Blaine Reed
P.O. Box 1141
Delta, CO 81416
Ph/fax (970) 874-1487
LIST 218-
Admire, coins, graphite, etc.
August 21, 2018
Dear collectors,
Once again, I really hesitated to post this offering, as there tend to be very few people interested in meteorites during these (still far too hot where I live) summer days. I know that the entire continent of Europe is almost entirely shut down the month of August as most folks tend to take this month off for vacation (except for the poor folks stuck in the work/ businesses that need to serve all of those vacationers). However, I do have some really neat (all be it generally on the more expensive side) items I picked up months ago that I thought I’d offer up to you my direct customers before they get put out on display at the soon (far too soon) to be here Denver Show.
DENVER SHOW INFO:
I will be gone from home September 4th through the 17th (and possibly a day or two more). I will be at the same spot as last year – Crowne Plaza (just north of I-70 at Chambers Rd - exit #283 – 15500 E. 40th Ave, Denver, CO 80239 for those of you that want to enter the address into a GPS). Some folks were caught by surprise that our show had moved when they went to the old spot (what was the Holiday Inn for decades but then became a Ramada for awhile but may be something different these days) last year and did not find a show. I did get to talk with a few such people, a couple of which never made it to my new location.
The more specifics: My selling space is a conference room called “Frisco” on the West side of the building (near the hotel itself), whereas the “Main entrance” for the big showroom part of the show is on the East side of the conference building structure. If you park on the West side, near the hotel, and come through the glass doors to the right of the sign that says “Conference Center” on the lower building (to the left of the actual hotel entrance) and turn right IMMEDIATELY after passing through those doors, you will be looking right into my showroom. Don’t get confused if you see beautiful slabs of petrified wood displayed along the back wall – Mike Murphy of Murph’s pertified wood (a long time friend) is using that space. The rest of the room is mine. If you do park on the East side of the conference structure, you’ll have a somewhat long and winding walk to reach me (all indoors, so no worries about weather issues, just exercise). Barring any disasters, I should be open by 10am Friday the 7th. If things go well, I may even be open late the afternoon of the 6th. The official show opening time has changed this year. It was 9am last year but is 10am this year. Some folks (those that sell supplies to the dealers) will be open at 9am. As I did fairly well in the mornings last year I will likely try and stick to a 9am opening time myself this year (though it may be a hair later some days. It was a bit difficult to get everything done that needed to be done and open at 9am some days last year). Evenings: I will certainly stay open after the show’s official close of 6pm (being able to do this was the whole point of getting my own selling room). Last year I did not have a lot of visitors after hours. But then, I didn’t realize that they’d be locking those Conference Center glass doors just outside my door right around 6:30 either. I didn’t get the chance to warn people of this last year (so I am sure many folks simply turned around and left when they found those doors locked. Unfortunately, you really can’t see into my room and see that I am still open from outside those sliding doors either). I plan to stay open until at least 9pm each night, possibly later if folks are still visiting (though, if I hope to open by 9 the next morning, I can’t stay open drastically later). So, if you do come by to visit after 6:30 or so and find the conference center doors already locked, go in through the hotel lobby, turn left after leaving the check-in area, left again when you come to the restaurant area and my room is down the hall another 100 feet maybe. The show officially runs through September 15th. I plan to stay the full length, but will likely close at 6pm on the final day so I can begin the long arduous task of packing.
I will have a cell phone with me but it will only be turned on while I am at the show and as it is a pay by the minute thing I can’t freely chat too much. The number is (970) 417-8783. I don’t recall how well this worked from inside my selling cage (having no windows, I barely ever got see the sun/ sky the entire show last year) so there may be issues, so don’t get upset if I don’t answer, can’t retrieve messages right away. Regardless, messages may be a problem. In Creede I found that I had a message or two but could not retrieve them. It seems that the message system is demanding a “pass code” for me to do so. I have never needed one before, never asked to change my service this way nor have I been notified of this change (and what ever the “default” pass code is currently). So, if I can’t get this weird issue resolved soon, I may NOT be able to retrieve messages on my phone, unfortunately.
Anyway, on to the list!
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| LIST 218 |
ADMIRE, Kansas: Stony-iron (Pallasite). Found 1881.
These are pieces I’ve had laying around uncoated, unprotected for at least a year before I bothered to do anything (polish and coat) with them. They each had some rust but it wasn’t drastic and didn’t seem to be developing any further (and certainly wasn’t doing the oozing, crumbling, crystals falling out thing as many Admire specimens like to do). They have been sitting around out in the open (no special care, storage, etc. Just sitting in a cardboard box in a corner of my office) for at least 6 months since I did the prep work on them. Looking really, really closely (and with a little imagination) you can see a few tiny brown dots on these (but you really do have to look) but no real rusting! However, I do live in a dry (really dry this summer) climate so I’d suggest taking at least some precautions storing these if you live in a humid climate. Regardless, I think these will prove to be among the most stable Admire pieces you have ever had. I have two end pieces and one thick slice. All pieces show multi-colored olivine crystals (with many bright green gemmy ones). The larger end piece has more olivine percentage wise but in generally smaller highly angular pieces whereas the other two specimens have less overall olivine but in larger (and somewhat more gemmy) olivine crystals. Really nice and pretty specimens!a) 136.3 gram end piece – 80mm x 35mm x 15mm - $275
b) 152.3 gram end piece – 70mm x 60mm x 20mm - $300
c) 384.1 gram part slice (has one cut edge) – 130mm x 65mm x 11mm - $750
ANCIENT METEORITE COIN: Seleucid Kings of Syria. Antiochas I. 280 – 261BC.
