In 1984, Dick Stout, along with a small group of individuals, had a dream of unity for all clubs dedicated to our recreational hobby of metal detecting. The idea proved to be a time consuming endeavor for those who firmly believed we needed a national organization, and the support of all those in the "Trade" (manufacturers, magazines and all connected with treasure hunting). They supported the idea but hesitated, until the fledgling organization gathered intensity, and began a domino effect. One by one, clubs across the nation were beginning to realize as our hobby grew at an ever increasing pace, we would someday be in jeopardy due to unfair governmental legislation restricting our recreational hobby.

The FMDAC was formed as a non-profit organization dedicated to the education, and preservation of our sport/hobby. We welcome prospectors, bottle diggers, fossil collectors and rockhounds and we are closely affiliated with many like organizations. We have a Code of Ethics we insist our members comply with.

The FMDAC provides a Forum to bring the entire metal detecting community together, to include our supporting partners from industry.

The FMDAC's purpose is to unite, promote, and encourage our members to preserve the hobby of metal detecting, to make available to our clubs, information pertaining to our hobby, to keep all members informed as to active or pending legislation that can prove harmful to our hobby, to protect our rights as tax paying citizens to pursue our hobby, with-out threat or harassment, as long as we are within our rights and obeying our Code of Ethics.

The FMDAC has eight chapters, dividing the country with officers in all areas. This improves communication. It's much easier to keep updated as to legislative action.

We have a Legislative Liaison officer who lives in close proximity to Washington DC and makes frequent trips to the Capitol to discuss our problems with National Forest Service personnel.

We encourage clubs to follow the civic actions of many of our clubs, working with boy and girl scouts, putting on special wheel chair hunts for the disabled such as veteran's homes, working with the blind and the deaf children (yes they love to have their days of fun using a metal detector), and we have several clubs that put on treasure hunts for those "Special Kids" as our contribution to the Special Olympics.

We have a very high percentage of lost valuables, including expensive rings returned to their grateful owners. We have assisted law enforcement officials in looking for evidence many times. We have made ourselves available to help during floods, earthquakes and other natural disasters. We are registered with the Department of Transportation, and have assisted in plane crashes helping to find valuable plane parts.

The FMDAC actively defends the rights of our members if unjustly accused of breaking a law while metal detecting. HOWEVER, we do not condone those who knowingly go on to property such as National Parks, National Historic Sites or National Military Parks. We do, in fact, encourage our members to police our hobby and call the authorities if they see "outlaw determinists" in an area they know to be off limits.

We strongly advocate, "Always Ask Permission" and please, follow our Code of Ethics. The FMDAC needs ALL OF YOU NOW as the government seems obsessed with closing more land to public use. Our areas to detect shrink accordingly. Our right to pursue our family oriented, recreational hobby is in danger. If we do not band together as the strong organization we are capable of being, if we do not write our congressmen even our local city councils and our state governor and protest the unfair closures and the huge government land grabs such as the horrific Heritage Act, and the many land trusts in different states, we will not only lose our hobby, but our right as citizens to pursue our hobby on the land we pay taxes on.

JOIN US TODAY!! We need all of you. If you are a member, take a few moments of your time to promote our unity and visibility. We have come to a point in time where "Let the other guy do it" is no longer an excuse.