1800s wine tap on 1820s property.

[nalc472]

Found this wine tap on a 1820s property who used to send wine by flatboat down the Ohio to New Orleans from around 1820 to 1860s. He had one of the largest fleets for flatboats on the river at the time. Me a my buddy have also found 6 large cents (rom 1818 to 1850s), one 1725 Spanish Reale, and a 1875 dime on this property. This is a rock wall at the bottom of the property it is an wall that is 60 ft long and as high as 10 ft. There is a 30 ft round going down to it. The Ohio River is the other direction from the wall. That is where I believe the flat boats were loaded.

 

[Lodge Scent]

Very cool find! Very cool site. Yeah if you are finding nonferrous targets that big I would keep detecting that site!

 

[del]

congrats on the keg tap spigot . the site sounds like a great area that will keep you busy

 

[nalc472]

The river site has not been detected yet. There are lots of trash due to the river. Should still give it a try i guess.

 

[MangoAve]

This is a rock wall at the bottom of the property it is an wall that is 60 ft long and as high as 10 ft. There is a 30 ft round going down to it. The Ohio River is the other direction from the wall. That is where I believe the flat boats were loaded.

So you think this was more of a warehouse?

 

[nalc472]

I guess it could have been some warehouse or maybe an open ended building facing the river. Kind of like a carport of wine kegs?

 

[Mountaindigger]

Wow, what a great find, congratulations to you. Very interesting also.

 

[OxShoeDrew]

Sounds like a great place...I love walls like that...I look forward to future posts :thumbsup01:

 

[aloldstuff]

Some great finds from that site. I would love to find a keg tap. Great pictures. Did the owner have a winery or a vineyard?

 

[Pacivilwarluke]

Sounds VERY promising! Cool find there, nice that you even know what beverage would've been stored on the property! The early Spanish reale sounds awesome, hope there's one like that waiting for you there! HH!

 

[Bell-Two]

These old taps are very interesting!

 

[MangoAve]

I guess it could have been some warehouse or maybe an open ended building facing the river. Kind of like a carport of wine kegs?

Well the tap is cool, but I was noticing how large you said the footprint of the structure was. I've been in the basement of a pre 1750s house and they sure aren't 10' tall under there and quite a bit of houses even built today don't have one wall 60' in length. Up near me I haven't been able to trace where there was a warehouse, but there was a place used specifically as a warehouse for shipping up river from the 1600s until the mid-late 1800s. I have not found where the building would have been... but just a possible correlation to that spot.

 

[nalc472]

The town had the first commercial winery in the United States. He shipped the wine via flatboat to New Orleans. When the flatboat got there he would just have them sell them. Too hard to go up river. President Jefferson gave the land to the first settlers via Congress with the promise that they would show him how to make wine. They were all from Switzerland and this area reminded them of their homeland. I believe it is a retaining wall that was to the left of the road that went down to the river. It took a lot of man hours to build and the owner was one of the biggest land owners in the county on the river. He would spend his winters in the south. His son was a Doctor and served as a Captain in the Calvary in the Civil war