Digging in Dubuque or As The Shovel Turns

Don't want to speak too soon, but the trenching is apparently done. Just pray the plumber agrees. Scott returns the THIRD and FOURTH rented jackhammers tomorrow. Cutting the concrete on this second trenching attempt was Scott's intended last act for his old circular saw - he has a spare. Tony and Scott finally hit rebar on this go-round, which they cut through with Scott's grinder. I just learned older rebar is called "twisted bar" and it is in some of our building, but this rebar is simply square and was laid with large diamond wire mesh on top of earth. The reinforced concrete floors date to the Sanitary Dairy, which owned and operated a plant and retail shop in our building from about 1921 to 1943, and which put in the smokestack. Once through the rebar, today's gentlemen hit dirt and found this little collection:

What the hell is this stuff?
Clockwise: Shards of pre-1880 earthenware bottles that once held Apollinaris Mineral Water,
imported from Germany; a clamshell;two small bottles of the exact same type, but from different manufacturers; 
a small round glass bottle; a broken bottle neck; and what seems to be a serving spoon

Close-up of the Apollinaris logo, the company and its spring still exist in Germany

This weekend's little archaeological find is likely from the time our building was a hotel, its original and intended usage. Built by Joseph Gehrig, who bought our property in 1851, the hotel first opened as the Adams House in 1856, but Gehrig took over its management shortly thereafter and changed the name to the Jefferson House. A Swiss immigrant to Dubuque in the 1840s, he soon became a '49er and allegedly dug the first two basements in Sacramento, made real money in the Gold Rush, then returned to Dubuque for good. He and his family operated the hotel until about 1916.

Our discovery is nothing compared to Gehrig's of 1852 when he leveled the Indian Mound, the site which would become his hotel, now our corner building. That's when the coffin and body of the murderer Patrick O'Conner was discovered, buried in the Indian Mound on which he was hanged on June 20, 1834, in front of over 1000 people who came from all over the region, for killing his business partner George O'Keaf, events which made national newspapers almost immediately and forced the United States to take its first step toward creating what would later become the State of Iowa. O'Conner's trial and execution were the first in what would become Iowa. Our property has a long and interesting history, but it's for another day.