the GC. I decided to swing by the lot to see if anyone was there or had dug into the one pit with all the stoneware bottles. Well it just happened that no one had, so, as you may be thinking, I could not leave without digging down just a bit to see what treasures awaited me in the sand. As do all well prepared and addicted diggers I keep my folding military style shovel in the truck for such occasions. It has been a couple years since I pulled the shovel from its resting place under the drivers seat. With the first gentle scoop of the shovel I uprooted an intact stoneware bottle. Within a few minutes I had surfaced two additional ones. About this time I decided to refill the small hole I had dug and continue this dig after I obtained permission. The lot was off a busy street so I figured it would not be long before I was noticed. I took my finds home and cleaned them up. Here’s a couple pic’s. The one with the embossing says Speyers Lion Brewery New York. If anyone has any info on the value of this bottle please let me know. Bob Latham in New York told me that it was an uncommon bottle.

By the next evening I had gotten the OK from the GC to look around the site. I left work a little early due to excitement about what a waited me in this lot. The prior evening  I  studied my Sandborn maps and had a good idea where the houses stood in 1885. The first place I dug, when I got to the site, was the stoneware pit. After about an hour I cleared the pit and ended up with six additional and different stoneware bottles and two green crude whiskey/beer bottles. One of the bottles has a defect in the lip where the glass had fallen/dripped and stuck to the neck of the bottle.          

  I probed the lot and found three additional trash pits. One was full of common 1890ish whiskeys and wines and one contained a local Hutchinson soda (Jacob Lipps) and a bitters (Brown’s Iron Bitters). All in all I came away with about 25 bottles of which many were keepers. It was a good dig!  I will be returning to the lot as soon as I get a chance. I’ll keep you posted. Here is a picture of the best finds thus far.