|
|
News Nuggets Newsletter of the Albuquerque Gem & Mineral Club Volume 50 Number 2 It’s Showtime ! It’s time to get revved up for AGMC’s Treasures of the Earth 2003. This year’s show will be at the same location it was last year, at the School Arts and Flower Building at the New Mexico State Fairgrounds. The show will run from March 21 through March 23 this year and will have 35-38 dealers. I know some of you are tired of hearing this but listen up anyway. A lot of you signed up as show volunteers at the last general meeting. Thanks, in advance. We still need people for breakdown on Sunday and various other jobs throughout the show. Remember, volunteers get to attend the show for free. Volunteering is also a good way to meet other people in the club and learn about their interests in our diverse hobby. The upcoming Deming show is only 3½ hours away and is really a great show. There are about 100 dealers, both indoor and outdoor, and a live auction on Friday night. The auction is a community event and raises about $5,000.00 for everything from club activities to providing gas and food for stranded travelers and blankets for the homeless. I hope to see you there in early March and at our show later in the month. -OG Shows, Shows, Shows!!! Rockhound Roundup March 6-9 SW New Mexico Fairgrounds Deming, NM (great Show! - OG)
42nd Annual Gem & Mineral Show March 7-9 KCI Expo Center Kansas City, MO
SW Gem & Mineral Society’s Fiesta of Gems March 14-16 San Antonio, TX
Ft. Collins Rockhounds Mar 21-23 42nd Annual Show; Ft. Collins, CO
Treasures of the Earth March 21-23 Gem, Jewelry & Mineral Show New Mexico State Fairgrounds Albuquerque Gem & Mineral Club Albuquerque, NM Officers 2003 President/Editor- Orlando Garcia;Home phone: 345-0520; e-mail: jabog02@msn.com VP-Programs - Grant Kuck; Home phone: 323-1520 VP-Field Trips- Kimberly Richie; Home phone: 296-8847 VP-Field Trips- Ray DeMark; Home phone: 822-8715; e-mail: RayDeMark@msn.com Secretary/Historian- Dave Moats; Home phone: 892-8163; e-mail: beepbeep59@hotmail.com Treasurer- Stephanie Bell; Home phone: 281-7192; e-mail: stephbell22@yahoo.com Editor- Darlene Nelson; Home phone: 271-4694; e-mail: agmcnews@aol.com VP-Special Events- Hank Miller; Home phone: 255-7218; e-mail: rgmhgm2@msn.com Show Chair- Paul Hlava; Home phone: 255-5478; e-mail: hpf1@qwest.net Membership- Donna Scott; Home phone: 934-6564; e-mail: dutchessofalb@aol.com Jr. Club: Carl Johnson; Home phone: 344-3178 Please call the appropriate Board member for information regarding club functions The Club Newsletter; News Nuggets exists to assist the membership in communications and to provide information on club activities. Contributions from all members are welcome on any information that will promote club activities or that would be of interest to club members. News Nuggets is scheduled to be mailed approximately one week prior to the monthly meeting. Mail news, articles or comments to: Darlene Nelson, 817 Sagebrush Trail, Albuquerque, NM 87123, or email to agmcnews@aol.com. The Albuquerque Gem & Mineral Club was organized on January 22, 1944. The club is a non-profit organization dedicated to the advancement and enjoyment of the Earth Sciences and associated subjects. Its primary purpose is the exchange of information and the furtherance of knowledge of Mineralogy, Fossils, Geology, Rock Cutting and Gem Faceting and to stimulate interest in the development of these studies. All Meetings are held at the NM Museum of Natural History. The general meeting is held on the 4th Monday of the month at 7:30 pm The Junior Club meets at 6:45pm prior to the general meeting. The public is welcome to both meetings. Board of Directors meetings are held at 7:30 pm on the first Monday of each month. (Call for location). All memberships are family memberships and can include all members of the household. Dues are $20. Send checks to the AGMC, P.O. Box 13718, Albuquerque, NM 87192 or pay Donna Scott ,Membership Chair, at the monthly meeting. RENEW YOUR MEMBERSHIP NOW
PRESIDENTS MESSAGE Tucson time again!!! The Tucson Gem & Mineral Show at the convention center will take place on February 13-15 this year. It looks like there will be rain during most of the show this year which could mean some good buys at the motel shows along the freeway. This year, Dave Moats and I will be purchasing some specimens for our monthly door prizes. We will be doing this to add some variety to the door prizes. We are also encouraging members to bring specimen donations for both the door prizes and for the silent auctions at the show in March. Look at your collection and see what you can donate this year. The BOD has approved funding of a host for the AGMC website and have asked John Scully to be our Webmaster for this year. Once we get everything up and running, members with web access will be able to receive their News Nuggets by accessing the website. If you have any ideas or suggestions as to content (besides the newsletter) please feel free to call me at 345-0520 or e-mail me at jabog02@msn.com. The club’s web address is agmc.info . Orlando
