The
752nd Meeting
of
the Mineralogical Society
of Southern California
7:30
p.m.,
Friday, September 8, 2000
Geology Building E Lecture Hall
Pasadena City College
Pasadena, California
Featuring
a Talk
by
Professor
Gary L Peterson
“Exploring the Martian Desert”
We are pleased to welcome Dr. Gary L. Peterson, Professor of Geology at San Diego State University who will speak on “Exploring the Martian Desert.“ Professor Peterson has been fascinated with planetary geology since man began exploring space. He has addressed many audiences and has a long list of publications dealing with various aspects of the subject. A graduate of the University of Colorado (Boulder) in 1959, he earned both M. S. and Ph. D. degrees from the University of Washington. He was a Visiting Scholar at Stanford University, and Visiting Professor of Geology, University of Montana, 1977. He joined the staff at San Diego State University in 1963. He is a Fellow of The Geological Society of America and a member of The Planetary Society.
Planetary geology can best be described by quoting from Dr. Peterson’s website "Planetary Geology Lectures for Southern California," at http://www.rohan.sdsu.edu/~3gleep6/poster.html: “The United States and Russia have long-term Solar System exploration programs. These undertakings have provided us with detailed imaging at a variety of scales of all planets and major satellites except Pluto/Charon. Many more NASA projects are currently underway. Landings on Venus (Russia), Mars (U. S.) and the Moon (Russia and U. S.) greatly enriched the available imagery with rock samples and/or analyses.
How is this voluminous information to be interpreted? The only way to comprehend most of it is to place it within the context of our understanding of the Earth. That field of endeavor is Planetary Geology. The persons most adept at interpreting features of other planets and satellites would be those who are most adept at interpreting similar features on the Earth.”
Thanks to the hard work of several people our annual potluck and swap meet was a rousing success. I want to especially thank Janet Gordon who spent her whole day there making sure that we had all the facilities and support we needed. Pat Stevens arranged for Tony Kampf to give us a very interesting and enjoyable talk on his two trips to Brazil this summer. Although he could not be there Jim Schlegel loaned us his ice chests, and Carolyn Seitz brought eating utensils for all and shared her experience from organizing the potluck last year.
In order to make cleanup easy we had covered all the tables with disposable plastic table clothes and had placed two large trash cans and a cardboard box for recyclable cans near the door. During my announcements I explained to everyone that we did not want to leave a mess since the classrooms we were using had to be ready for class on Monday. I asked everyone to clean up after themselves and as we were getting ready to leave it looked like everything had worked fine and there was not much left to do. I went out to the car with a cart load of stuff. When I came back I found Janet in the hallway with a mop and a bucket, and the box of cans stuffed in with the rest of the trash. At the last minute someone had thoughtlessly tossed a nearly full can of pop into the recycle box and undone the good efforts of the rest of us. I guess next year we will just have to announce that the recycle box is for empty cans.
It was good to see several members who do not usually make it to general meetings. The Moller’s were down and Mike Evans came up and both brought some nice stuff to trade. A happy surprise was to see Ron Sleeper who now works swing shift so cannot make it to regular meetings. Al Wilkins came up with his microscope and some nice microminerals to trade.
At the Field Collectors Forum we talked about a lot of interesting places we would like go. Next after our Labor Day trip will be a trip to the Clear Creek area in San Benito County on the third weekend in October. Following that we will return to Borate and go also to the Ludlow Fluorite Mine late in the Fall.
After my last column I went out into the area south of Fort Irwin with Bob Reynolds one more time. In the category of microminerals I found some interesting red clinoptilolite on quartz and calcite in a limestone quarry in the north end of the Calico Mountains and some interesting yellow stilbite in small pegmatite veins in schist in the Paradise Mountains about half a mile from the Starbright Mine.
We camped in the Dagget Hills near where Bob was doing some mapping. Nearby there were some old diggings where people had prospected for borates. The rock appeared pretty uninteresting, but when I broke open some of the large pieces they contained very nice strontianite crystal clusters. We may also stop there on the Fall field trip if there is enough interest.
Thanks to the efforts of Bill Besse our website is continually being improved. He has just added a Southern California Friends of Mineralogy page that among others things contains a listing of California mineral localities by county. It is a SCFM project to continually update this listing. I encourage you all to have a fresh look at our site and of course if anyone wants to send in information for the update it will be greatly appreciated.
SEPTEMBER 30-OCTOBER 1; Vista, CA
Vista Gem & Mineral Society Show, Brengle Terrace Community Rec Center, 1200
Vale Terrace Drive, 10– 5 both days. Mary Mital 760-758-4599
OCTOBER 14-15: Trona, CA
Searles Lake Gem & Mineral Society, 13337 Main St
Saturday 8-5, Sunday 8-4. Bonnie Fairchild 760-372-5356; http://www1.iwvisp.com/tronagemclub/
OCTOBER 21-22: El Cajon, CA
El Cajon Gem & Mineral Society, El Cajon Valley Masonic Temple, 695
Ballantyne St, 10-5 both days
OCTOBER 21-22; Whittier, CA
Whittier Gem & Mineral Society, Whittier Masonic Temple, 7604 Greenleaf Ave,
10-6 Saturday, 10-5 Sunday Jay Valle 626-934-9764 jvalle@aqmd.gov
NOVEMBER 18-19: MSSC’s Pasadena Show
Short Bulletin this month. I would like to say it was because I was at Topaz
Mountain and had trouble carrying all those crystals home...but alas, not so. -Ed