Rocky Mountain Prospectors & Treasure Hunters Newsletter
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Rocky Mountain Prospectors & Treasure Hunters Newsletter The News v. 17, n. 9 September, 2013 Going for the Gold Visit RMPTH On The Internet At http://rmpth.com Contents The Gold Coins That Never Were 1 The Gold Coins That Never Were 2 About The News Feds seize gold coins worth $80 million 3 UPS Aircraft Repair Checklists from Pennsylvania family 4 Colorado Treasure Tales 6 Father-Son Team Digs Into The From rt.com Past 7 Annual Paul E. Lange Detector federal judge has upheld a verdict that strips Coin & Prize Hunt a Pennsylvania family of their grandfather’s 8 The Many Survival Uses Of Coffee A gold coins — worth an estimated $80 million Filters — and has ordered ownership transferred to the US 10 Calendar of Events government. 11 Calendars 13 Good Reasons To Own A Metal A federal judge has upheld a verdict that strips a Detector Pennsylvania family of their grandfather’s gold coins — worth an estimated $80 million — and has ordered 14 Badger Unearths Medieval ownership transferred to the US government. Treasure 15 Raising Chicago Judge Legrome Davis of the Eastern District Court of 16 Trading Post Pennsylvania affirmed a 2011 jury decision that a box 18 2013 Schedule of Events of 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle coins discovered 19 Contact List by the family of Israel Switt, a deceased dealer and collector, is the property of the United States. In the midst of the Great Depression, then-President Franklin Roosevelt ordered that America’s supply of double eagles manufactured at the Philadelphia Mint be destroyed and melted into gold bars. Of the 445,500 or so coins created, though, some managed to escape the kiln and ended up into the hands of col- lectors. In 2003, Switt’s family opened a safe deposit back that their grandfather kept, revealing 10 coins among that turned out to be among the world’s most valuable collectables in the currency realm today. Switt’s descendants, the Langbords, thought the coins "Patriotism is supporting your country all the time had been gifted to their grandfather years earlier by and your government when it deserves it." (Continued on page 3) - Mark Twain Advertising About The News Classified advertising for topic related items is free he News is the official newsletter of the Rocky for non-business ads. See the “Trading Post” section Mountain Prospectors and Treasure Hunters for donation pricing of camera-ready display ads. Do- T Club (RMPTH): our mailing address is 278 nations for ad makeup from sketches, etc., are avail- Sierra Vista Drive, Fort Collins, CO. 80524. able on request. Opinions expressed in The News are those of the About RMPTH authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the club or its members. Publication of information in RMPTH is an independent nonprofit hobbyist social The News constitutes no guarantee of accuracy. Use club, open to anyone interested in prospecting, detect- of any information found in this publication is at the ing or treasure hunting. Its purpose is to provide an sole risk of the user. Neither RMPTH, nor its coordi- educational and social forum of mutual benefit for nators, nor The News, nor its editors or contributors members. RMPTH holds a monthly meeting and con- assume any liability for damages resulting from use ducts various field outings, as well as offers special of information in this publication. presentations and seminars. Active participants have voting privileges. The monthly newsletter, The News, Submissions is readily available on the Internet. Annual dues are $25 payable in June. Applicants joining in any month Articles, letters and short items of interest on pros- other than June pay partial dues of $2 per month for pecting, detecting and treasure hunting topics are months remaining prior to following June plus $1. welcome and encouraged. All items submitted for publication are subject to editing. Submittals for pub- lication may be made in writing or, preferably, in AS- CII text format on IBM-compatible disk. If you have questions about a submission, please contact the edi- tor for information. Copyright Unless otherwise noted, other nonprofit groups may reprint or quote from any articles appearing in The News without prior permission, provided that proper author and publication credits are given and that a copy of the publication in which the article ap- pears is sent at no cost to RMPTH at the above mail- ing address. Clubs wishing to exchange newsletters with RMPTH are invited to send a copy of their news- letter together with an exchange request. CLUB MEMBERS TAKE NOTE Club Hats, Shirts, Jackets, & Patches