Treasures of the Earth: Gem, Mineral, and Jewelry Show 2003 Our show is coming up FAST! In fact, we only have one more club meeting (and two show committee meetings) before the BIG event. I was very happy to see how many people signed up to help on parts of the show. I’m sure that Kimberly and Hank will be also looking for some folks to help them. Don’t forget that you can help a little here, see the show a bit, then help out there, see the show and so on. We should soon see an announcement about our own webpage, which is being developed through the efforts of Tom Katonak and John Scully. Until then, you can read a blurb about our show on the Rocky Mountain Federation of Mineralogical Society’s webpage on shows. Go to www.rmfms.org and following the obvious links. See you at the meeting on the 24th. Paul Hlava
RENEW YOUR MEMBERSHIP NOW To receive News Nuggets, your dues must be paid by March 15. 2003 TOTE SILENT AUCTION
We will have no percent surcharge on sales. Buy 3 or more tables throughout the show and get the discount rate of $15/table/auction, otherwise a table will cost $20. You can purchase those 3 or more tables in any combination: All three at one auction; or one table at each auction on any day; it’s your choice. Purchase a ½ table for $10. Purchase a table or ½ table by splitting the cost among any number of people if you find that want to sell less than a table’s worth of minerals. Decide amongst yourselves how to split the $20 expense to pay the club. Pay Dave Moats in advance to reserve the table(s) of your choice based on first come first served. HOW AUCTION WILL BE RUN We will start and end at or near published times all three days: 12:00 –12:45 p.m., l:45 – 2:30
p.m., 3:45 – 4:30 p.m.
Auctions will close 3 – 3 – 3 basis on random
tables based on
numbers pulled out of a hat. After they close,
tables will be draped with colored tape until
all tables
are closed at which time everyone will claim their
minerals and pay at the proper table. SUGGESTIONS Use a colored Magic Marker to sign your name at bottom of bid sheets so if bidder takes them to the wrong person the mistake can be caught and corrected easily. I encourage those dealers who have done well to donate specimens or money to the club’s silent auction. I would like to emphasize to the sellers/dealers that our silent auction customers are looking for deals. Keystone/discount your material. They can buy full retail at your booths. This is an excellent opportunity to move items that have been sitting in your stock for a long time. Members: this is an excellent opportunity to get rid of those extras collected on our Field Trips and those pieces in your collection that have alreadybeen replaced with upgraded material. This is a WIN-WIN opportunity for all concerned, dealers, members and customers Dave Moats Mystery Mineral For July, 2002 From the devious mind of Paul Hlava The Game Plan – I will describe a mineral and you have to guess/decipher/research the name of the mineral and the answers to the other questions asked about uses, history, notable facts, etc. I expect the Top Guns in the club to be able to guess the name off the top of their heads. The learners will need a reference book or two. You will benefit most if you do not ask others for the answers but work it out for yourselves. When you have decided on the name you can compare notes with others or wait for the answers to be announced at the meetings or published in the News Nuggets. Good luck and have fun.This Month’s Mystery Mineral is— A sulfide of a heavy metal that is found in low temperature hydrothermal deposits. The trigonal crystals have perfect rhombohedral cleavage, Hardness = 2.5; Gravity = 8.10; Luster = adamantine to dull; Color = vermillion-red when pure going to brownish red when impure, Streak is scarlet. Questions What is the name of the mineral? What is the chemistry of the mineral? What is the origin of the name? What is the mineral used for? What minerals might it associated with? Localities – (Just list the famous ones) --NM – --USA – --World – Answers to Last Month’s Questions What is the name of the mineral? Diamond What is the chemistry of the mineral? Carbon What is the origin of the name? From the Greek for invincible What is the mineral used for? Abrasives, jewelry, (heat sinks in some electronic devices and high pressure devices in materials research). What kind of rock is it usually found in? Kimberlite What other kinds of deposits may it be found in? Gravels derived from kimberlites (Toughie – What kind of rocks does it originate in?) Rare ultramafic rocks like griquaites. Localities – (Just list the famous ones) --NM – none --USA – Arkansas. CO & WY --World – India, Africa, Brazil, Russia, Canada, Australia Paul Hlava 030206
Orders are being taken from those members needing an Albuquerque Gem and Mineral Club nametag. The cost is approximately $9.00/ea.
