As we looked out into the backyard, he pointed to where they had the outhouse. From time to time, they'd cover up the hole and move it another spot. The outhouse served not only as a toilet, but also a garbage disposal. They'd throw glass bottles and other assorted trash down there.
This makes outhouse locations kind of the amateur archaeologist/treasure hunter's dream. Broken glass has a constant presence in my backyard. A green piece here, a blue piece there, a clear piece everywhere. They tend to float to the surface, especially after heavy rains.
We also pulled out the metal detector to search around the areas. Doing this helped us narrow down a couple more long lost treasures. The first was a vintage Schrader-Universal tire pressure gauge from the 1910s-1920s. Pretty cool find!
In another spot we found these old metal, matchbox-like toy cars. Maybe from the 1970s or 1980s?