A Drumheller man has found a “miner’s booty” in his back yard.
Chris Bobra lives near Elgin Hill. Getting a jump on his garden this spring he began overturning some sod in a corner of his yard to plant some potatoes for the first time. Like so many treasure stories begin, his shovel hit something hard.
“I knew it wasn’t a rock because it sort of gave when the shovel hit,” said Bobra. “The ground was red with rust.”
He quickly dug around the object and pulled up a coffee can. He unsealed the lid and saw a pile of currency.
“It actually stunk. Many of the bills were black and stuck to the rusty can, but you could recognize them as bills,” he said.
He did a little research and noted the bills would have been issued in the early 1930’s and was used commonly into the 1940’s. On top of the Canadian bills, he also noted some Hungarian “pengo” notes and some American currency.
Not knowing the value of the Hungarian bank notes, he totaled it to be over $1,100, which would have had the buying power of about $18,000 in 1940.
“This was someone’s life savings, this wasn’t a couple bucks tucked away,” said Bobra. “Miners in those days were notorious for caching away their money.
The Hungarian notes did help provide some clues as to the original owner of the cash. When Bobra bought the home in the 1990’s, it had sat vacant for a number of years. He purchased it from the nephew of Ivo Bajusz, who was a miner and once had a shack on the same property.
Bobra spoke to Fred Orosz, who said his father was a friend with Ivo.
“I remember him coming to the house a couple times. He was a quiet man, a bachelor, my dad used to say he was a mean man,” said Orosz. “He never drank, but he did like that traditional Hungarian coffee. When that wouldn’t suffice, they would go to McDonalds.”
Happy April Fools Day!