REMEMBER: A nametag will let people know who you are.
Your chisel hand is covered with scar tissue and your hammer hand has blisters. One eye is constantly squinting as if looking thru a magnifier. Your face is scarred from walking into things while searching the ground looking for rocks. Wb1q Do you have your own "You might be a rockhound if"? E-mail them to agmcnews@aol.com, or give them to Darlene Nelson at the meeting.
RENEW YOUR MEMBERSHIP NOW
AGMC GENERAL MEETING Monday, 27Jan03 It was announced that Wilma Hill, a long time member, recently passed away. Many may remember this very nice person. Orlando announced that our club has the beginning of a web site thanks to Tom Katonak. It will be useful in advertising our annual show and getting club information to members. Orlando thanked Loyd Keller, our recently retired Treasurer, for his many years of service to our club. Paul made a presentation on our upcoming 36th annual Show being held on March 21 - 23 at the School Arts and Flower buildings at the State Fair grounds. This event is our big money maker of the year and our chance to educate the public about our hobby. We need everyone’s participation for its success. It could be a lot of work for a few but a party if many are involved (coffee and donuts & a pizza lunch for workers). It won’t work without the volunteerism of our members. Our customary pre-show dinner is always fun and our hospitality and friendliness to the Dealers is renowned. Signup sheets for the various show functions were passed around for volunteers to sign. Of course one bonus for the volunteers is the club paying $480 for Parking Permits for those who help. Ray and Kimberly had a flyer handout with a map giving details on our next field trip to the Tucumcari area on February 22nd. Grant Kuck reminded the 77 of us present of Scott Wilson’s talk on making man-made opals given almost a year ago. Tonight he would introduce a man who has made an exceptional living for the last 38 years mining opal in Austrialia that was formed the old fashioned way, by nature. Without slides we were entranced and entertained for the next hour listening to James Mougris tell his life’s story of his experiences as an Australian opal miner while he was wearing an opal bolo tie he says was worth $10,000. James Mougris was born in Greece and in 1952 immigrated with his parents to Australia. Traveling thirty days on a boat to reach Perth and then 4 days through some of the most treacherous waters on earth (southern coast of Australia) to reach Melbourne where they were loaded on a bus holding 60 people and driven to army barracks where they stayed for four weeks. His father got a job making 12 pounds a week which was not enough to feed the family, so they moved to the middle of the hardscrabble part of Austrialia to try their hand at mining. They did pretty well, as they were able to pay off the house in two years. That house, purchased at 200 pounds, is now worth about 4000 pounds! James went to the twelfth year of school and failed, he says, due to discrimination against immigrants. With no alternatives or options and 18 years old, he went with his father in 1964 to Coober Pedy. Digging by hand a four foot diameter hole with James at the bottom of this hole, cramped, and digging with a 12 gallon drum by his side, he would tell his father when to haul it to the surface via a windless. In about 11 days he had gone down 22 feet where he remembers hitting hard sandstone and found a pocket of 330 fossilized shells – all opalized! In 1966 they sold them for 12,000 pounds but today would be worth $3,000 each! Back then $1 (pounds) Australian equaled about $1.30 U.S. but today $1 Australian equals about $2 U.S. There has been a 12% to 15% increase per year in value of opal over the years. After all this work James realized about $4000 so bought a block of land, a house and, with additional borrowed money, he bought some apartment buildings. They then went back to mining at Coober Pedy with a purchased John Deer back-hoe. After four weeks of digging many holes they never saw a trace of opal so decided to travel about 25 miles north to Whiskey Field. On their way there, at Show Patch, they got stuck in a creek bed and in trying to dig their way out found gray opal. It was low grade, but they were mining 4,000 to 5,000 oz/day so were getting wealthy at a tune of $2,000/day. James says "mining for opal is 90% luck and 9% having the right tools to work plus the capital to get started. If you’ve got the capital - buy the opal!" By 1975 they were not finding any opal and were using up their capital made over the last 4 to 5 years and things were getting difficult. Never-the-less, James decided to go back to Greece where he spent some time before touring Europe for a year In 1976 they went to Mintabie where they worked for four months on land rented from the aborigines. They hooked up with the guys who owned Eight Mile Opal Mine, the largest opal run and some of the best ever found. Today that opal sells for $15,000/oz. Here James and his father worked on claims three feet wide and four feet deep on an edge of an escarpment. One must look for the "verticals" (cracks) that allow access of water from the surface to penetrate into the sandstone where the opal is formed. At four feet down they found a seam of opal, some of the best he’s seen and it sold for $1,000/oz. At seventeen feet, following a vertical crack from the surface, they found a pocket of 500 ounces worth ½ million dollars.With that profit they bought a D-9 (bulldozer?) that could rip three feet. Ripping 70 x 70 yards and 20 yards deep they found five or six pockets. Working about four claims a year, expenses dropped to about 30% of what they were. James brought with him tonight about $300,000 worth of opal in a carrying case. One specimen he brought tonight was a large, in-the-rough specimen of ¾ inch seam opal in its host sandstone that he passed around for our inspection and said was worth about $15,000! He told another story of another claim that went 50 feet deep which he worked with a bulldozer and scraper, his parents and two other partners. He accepted an offer of ½ million dollars for the claim with the deal to be finalized in one week. That left he and the crew 6 days to go down another four feet by working 16 hour days. It was worth it. In a 5 x 7 yard area they found opal about 6 inches thick on Thursday and the deal was going thru on Saturday. Working quickly, they pulled ½ million dollars out before Saturday. The deal was completed but the buyer apparently got discouraged quickly and left the claim soon afterwards. Three years later James was back to the same claim and pulled out another $5m worth of opal! Is this guy lucky or what!James has been coming to the United States since 1984 to sell at Tucson (and other places?) and hasn’t done any mining for seven years. He says flat seam opal is the best to buy as you can get 45 to 90 carets per specimen. He also demonstrated how a bag of it should ring like shards of glass when shook. Any prospecting done now requires a permit and 2 to 3 hundred thousand dollars to get you going properly. James cautions to be very careful when buying opal as there are many "sharks" out there, perhaps more than in other precious stone. As in any venue of life when one spends "real" money you better know what you’re doing.Door prizes were drawn including two expensive opals that were donated by James Mougris. Needless to say ticket sales were brisk. Mike Potts brought the Club’s fluorescent light and some specimens collected at the famous Red Cloud Mine in Arizona were observed under the light. Refreshments provided by Orlando and Julie were enjoyed while discussing the night’s program and catching up on each other’s news. We were finally all shooed out of the building at about 10:30 p.m. by the museum’s security. Way to go Grant. What a great program to start the year! Dave Moats, Secretary
FEBRUARY FIELD TRIP MESALANDS DINOSAUR MUSEUM Our field trip for February will be to the Mesalands Dinosaur Museum in Tucumcari, NM. We have a group reservation for Saturday, Feb 22. The plan is to meet at the museum at 9:30 a.m. From there we will travel as a group to the Caprock Amphitheater for some fossil collecting and then return to the museum around 1:00 p.m. for a guided tour (including behind the exhibits). Weather and time permitting, we will visit the aragonite pseudomorph location near Puerto de Luna (south of Santa Rosa) on the way back to Albuquerque. We have a group rate for the museum tour ($3.00/adult and $2.00/children 11 and under.) Tucumcari is a two and a half hour drive from Albuquerque. You will take exit 332 north in town for one and a quarter miles and turn right on