The mystery button...

One of the interesting items that I came across in my hunt at the 1912 house in my last post was what looked like a rather large button. My initial impression was that the button had some sort of baseball pattern with a letter "E" in the middle.

Mystery button

I posted on a few metal detecting forums to get some feedback on what this relic might be. Although I did not get any solid info - one member did observe that the image on the button was not an "E" but rather part of an image of a belt. Using this to base my research on, I scoured the internet, looking for anything that looked close to what was on the button. Many, many, many images poured through later,



I discovered the very same design on a smaller button for sale on an auction website, offered through someone who had business that dealt with all sorts of button, along with other trinkets. I emailed the owner and was surprised to get a rather quick reply. She indicated that she will consult with her other "button friends" and let me know what she found out. A few days later, I got the following response

** I believe it is made of brass. Nice size too. It represents a belt buckle, and I would think probably dates between 1910-1930. Unless it has a backmark you would not be able to tell who made it **

Very cool! This is perhaps the oldest relic I have found to date. Will continue with this site - even sweeping through with slightly different sensitivity/threshold settings.