The 2007 East Coast Show Trinity Mineral Company

Minerals posted here:  East Coast Show specimens

I arrived in Newark, New Jersey August 8th and spent the first day visitng Herb and Monica Obodda.  They kindly allowed me to stay in their home my first night and then treated me to a Maine lobster lunch.  It has been years since I had a true Maine lobster and their are few substances which humans can put in their mouths to rival the flavor.  Many thanks to Herb and Monica for their kind hospitality.

The 9th was set up day at the show.  This is a great time to visit with friends and find out more about what is new in the mineral world. Turns out there is very little that is new of significance but there are literally truck loads of incredible minerals available.  The buzz here is about the remarkable specimens of fluorite and celestite from Clay Center, Ohio.  There was a new find made at the quarry this year - the best since the late 1940s - of root beer colored fluorite on milky white celestite.  Several dealers had them here but Don and Gloria Olson by far had the best specimens and they got hit hard by collectors and many of the dealers here.   I picked out a dozen and will have them available when I get back home to Weaverville next week.
 

Wendy's minerals had some fine specimens of chartreuse green pyromorphite from the Doaping Mine in China but they were somewhat misleading in stating that they were a new find.  Their best items were the large single crystals with hoppered habit.  I have had these in the past and opted to pass on them as the prices were kind of high for what they were.

Leonard and Linda Himes of Minerals America had two impressive specimens of elbaite from the Tourmaline Queen Mine in California and Jonas mine in Minas Gerias, Brazil on display.  Absolutely stunning.
 

This is a 40+ cm specimen from the Jonas Mine in Minas Gerais, Brazil

This is a 15 cm blue cap elbaite on the side of a large quartz  crystal from the Tourmaline Queen mine in Pala, California.

Isaias Casanova had some fine specimens of chrysocolla after selenite from the San Manuel Mine in Pinal County, Arizona.

Doug Wallace had earlier sent out a notice of having various items available including some interesting minerals from the Oujela Mine in Durango, Mexico.  I stocked up on Mn-adamites, fluorite, and even one specimen of scorodite from the Ojuela mine also.  These will be posted later this week.
 
 

This is a 4 mm crystal of scorodite from the Ojuela Mine.l

This is a 5 cm specimen of manganoan adamite.

I spoke with Dudley Blauwet and he showed me some new grossular specimens from Pakistan.  He also had some new tourmalines from Afghanistan though the colors were a bit drab.  I did not pick up any of them for the update. When I saw Dudley he showed some horrific injuries from two recent bicycle accidents (For those who don't know Dudley, he is probably the person in best physical condition at any mineral show as he is a distance runner and bicyclist).   Judging from the depth and extent of his scrapes I would bet that he's had some rather painful nights trying to sleep.

The usual suspects were at the ready when Phil Scalisi started to unwrap specimens at Studio C.  This year Phil had numerous specimens from Arizona's rich mineral localities such as Bisbee, Ray, Ajo, Morenci and Rowley to name just a few.  There were other specimens from global locations but the Arizona material was the best.
 

The annual show at Phil Scalisi's booth. Pictured here are Herb Obodda, Skip Szenics, Bill Pinch, Mike Bergman, James Zigras, Dave Bunk and Kevin Brown.

Terry "Skip" Szencis had some very good specimens of his namesake - szenicsite - and also good pieces of rich apple green cuprian powellite.  I also found a very large Pennsylvanian brucite and very nice Touissit cerussite.
 
 

This is a superb specimen of szenicsite 5 cm across.

This is a 8 cm specimen of smoky cerussite fro Touissit, Morocco.

This was the first year that Hawthorneden was not at the show.  Wendy and Frank Melanson sold their business and inventory this year to Pete & Jack Heckscher under the name Crystal Circle.  Frank and Wendy will be missed but they are enjoying retirement.  Speaking of changes this was Carter Rich's last year here at the East Coast Show.  I found several interesting specimens at Carter's including a stillwellite, Chanarcillo proustite and a North Carolina amethyst that was in the Bement collection. He has one more show to do at Franklin, New Jersey and then he and Jean will call it quits.

Sites and scenes from the show...

The theme of the show this year was on minerals and mining history of Sterling Hill, New Jersey. Dick Hauck brought numerous specimens from the museum's collection as well as interesting artifacts.  There was also a tunnel constructed so that some dazzling fluorescent displays could be set up.  The following are images from the displays.

Final thoughts about the show.  This year's edition was very light in the way of anything new in the mineral world. However, there were scads of very good specimens available from recently released collections.  This seems to be the "soup du jour" these days.   Overall the show was well attended but surprisingly few people from over seas were here. I would have expected to see a lot of folks from Europe here since their currency is crushing the US dollar.  But then I am not an economist so what the heck do I really know?  My plans are to be here again next year as this has become one of my favorite mineral  "hits" during the year.

Next year Herb and Moni Obodda will have their collection on display.   I have seen their collection at their home and can assure you that it will be similar to a visit to a fine museum.  Their Paki and Afghan material is stunning and Herb has many fine examples of classics from around the planet.

Thanks to Marty and Laura for their professional work in pulling this all together.

See you again next year here from West Springfield, Massachusetts.

John