are again available. See Paul Mayhak at the club meetings to purchase your club items! We will be running a 50/50 Drawing at each club meeting. At the end of each meeting Tom will split the pot 50/50 and a lucky member will go home with more money than they came with.! The remaining 50% goes to the club treasury. Page 2 The News, September 2013 (Continued from page 1) remove their own items and transfer property back to Mint cashier George McCann and took the coins to the state. the Mint to have their authenticity verified, but the government quickly took hold of the items and re- "This is a case that raises many novel legal questions, fused to relinquish the find to the family. The Lang- including the limits on the government's power to con- bords responded with a lawsuit that ended last year in a victory for the feds. Because the gov- ernment ordered the destruction of their entire supply of coins decades earlier, the court found that Switt’s family was illegally in possession of the stash. Even though they may had been pre- sented to the dealer by a Phila- Rarest of the rare—1933 Saint-Gaudens Gold Double Eagle delphia Mint staffer, Judge Davis agrees with last year’s ruling that fiscate property. The Langbord family will be filing an Mr. McCann broke the law. appeal and looks forward to addressing these impor- tant issues before the 3rd Circuit," Barry Berke, an "The coins in question were not lawfully removed attorney for the Langbords, tells ABCNews.com from the United States Mint,” the judge rules. Despite this decision, though, the attorney represent- ing Switt’s family says the government has no right to solutions recorded (marked with an S) by mainte- UPS Aircraft Repair nance engineers. Checklists By the way, UPS is the only major airline that has never, ever, had an accident.... Just in case you needed a laugh. P: Left inside main tire almost needs replacement. emember it takes a college degree to fly a S: Almost replaced left inside main tire. plane, but only a high school diploma to fix one: R P: Test flight OK, except auto-land very rough. After every flight, UPS pilots fill out a form, called a S: Auto-land not installed on this aircraft. ‘gripe sheet,' which tells mechanics about problems with the aircraft. P: Something loose in cockpit S: Something tightened in cockpit The mechanics correct the problems, document their repairs on the form, and then pilots review the gripe P: Dead bugs on windshield. sheets before the next flight. S: Live bugs on back-order. Never let it be said that ground crews lack a sense of P: Autopilot in altitude-hold mode produces a 200 humor. Here are some actual maintenance complaints feet per minute descent submitted by UPS pilots (marked with a P) and the (Continued on page 17) The News, September 2013 Page 3 Colorado Treasure "There comes a time in every Tales rightly constructed boy's life when he has a raging desire to go some- La Caverna del Oro (The Cave of Gold) where and dig for hidden treasure." ong before the white man ever came to the - Mark Twain United States the legend of La Caverna del Oro, L the Cave of Gold, was passed down from gen- eration to generation by the Indians. When the Span- ish explorers arrived in the fifteenth century, monks translated the legend and the gold was eagerly sought Gold Glossary by the explorers. Drywasher - A common desert mining tool. The drywasher Caverna del Oro, 13,000 feet high upon Marble Moun- is like a highbanker but lacks the need for water. A dry- tain, was believed, by the Indians, to be plagued by washer operates by the use of wind. The light junk mate- demons. However, in 1541, three Spanish monks rial is blown off the top of the sluice in the drywasher and from the Coronado expedition forced the Indians into the gold stays on the bottom. The sluice riffles in a dry- slave labor to extract gold from the cave. Finally, the washer are backwards for better recovery. Indians staged an uprising against the monks and two of them were killed. However, the third monk, De la Cruz, convinced the Indians that he was able to sub- due the "evil spirits” lurking underground in the mine. With the help of the slave-miner natives, vast TREASURE HUNTER’S amounts of gold were brought forth from the subter- ranean passages. Later, when the Indians had served CODE OF ETHICS their purpose, De la Cruz and his small group of sur- viving Spaniards killed the Indians, loaded up their treasure on pack mules, and fled south back to Mex- ico. I WILL respect private property and do no treasure hunting without the owner's permission. The cave was then left unexplored until about 100 years ago, when it was found again by Elisha Horn. I WILL fill all excavations.