April 1957 Popular Electronics Table of Contents Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles from Popular Electronics, published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged.

Carl Kohler's dry techno-humor hits a new high with "Mettle Detector," in a 1957 issue of Popular Electronics magazine. Our familiar hubby, who is the quintessential do-it-yourself hobbyist and adopter of somewhat overzealous projects (in the opinion of "friend-wife"), is once again forced to justify his latest obsession. In this case, it is a metal detector. Keep in mind that in 1957, you could not walk into a store or place an online order to buy such a device. Magazines of the day, including this one, ran articles for building metal detectors, and they were big, heavy, and not even as sensitive as a $50 cheapie today. You'll get a kick out the plot. It reminds me of my own experience with a metal detector, where I blindly tossed a quarter into the sand at a beach, and then thought I'd never find it (finally found it about 15-20 minutes later). Metal detecting is part art, part science, and part luck. I took the liberty of colorizing the drawings.

The Mettle Locator

By Carl Kohler

Shambling through the garden - completely absorbed with seeking fresh test-areas for my new metal locator, I failed to see the Girl Kibitzer until she was breathing down my neck. Since there's just no ignoring her once that happens, I removed the headphones and threw the first punch.

"This skillfully constructed instrument could be an electronic gardening-device," I said.

"!" She exclaimed, her narrowed eyes unnarrowing. "But it's not," I added.

"?" She asked, articulately. "Well, it might also be a high-voltage beam-sprayer with which to send insects to whatever buggy Valhalla may exist for insects."

"!!!" She gasped, admiration beginning to tinge her face. "But," I amended, mysteriously, "it's not!"

"?????" She demanded excitedly.

"Well, I'll give you a hint," I said, generously. "On pages 86-87-88, of the June, 1956, issue of Popular Electronics lie the facts, the figures and the entire story of this versatile instrument." I chuckled indulgently and pointed toward my work-shack. "Seek and ye shall most likely find out all about it, my dear!"

She took off like a super-charged missile.

By gosh, I thought, returning to my tests, I've been telling that girl too much. Have to let her do her own ferreting after this. That's the ticket! Keep her so busy, hunting up information, she'll be too occupied to ...

She was back, breathing stentoriously.

"Okay, chum," she rasped caustically, "so ... you built a ... metal locator ... and ... what does ... that ... do for the ... state of ... electrical ... disrepair around this ... lashup?"

"I'll show you! It's utterly fabulous!" I said enthusiastically.

"I bet!" She sneered.

"Now, watch!"

"I'm looking."

"Get this, now!"

"I'm looking!"

"Don't miss this - it'll shake you, at first!"

"I'm braced - go ahead!"

Carefully, I lowered the housing containing the search-coil to the ground and slowly swung the locator back and forth, listening intently to the beat-note singing in the headphones.

"I ain't shook much, yet ..." she observed evenly.

"Just a min - wait, now ... no ... wait, I think ... yes, there it is!" I rejoiced. "We've got it now! Boy, that's performance!"

"Still unshook, chum," she mentioned acidly. I removed the headphones, put the locator carefully down on the ground, scratched an X into the soil with my finger and lit a cigarette.

"Something happened ?" she inquired. "It's down there," I said, my features (I hoped) a bland combination of inscrutable confidence. "Right ... down ... there."

"It is, hey ?" She bent over and studied the X with a sour expression. "Imagine that! It's right down there! Why, you could walk over it a dozen times and never know it was there." She stood up and folded her arms across her chest.

"Well, what is it?" she demanded, scorching me with her eyes.

I handed her the spade.

"Now, I did my job - you do yours."

She began digging.

"While you're engrossed with the excavation process, I'll brief you on the general characteristics of this marvelous instrument," I said, settling myself comfortably in a nearby lawn chair. "Its possibilities will stun you with avarice or you aren't the same girl who haunts department stores searching for a 10¢ difference in bargains!" I chuckled, softly, at my small jest and hoisted my feet a bit higher.

"Of the two major types of locators," I continued, rather wishing I'd had her bring some coffee with her, "the field-distortion and the beat-frequency, I chose the latter because it was simpler. Also, while not quite as effective, performance-wise, as the more complicated type, it'll serve very nicely since I checked out the variables connected with -"

"Hey," she called, "I'm down three feet and haven't found a single thing ... unless this gismo of yours locates earthworms, potato-bugs and the remains of what looks like an old coffee-pot."

"Excelsior! Eureka!" I cried, dragging myself painfully to my feet. "You've done it!"

"I did good?" She appeared uncertain.

"Of course!" I assured her, warmly pumping her hand. "You've just proven that the locator can operate very swiftly if the buried metal - in this instance, what seems to be an aged and semi-disintegrated pot - has attained any degree of association with the surrounding mantle rock, due to chemical -"

"I did something real jazzy, eh ?"

"Mais oui!" I exclaimed, kissing her on both cheeks.