Laughlin. The museum is on the southeast corner, and there are signs. The Caprock Amphitheater fossil location is about 20 miles east of Tucumcari. Turn south, near San Jon, for about seven miles. I have not been to the site, but Dr. Craig Currell, the museum director, tells me that cretaceous marine fossils (ammonites, pelecypods, etc.) can be found at this location. I would expect us to be at this stop for about one and a half hours, and then we will return to the museum for our tour. The Puerto de Luna aragonite pseudomorph location is reached by taking SR 91 south for ten miles from Santa Rosa. We will travel as a group from Tucumcari to this location. The pseudormorphs at this location are calcite after aragonite, which is more precisely referred to as a paramorph. A paramorph as the same composition as the original crystal (both calcium carbonate). Kimberly Richie JOHN SCULLY 2003 WEBMASTER John Scully has graciously accepted the position as Webmaster for 2003. His task will be to design, install, and monitor the site. In the near future, online access to agmc.info will be available to club members directly through the internet. It is anticipated that the web site will contain a history of the club, current field trip information, News Nuggets, and other activities and information which cannot be provided in a 12-page newsletter. REFRESHMENTS Ok, folks, I know you like having refreshments at the general meeting every month. I know because the food always disappears, right down to the last crumb. Last month I passed around a signup sheet for refreshment volunteers for 2003. There were about 80 people at the meeting and I ended up with 5 volunteers for the year!! You may not know it but the club pays for those refreshments. You just do the footwork, give the receipts to Stephanie Bell, the Treasurer, and she will cut you a check. What we consume monthly is: four 2-liter bottles of soft drinks (one diet please) and about 100 cookies or similar sweets. We have cups, which Kimberly brings, and I bring the cooler with two bags of ice. I know some of you figure that you volunteer for the show and the science fair but this club takes volunteers eleven months out of the year to make it what it is. February, July, August and October are still open. Call me at 345-0520 and give us a hand by volunteering with the refreshments. -Orlando Enclosed is your club membership form for 2003. Please include all the names to be included in your household membership. This information is required by the American Federation of Mineralogical Societies A.F.M.S. for insurance and dues purposes. Annual Dues are $20.00 per household and $10.00 per family for memberships from June 30, 2003-December 31, 2003.
Albuquerque Gem & Mineral Club Membership Form Last Name_____________________________ Renewal from 2002? Y N Senior Member Names: 1.___________________________ 2.___________________________ Junior Member Names: 1.___________________age______ 2.___________________age______ 3.___________________age______ If this is a renewal, is the News Nuggets going to the proper address? Y N Please fill in the following information Mailing Address: ______________________Apt. # ________ City:____________________ State: _______ ZIP + 4: _______-_____ Phone: (_____) _____-______ Please include. This is only for club use and not for any other purpose e-mail Address: _____________________________ Annual Dues: Dues are $20.00 per family. Send this form and check to: AGMC PO Box 13718, Albuquerque, NM 87192
February 24 Speaker: MIKE SPILDE Mike Spilde is a Research Scientist/Geologist with the University of New Mexico Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences and the Institute of Meteoritics. His program, "microbes and minerals", was first presented at the recent Mineral Symposium in Socorro. The Albuquerque Gem & Mineral Club meets on the 4th Monday of every month (except December). All meetings are held at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Sciences, 1801 Mountain Road NW in Old Town (the entrance is on 18th Street), Albuquerque, NM. The meeting begins at 7:30 PM. There will be a short business meeting prior to the evening’s talk, which begins at approximately 8 PM. Refreshments and door prizes will follow immediately after the talk.
Albuquerque Gem & Mineral ClubDarlene Nelson, Editor PO Box 13718 Albuquerque, NM 87192-3718
|