Meteorite Times Magazine Contents Paul Harris Featured Articles Accretion Desk by Martin Horejsi Jim’s Fragments by Jim Tobin Meteorite Market Trends by Michael Blood Bob’s Findings by Robert Verish Micro Visions by John Kashuba Norm’s Tektite Teasers by Norm Lehrman Mr. Monning’s Collection by Anne Black IMCA Insights by The IMCA Team Meteorite of the Month by Editor Tektite of the Month by Editor Terms Of Use Materials contained in and linked to from this website do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of The Meteorite Exchange, Inc., nor those of any person connected therewith. In no event shall The Meteorite Exchange, Inc. be responsible for, nor liable for, exposure to any such material in any form by any person or persons, whether written, graphic, audio or otherwise, presented on this or by any other website, web page or other cyber location linked to from this website. 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Meteorite Times Magazine Book Notice: Meteorite: Nature and Culture by Maria Golia Martin Horejsi http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/M/bo22258162.html For over three decades I have been collecting, studying and writing about meteorites from the perspective of their impact on culture, society and science. So I’m more than a little excited about this book. Golia blends the magic of meteorites across time and ownership. The book is filled with stories, example, and exceptional pictures. At no time does it go overboard into heavy science which makes it a great read for the casual meteorite aficionado. Many of the colorful and large pictures are the work of my friend Tom Phillips who initiated the Micro Visions column in The Meteorite Times. In fact the book is filled with the litterati and glitterati of meteorites, both intellectual and commercial. The tales of science are as thrilling to uncover as the auctions stories. Whether poetry, paintings, or pop culture, Golia drills home the interaction between everything meteorite in a precious tome of some 208 pages. Sitting on over a kilo of history, no doubt that those lucky witnesses to the fall of Alfianello would have ever expected that rocks falling from space would be such an important contribution to humanities’s intellectual evolution. It’s not very often that a book such as Meteorite: Nature and Culture comes along. In fact, pretty much never. Here’s the dope from the publisher… Book Description from the publisher’s website: “Arriving amid thunderous blasts and flame-streaked skies, meteorites were once thought to be messengers from the gods. Worshipped in the past, now scrutinized with equal zeal by scientists, meteorites helped sculpt Earth’s features and have shaped our understanding of the planet’s origins. Meteorite tells the long history of our engagement with these sky-born rocks, which are among the rarest things on earth. Scientists, scholars and enthusiasts have scoured the skies and combed Earth’s most unforgiving reaches for meteorites, contributing to a body of work that situates our planet and ourselves within the vastness of the universe. Prized for their strange and otherworldly qualities, meteorites are both collectibles and commodities, art objects and the objects of artists’ desires, while ‘meteorite hunting’ is an adventurous, lucrative profession for some and an addictive hobby for thousands of others. This richly illustrated, wide-ranging account surveys the place of meteoritic phenomena in science, myth, art, literature and popular culture. Appealing to anyone interested in interplanetary space, in the uncanny and the marvelous, Meteorite explores the ancient, lasting power of the meteorite to inspire and awe.” As a paperback, the retail price of $24.95 might seem on the high side compared to Richard Norton’s Rocks From Space 2ed. or Caroline Smith’s recent book Meteorites, the books is well worth it. Not as hard-fact filled as RFS, but if you want to understand the landscape of meteorites in the 21st century, then Golia’s book is your one-stop-shop to get you up to speed. But then again, with the inflation of out- of-print meteorite book prices, you would be happy to pay the $25 now than the $100 used price a few years in the future. Meteorites are crying for attention, and have have been for centuries. Many have listened, but then muted the message when trying to broadcast the information to a wider audience. the but not since Christopher Cokinos painted his picture back in 2009 with his “epic journey” of meteorites in his thick book The Fallen Sky: An Intimate History of Shooting Stars, has there been an attempt to sell the magic of meteorites to the very public that his been infinitely affected the the rocks from space that fall into our lives every year. Meteorites: Nature and Culture is the next chapter in our collective journey where the humble meteorite has brought us together for better or worse. Until next time…. Meteorite Times Magazine The 20th Anniversary Gold Basin Meteorite Celebration James Tobin Jim Kriegh finding a Gold Basin meteorite with his metal detector in 1998. Photo by Richard Norton The History Shown above is a 20.07 gram Gold Basin meteorite from this writer’s collection with an unusual metal inclusion, it has the normal ancient exterior appearance. Twenty years ago Jim Kriegh found the first meteorites at Gold Basin, Arizona while prospecting for gold in Hualapai Wash. He had the stones identified and confirmed as space rocks. For the next two years or so the area was systematically hunted by Jim Kriegh and Twink Monrad and John Blennert to determine the extent of the strewnfield in cooperation with the University of Arizona. They received special permission to hunt in the Lake Mead Recreational Area and those meteorites were sent away to the Smithsonian. Going to the strewnfield month by month for two years revealed that the strewnfield was of enormous size. We now know that it is even far larger extending beyond Lake Mead into Nevada and having personally found a Gold Basin meteorite far to the south it is truly a huge strewnfield. Gold Basin meteorites have also been on Earth for a very long time. It was thought years ago that they might have arrived millions of years ago during the Wisconsin Glaciation. But new technology and techniques set a time-frame of 10,000 to 15,000 years ago for the fall. The Gold Basin area has from nearly the start been a Gordian Knot to unravel. While many are L4 Chondrites some were early on being classified as L5 and L6 with solo meteorites as would be expected mixed into such a large area. Today with a dozen different meteorite names in the area it is still a confusing situation. So questions remain today about the relationship of all these old meteorites of varying classifications. Are they part of just one huge fall of perhaps a brecciated mass? Or were there actually a dozen or so falls on the same plot of land. Hunting continues and finds continue to be made. The area is filled with “hot rocks” that are iron mineral rich and set off metal detectors. These Hot Rocks were what originally made finding meteorites a little easier. The gold prospectors would get a hit on a meteorite and dig the spot but finding what they thought was just another hot rock threw it aside by the hole and moved on to hunt gold. After the recognition of the hot rocks being meteorites many were found still lying near the numerous holes from the past. Gold Basin has been a challenging place to hunt. Three trips in the past with just a single meteorite found. What will this fourth trip yield? Before The Event I begin this article while I am in the packing and getting things together stage of the trip. It has been a long time since I have been dry camping just out in the desert with no facilities. Paul and I used to do it all the time with the first astronomy club where we met. But for the last 20 years he has had an RV and I have gone to places with at least water and electricity if I went camping alone. But the Gold Basin 20th Anniversary Celebration was being held out in the desert with nothing in the way of amenities. Like an island; if you don’t bring it with you then you don’t have it. I had to get all the camping equipment out and clean it up. I had a fire the last time I used a Coleman stove and I am not referring to the normal fire it is supposed to make. This was billowing orange flames lapping into the camper as I used it on the tailgate of my truck. I turned off the valve but the fire did not stop so I grabbed the fire extinguisher and put it out.