By Craig Westcott/September 2, 2021
He hasn't found Peter Easton's gold, but Peter Pierce is turning up plenty of other stuff with the detectorist kit he bought at the beginning of the summer. The former Goulds Arena attendant, 65, bought two metal detectors earlier this year to take on a hobby in his retirement.
There's been no treasure unearthed, but he's discovered plenty of fun.
"I just saw it (a metal detector) online one day and said, 'Geeze, I might be interested in that, I'll have a look at that now.' So I went to Canadian Tire and I bought one and put it all together, and went out and got at it," Pierce said.
The cost was about $180 on sale, he reckoned. Pierce also bought a hand sized metal detector called a pinpointer.
"You can buy them at Canadian Tire or anywhere," he noted.
The Goulds resident spent 19 years working at the Goulds Arena and agreed you wouldn't need a metal detector to find objects left in dressing rooms after hockey games. When retirement came, he looked for something to occupy his newfound time.
"I just wanted a hobby," said Pierce. "I needed a hobby, something to do, something that's not too hard, because I've got back problems."
And what is he finding?
"I'm after finding some coins and things," said Pierce. "They're not old, old coins. And I've found a lot of garbage. But if you find anything, you take it with you. You don't put it back in the ground and bury it over. You take it with you and dispose of it, if it's no good. Anything valuable you keep for yourself."
The oldest coin Pierce has found has a date of 1912 on it. He located it in the ground at Pippy Park. "But there are people who are after finding them a lot older than that," he added. "In the 1800s and that."
Pierce spends time detectoring at Kent's Pond, Pippy Park ("but not in the campsites - you're not allowed in there”), behind Confederation Building, on Confederation Hill, which is the big parklike grounds across from the government building, Pleasantville, the White Hills, Cape Broyle and other spots. Sometimes his wife Rhonda joins him. "You're not allowed to go to Signal Hill or any provincial parks or historic sites, or graveyards, especially graveyards," he pointed out.
Pierce said there's a good many people detectoring in Newfoundland. Recently he took part in an event organized by Digging The Rock, a Newfoundland detectorists' club. Organizers buried "treasure" in spots throughout Confederation Hill and detectorists from all over the province gathered to find them and claim prizes.
"It was a day really for people to meet each other," said Pierce. "I'd say there was 50 or more there. They say on the island there's about a thousand (detectorists). It's interesting, right?"
Six months into his new hobby, Pierce is happy with his choice and thinks it's something he's going to stick with.
"I won't be doing it in the winter though," he said, laughing.
Goulds detectorist Peter Pierce with his metal detector on Cape Broyle beach earlier this summer. All he found that day was some old screws and nails. He found a Newfoundland coin dated 1912 in the ground at Pippy Park.
