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Two meteorite A to Z books where specially signed and inscribed for the event. Anne Black, William Jensen and Mike Jensen each signed and made several notes inside. Such as Mike's: Coments Auction 2001 Mike Jensen 9/14/01 "the auctioneer". One book went for $15.00 while the other went (to me) for $20.00. Free drinks and eatibles where provided by the Comets. Many of us stood around and talked trying our best to forget the tuesday before. I believe all enjoyed themselves and a portion of the sales is being donated to different charities so we managed a little good as well. After we parted from the auction it was now late so off we were off to get a room. I had cancelled a room I had reserved because of everything this last week. Unlike Tuscon however., there is lots of housing in Denver. The only worry being the airport was yet up to speed and many where still stuck in town. We did manage to find a room not far from all the action. The hotel we stayed at boasted proudly $19.95 rooms. Somehow they were $42.95 but it was fair as they were clean and was in good location for us. The morning light woke me up around 7:00am. I guessed it to be 8:00am and would have been correct had I been in Kansas, which is one time zone over. I played with the specimans I got the day before and made notes untill my brother woke up. After breakfest and a brief tour around the football stadiums for photos it was back to the Holiday Inn. Now it is 9:00am, people were starting to open the tents outside the hotel bordering the parking lot and behind the building. Most of the rooms where now open and I wandered around a little picking up a couple items here and there. Many meteorites and tektites where to be found on the 3rd floor and I spent several hours within its halls. I collect a lot of the African meteorites and Dean Bessey was by far the NWA man in Denver. Among the table of the new NWA869 L4 I found a very nice 4700 gram oriented individual with great regmylsts pitting and almost complete crust with the exception of the lee side, I couldn't help picking up a couple extra kgs for selling and trading. Among the room was two areas with thin sections, Imilacs, morrocans, some nice ammonites, Sudbury impact slices, and more. For Dean's effort he gets the "Most NWA Meteorites in Denver 2001" and the "Best Selection of Thin Sections in Denver 2001" awards. Several foriegn meteorite dealers where attending the show, including Hans Koser, who had a lot of African offerings, some very large Campos with nice pitting. I picked up some Bendego and some Santa Cararina before making my way into other rooms. One of the russian dealers had Sikhotes in almost every direction. This was a great chance for me to pick out a few hundred grams of small Sikhote-Alins from many, many kilograms. They also had a what I believe was the main mass of DAG200. A meteorite with an unusal shape that reminds everyone who sees it as.....well the male organ. This item was also in the auction the night before and failed to receive the opening bid of $200.00. It did however get a quite a few laughs. Premiering here where several new moon rocks and carbonacous. Eduardo Jawerbaum's room was filled with a lot of very nice offerings. Some complete or main mass SAH's. A display full of Pallisites including a nice Esquel slice over 1.6 kg had a large area of almost complete olivine. Moon, Mars, Howardites and many other rare offerings to empty your wallet filled another case. Eduardo did the best job at having all the well known meteorites (Gibeon, Gao-Genie, Imilac, Allende, Odessa,ect) as well as the more expensive items like Kopeta, Zagami, and Gloria Mountain. An eye grabbing offering here was a 12 kilogram slice of the Argentina Rio Limay stone meteorite. I give Eduardo the award for "Best varity of Meterites at Denver 2001". Somehow among all these items it was his minerals that caught my eye and I walked out with several flats. Okay we wheeled out several flats. My brother also managed a trade for some Chassigny, something I thought was unusual since the auction that Friday was where he bought his first meteorites.Also to be found lerking around the 3rd floor was none other then the Meteorite Man himself, Robert Hagg. Robert Hagg was very friendly and posed for a pichure with me. He seems to be a very positive person and is a good spokeperson for our hobby. Big deals where in the background and few even saw Hagg. For his efforts I give Hagg the "Hinding in the Background Denver 2001" award. Several of us sellers stood around the hallway talking as big wheels where turning. Back to Dean Bessey's room for a couple MGD longnecks, my choice of beer and apparently his as well. Then off to the second floor... Blaine Reed and Bruno Fectay where the spotlights of the second floor.Blaine Reed was a quiet guy that had a lot of nice items at fair prices. He had many US meteorite slices for the most part under what is considered "retail". This room had also became a hangout for other dealers and collectors. It had a pleasant atmosphere as most people where drinking Reed's beer rather then buying his meteorites. Blaine Reed spent most of the time being quite while others drank his beer. I give Reed the "Most Full Room with No One Buying Anything Award." Here I also found a fellow collector from Kansas, Rex Powell. Jim Strope (Sikhote-alin.com), who sharing the room with Reed, pulled out a nice group of oriented or flight marked Sikhotes as well as a very awesome thin Esqual slice. The Sikhotes had several peoples attention and a few grabbed my eye. Rex would see ones that excited him and would scream out from time to time making us all laugh. I picked up out a neat bullet shaped, a nice heat shield and one of the stangest oriented meteorites I have seen. This Sikhote is about 2-3mm thick and has an almost complete rim. It fell very flat. Anyone who seem Jim's orientation collection would agree that he gets the "Best Oriented Meteorites in Denver 2001" award. Bruno Fectay was sharing his room with a mineral dealer that remained quiet the whole time I was there. He had a nice selection of Taza, along with many new meteorites incliding a new martian meteorite that looks very much like Zagami, but is quite different. Several new moon rocks and enchites could also be found. however, other then a few morrocans there was no low or middle range prices items to be found. Bruno did seem quite knowledgefull in the new finds he had to offer. Showing chemical charts and explaining several of the new meteorites well. The Western Inn beside the Holiday Inn had several meteorites sellers as well. None of which I had heard of before and walking the hallways most doors where shut. One dealer did have a very large collection of moldavites in all size and most of the well known irons. The items that interested here me was a large pile of tiny Campos less then 10 grams each. $1.00 a gram was fair for such small irons but I didnt buy any as I was still trying to "brouse". Lacking meteorites to look at, We now decided to make our way to the Merchandise Market, where I knew from the meteorite e-mail list. Anne Black with Allian Carrion and the Jensen's where settled. This show was several together. After donning a Wholesale buyers badge I was given free reign of the complex. This was the fossil headquarters of Denver. Entertaining the crowds was a lady with an animated baby dinosaur (The Stone Company) for rent and Mr. Bones, a guy in a realistic dinosaur suit that was going around and "eating" people. The kids really enjoyed it and several even asked for his autograph. He handled the kids quite well and it made me and my brother both smile. Among the many fossil dealers were a lot of Chinese sellers. I mention this only because of the lack of attention that was spent at their offerings. This was everybody elses loss. One of my finds among their tables were tektites at great prices (Imagine that). One dealer had his marked down to $5.00 each. I grabbed the 4 largest and was able to get them for $15.00. All were at least 99% chip free and I could tell they were well over 100 grams. To my suprize when I later weighed them the largest was 229 grams and the smallest was 193 grams. Wish I would have grabbed a few others but I am happy with what I got. |
