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Re: (meteorobs) Re: what does a meteorite look like?

>From time to time we get on the subject of locating meteorites and I've 
always wanted to relate a story that was in one of my older California 
Mining Journals from the '70s after I found it again so I could give more 
details, but I have a hundred or so CMJs and not the time to search for it so 
from memory and while the subject is hot.....

     Two prospectors found a very large meteorite on federal lands in the 
'70s. Recognizing the potencial value for their find they put a placer claim 
on the site which was open for mining claims. A placer claim is a legal 
claim for loose minerals not part of the parent rock but in the overburden 
of the area, the meteorite would have been "placer" material. They 
removed it with a crane and notified everyone that they had a very large 
meteroite for sale, about a ton. Folks from some prestigious scientific 
organization in Washington, DC, came and looked at it and claimed it for the 
government, without payment to the miners. They brought federal 
marshals and removed it. All attempts to get payment for the huge 
meteorite were lost, so we have a moral to this tale of thievery, if you find 
a really big meteorite worth lots of money maybe it isn't best to tell 
exactly where you found it. These guys were robed by the government of a 
valuable find they had legally claimed under our mining laws. That's as I 
remember it, maybe I'll look it up and give names and dates, location of the 
find, the "scientist" from the Smithsonian and the size of the meteorite.

                                                     Dave English
                                                     Oceanside, California

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