Nope, these are NOT made out of meteorite (had this misunderstanding quite a lot when I offered these in the past, despite my best attempts to explain otherwise). These are some of the earliest coins that have a DEPICTION of what is supposedly a meteorite on them. In this case, the ‘meteorite” is the pointed rock that the figure (Apollo in this case) is sitting on. Though this “listing” is really for an amazing tetradrachm (a large silver coin that I really, really considered keeping) I do have a few of the (basically same design) small bronze coins for $60 each and one drachm sliver coin (3.73 grams, 15mm diameter) for $300 (these will be with the large silver coin in the group photo).
Fantastic silver tetradrachm (16.46grams, 30mm diameter) - $800
DAR Al GANI (749), Libya: Carbobaceous chondrite (CO3). Found 1999. Tkw = around 95 kilograms.
I am pretty certain that the person I got this from got it from me many years ago. While pieces of this (and its many pairings) were commonly available back then, there is not a lot of it (not really any large amounts of any of the Libyan finds really) around now. Anyway, this is a nice natural fragment/ individual (though the shape makes me lean more towards fragment in this case) as found. It has nice smooth surfaces and edges and, thanks to wind-polishing, it is easy to see the internal structure (tiny chondrules) showing that this is indeed a piece of a CO3 meteorite.
29.6 gram natural fragment as found – 40mm x 30mm x 15mm - $120
DHOFAR (020), Oman: Ordinary chondrite (H4/5). Found 2000. Tkw = around 256 kilograms.
For a weathered meteorite, this is actually a pretty cool specimen. It has a nice dark chocolate brown wind-polished color. It has some large cracks (that still have trapped desert quartz sand grains stuck in them) but yet seems really solid (nope, not going to drop it on a concrete floor to test it though). There is actually quite a lot of obvious (but wind-polished) thumb-printed fusion crust surfaces on this specimen (making up over 50% of the exterior actually) A neat example of a weathered, but easily identifiable (thanks to those fusion crusted surfaces) meteorite.
738.9 gram individual/ fragment as found – 90mm x 70mm x 60mm - $200
GRAPHITE NODULE: Canyon Diablo, Arizona.
I got these as part of a collection (along with several of the other pieces listed here) I bought back early this spring (and then proceeded to forget about the box these were hidden in). Recently, I had a potential customer contact me and ask about Graphite nodules about a month ago. This reminded me of the “lost” (forgotten) box of collection material (of which I then remembered these were part). I sent off a couple pictures of these specimens (so I do have a couple pictures more of these than just their presence in this offering’s group photo) but never heard back. So, now that I’ve weighed and “cataloged” these, I am going to offer them here and now. One (the largest) is a really nice complete solid nodule as found. The other pieces are end pieces (resulting from splitting another nodule) that show nice metal veining inside (though this feature didn’t show up real well in pictures, despite considerable effort on our part). These are all really nice pieces of an interesting and now rarely seen material these days.a) 26.2 gram end piece – 35mm x 30mm x 15mm - $50
b) 33.7 gram end piece – 38mm x 30mm x 12mm - $60
c) 87.1 gram complete nodule – 40mm x 37mm x 30mm - $130
TUXTUAC, Mexico: Ordinary chondrite (LL5). Fell October 16, 1975. Tkw = 20+ kilograms.
Originally, two pieces totaling 4.25kg were recovered. Later (in 1989) another 25kg piece was found. Robert Haag got this piece but not without some issues. It seems that the folks that had it busted it up into many small fragments trying to find the gold, diamonds, etc that MUST be in the stone to make it worth so much. Of coarse, no such things were in it but we, as collectors, are left with mostly fragments of this meteorite. This is indeed likely one of the fragments that resulted from this “problem”. I say likely because I can’t be certain it is from that 25kg mass or a later piece (I think a couple small pieces turned up later) as this does have some minor weathering to it. This is indeed mostly broken fragment surfaces but it does have a patch of (nicely thumb-printed) fusion crust on one end (I’ll try to capture this in the group photo). 106.2 gram fragment with crust on one end – 60mm x 30mm x 30mm - $700
ZAGORA, Morocco: Silicated iron (IAB). Found 1987. Tkw = 20+ kilograms.
It has been a long while since I have had a piece of this meteorite. I thought about cutting this in half to show the silicated interior but decided to leave it as it is as it has a neat sculpted shape (that likely resulted from the softer silicates eroding away easier than the surrounding iron). This is a complete, as found (right down to the small amount of local dirt still adhering to the piece) specimen. As already mentioned, this has a neat shape with a nice mostly smooth dark chocolate brown surface. A nice piece of a now rarely seen meteorite. 104.3 gram individual as found – 70mm x 25mm x 20mm - $550
