The cigognes (storks), Alsatian symbol and good-luck charm, were at their post and ready to welcome us all to the 20th Salon de Ensisheim on Friday June 21. This year the Show was back in the Palais de la Regence, just in time to celebrate its anniversary where it all started in 2000. A commemorative medal shows the fall of […]
During the recent Tucson Show I had the pleasure of a visit by Mary-Elizabeth Zucolotto, curator of the meteorite collection of the Museum of Rio. We had a long chat about the recent fire of the museum and its aftermath; she showed me many pictures on her cell phone, told me about all the efforts to recover so many artifacts
THE FIRE OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF RIO DE JANEIRO Read Post »
Almahata Sitta: Happy Birthday Almahata Sitta!! Almahata Sitta is 10 years old! It was the first meteorite to be identified as such before it even hit the ground. The story has been told many times but it is worth repeating. On the night of October 6, 2008, Richard Kowalski was the Catalina Sky Survey astronomer on duty under the
On August 28, 2017, the meteorite world, Texas Christian University, his former students and his many friends celebrated the life of Dr. Arthur Ehlmann, a kind giant of a man, a man who called Texas Christian University home for 60 years. People from all walks of life, academics, business people, former students and others came to honor him and to
Yes, the Ensisheim-Meteorite Show has the feel of a family reunion. We all meet there in this friendly old Alsatian town once a year, we celebrate the new deserving members of the family, we learn about the new accomplishments of various members, and we chat until late in the night over Alsatian tart, Meteor beer and Rhine wine. Friday around
The Great Family Reunion Also Known As The Ensisheim Show Read Post »
Personally, I have known Dr. Ehlmann a long time. How long exactly? Since I received a question through EBay… It must have been early in 2001. I had posted a small fragment of NWA 753 Rumurutite and this person was asking if I had a much larger piece available,—perfect spelling, perfect grammar and punctuation, unusual on EBay, the name at
The Harriman file is much bigger than the others with few pictures but many letters detailing a long, convoluted and difficult negotiation with many players. It was carried out by an associate of Oscar Monnig, who goes by the name of Vega or Bunch, not his real name according to Dr. Ehlmann, a resourceful person who not only did not
Atoka is a small town in the wooded hills of southern Oklahoma, some 100 miles north of Fort Worth and TCU, as the crow or the meteorite flies. According to Wikipedia, it was settled by the Choctaw Indians in the 1830s and eventually named after their chief by a Baptist missionary, and besides a small skirmish between Union and Confederate
by Alain Carion The tektites of Ivory Coast are without a doubt the rarest of the tektites in any collections. They have been found while searching for gold, particularly in gold placers, but local shamans and tribal chiefs usually kept them and prized them as amulets with great powers. They are sometimes called “Ivoirites”; they are black, opaque, often round
The Leedey meteorite fell in the evening of November 25, 1943 in western Oklahoma. The story of its recovery tells marvelously well how the traveling conditions and the communications have changed in the last 70 years. It is also a marvelous example of collaboration between the two best known meteorites hunters of the time: Oscar Monnig and Harvey Nininger. And
Somervell County, about 55 miles (almost 90 km) south-west of Fort Worth, is the second smallest county in Texas, famous for some of the best preserved dinosaur tracks along the Paluxy River in the central part of the county and also for having been a big producer of moonshine during Prohibition, according to the Texas State Historical Society website. It
INTRODUCTION Oscar E. Monnig was born in Fort Worth, Texas on September 2, 1902. Although he received a law degree from the University of Texas in 1925, he worked for the family business, a chain of dry goods stores all his life and eventually became the President of the Company, before selling it in 1981 as his health and sight