"Stop slobbering all over me," she snapped, peevishly, "and tell me exactly what's so wonderful! Doesn't seem like any big deal to me. I just dug up a lousy old pot. What's the alleged importance, chum?"

"I was afraid you'd ask that," I said, somewhat flattened.

"Is that all this gimmick's good for - finding pots?" ]

"Ho, foolish girl!" I laughed. "Use your imagination! Think! Think of all the wonderful, long-buried treasures that are just waiting- waiting for you and I to discover their ancient places of concealment and unearth them, I might add, to our personal profit and delight! Think of it! All the gold and silver objects, coins, items worth thousands! Nay, millions, or I'm a monkey's brother-in-law! All safely tucked away in Mother Nature's own vault and waiting for us to dig them out!"

"Around this joint ?" She looked dubiously around the tract-housing neighborhood. "Treasure ?"

"Don't forget." I lowered my voice to a harsh whisper, glancing about to be sure the bushes hadn't ears. "Don't forget, girl, this once was Spanish territory! The wealth of the Dons was carried through here - huge hordes of it mysteriously disappearing, murderously thefted and buried ... its owners then dying violently and the secret of its location lying silently within the breast of the sullen earth for, lo, these -"

"Let's not make a production out of it, chum," she said. "If what you say is true - let's just keep our mouths shut and start making with the locator."

"Muy bien!" I agreed, still caught up with my own rhetoric.

Armed with spade, locator and greed, we spent the following hours testing portions of the yard and, when the instrument indicated buried metal, digging furiously. For awhile I watched and she dug. Then, for change of pace, she dug while I kept an eye open, leanifig alertly against a tree, for treasure-jumpers ... a fine, co-operative system which worked smoothly - allowing us to cover (and uncover) a considerable amount of ground. The only flaw in the entire operation: we found no gold or silver objects. True, we found other aged and interesting things like tire-irons, skillets, ancient bottle-caps, rusted bed-springs, a ceremonial sword (later identified as belonging to a neighbor who returned, unsteadily, from a lodge meeting), several unknown chunks of steel that didn't appear to be much of anything, two pipe-wrenches (in excellent condition), a wheel (circa Whippet '30) and, lastly, assorted lengths of round-rod.

"Nuts!" snorted Friend Wife, casting the spade into the hole she had just neatly dug. "No treasure around here! You read the wrong books - those Spaniards must've lugged that stuff all the way home with them!"

"B-But I tell you, this locator -

" She glared stonily at the locator.

"That thing's a fake!" she announced in the cold tones of hate. "That thing couldn't find gold in Fort Knox! And I've got the broken back to prove it, chum!"

"Listen!" I protested. "According to the instructions -"

"I say it's a phoney!"

This was pretty strong talk. And strong talk calls for strong measures. I mentioned her to follow me. Stalking indignantly over to Junior's sandbox, I turned and eyed her belligerently.

Take off your watch!" I commanded.

"My -" She hesitated. "Why mine?"

"Because I unselfishly bought you a good, gold one, that's why. Mine's a five-buck, nickel-plated job - and I want something goldy to prove, once and for all, that this locator works!"

Unwillingly, she removed the wristwatch and handed it over. I promptly buried it in the sandbox, making certain it was well covered. Then, I rose and put the headphones on her head. Holding the locator over the buried watch, I demanded: "Hear that difference in tone? That lower quality to the beat-note ?"

She nodded.

"That's the locator's way of saying gold!"

"That doesn't prove much," she com plained, removing the headphones. "I already knew there was gold there."

"B-But ...b-but ..." I stammered.

"Where's my watch?" She pawed intently in the white sand. "Hey! Where's my watch? Hey, I don't see my watch!"

"In the sand," I replied, factually.

"Yeh, but where?" Now she scrabbled frantically in the sand, digging with the intensity of a demented gopher. "I can't find it!" she wailed, miserably. "I can't find the little watch I've had ever since my twenty-eighth birthday!"

Quickly, I brought the locator into play again. In a moment the beat-note indicated gold ... the pitch chnging noticeably. "Here - right pointing to a spot. The locator says it's right ... here!"

"Swiftly, she dug ... right there. No watch.

"Now see what your crazy old ideas have done!" she screeched in anguish-laden tones. "That improbable locator-thing has lost my watch! I want my watch!" And she returned to methodless excavation with the fury of a pursued mole.

Several days have passed, now, and the situation is still fraught with unsolved mystery and inexplicable circumstances. Friend Wife is removing a ton and a half of sand from the sandbox, by the admirable (if tedious) process of a bucketful at a time - screening each load with more scrutiny and care than a riverside miner expecting nuggets.

My personal disgrace has been compounded by another failure. The locator seems to be living up to her heated description of being "improbable" ... in fact, so improbable that I'm seriously thinking of mailing it to the FCC - and letting experts tussle with this fantastic instrument.

Although I followed directions to the last conventional shielded-coil, oscillator and audio-amplifier - that crazy locator's picking up ham calls now!

And I'm going batty with frustration since I can't seem to figure out a way to answer them.

Hi -fi was never like this.