Beneath a boulder in the Speed River, Guelph resident Steve Welch found what may be the oldest object he has ever pulled from the water. Welch was searching the river with his dog, Pepper, when he uncovered a stone spear point he believes is more than 5,000 years old. The discovery has taken his year-long hunt for artifacts to a new level - and turned a hobby into what Welch jokingly calls a curse. The Guelph native began his artifact hunting YouTube series The Curse of the Speed River last year, after Welch started spending more time exploring the river with Pepper. “I live really close to the Speed River near downtown Guelph, and so I just walk down there a lot and I started finding stuff,” Welch said. “I got Pepper, my dog, and she loves the river and she can’t stay out of the river… we’ll spend hours in the river and then you just find stuff… I kept finding cooler and cooler items.” What began with pieces of old cooking and hunting tools from the 1800s has grown into a full-fledged search for artifacts. Then came the spear point. “There was a large boulder in the middle of the river, you’d only see it if you’re in the river. Under the boulder, I kind of scooped up some stuff to see what was there, and this is what came up… the spear point. I knew exactly what it was right off the bat,” he explained. Welch said he believes the object is more than 5,000 years old and may have originated in the Niagara Region. He said he had used online research and artificial intelligence (AI) tools to help identify some of the objects he finds. “It’s amazing what you can do with modern technology. I look at it, I try and guess what it is and then I just kind of look it up with [AI],” he explained. ”I upload pictures, measurements, dimensions, where it was found, what was going on in that part of the river back 100 years, and sometimes it’s dead on, and sometimes it’s completely wrong,” he said. Several archaeologists who have worked throughout southwestern Ontario later reached out to Welch about the spear point and offered their assessments of the object. Welch said some of the finds have been difficult to identify, prompting him to teach himself new techniques to clean and restore them. “I figured out this process called electrolytic reduction… and it is a very slow process, but you can use electricity to get the rust off of things that actually restore them right down to their original form,” Welch said. He said none of the objects he has recovered, including what Welch has now coined as the “Speed River Spear Point”, are for sale. Instead, he said he would consider loaning or donating the items to Guelph museums. While the hunt has become an increasingly consuming hobby, Welch said he hasn’t lost sight of what, or who, rather, motivated him to begin the search in the first place. “I credit my dog for helping me in many, many ways, and one of them is just a love of life. She gets me into places that I wouldn’t normally go. I wouldn’t be going in the river as much if it wasn’t for her… I enjoy it, but she gets me down there daily,” he confessed. “I joke that she can sniff out iron artifacts, and you see her in the water and she’s sniffing around, so she actually helps me find things.” Welch said he wants to encourage people to appreciate and protect the natural environment around recovered artifacts. “My goal is to expose people to the amazing environment we live in, the local environment… the more people know the environment, the more likely it’s going to be protected, preserved and respected,” he said. The name of Welch’s project is a nod to The Curse of Oak Island, another source of inspiration for his growing passion. But the “curse” has taken on a meaning of its own. “I had to ask myself, is there a curse, what is this curse?” Welch said. “The curse is that you can’t stop. Once you find something like this, you’re not going to stop. That’s all I can think about… that’s the curse.”
