[Rockhounds] The Tucson 08 gem and mineral show.

[Rock Currier]

The 2008 Tucson gem and mineral show is history. The show has gotten large,
almost beyond comprehension. The big show guide, the Colored Stone Show
Guide, the largest of several that were created for this show, lists about
40 showplaces with floor plans of the various dealer spaces in each of the
venues. The venues are mostly motels, buildings, tents and tent cities and
some of them had more than 400 dealers selling stuff. There are undoubtedly
more of them than this. There were 9 different shuttle routs (passenger
vans) that shuttled visitors around between the various shows.

The description of the show by any individual person is like a group of
blind men talking about their encounter with an elephant. To the blind man
who feels the leg of the elephant says that the beast is like the trunk of a
tree. To another feeling its trunk thinks it resembles a great snake and to
the man who feels the ear the elephant is like a giant leaf. Each person who
describes the show, depending on their interests and the small part of it
they were able to see is going to describe it differently, sometimes
completely differently. Imagine what kind of description a bead person is
going to give on walking into one of the fossil venues is going to give.

My perspective is mostly related to minerals but since we also sell some
fossils and some sterling silver jewelry I have a small acquaintance with
some of the other things that go on at the show and I have several friends
that go out and spy out things for me and report back to me things that are
going on elsewhere in the show.

There was a lot theft this year. We lost an aquamarine that had a retail
value of $8,000 but it was mostly our own fault for having it situated so
near the door. There were a number of unsavory characters with a room in the
InnSuits Motel that one of my customers described as being real dirt
surfers. One of them tried to get away from a cop and jumped off the balcony
of the second story of the motel and was run down by a cop and got in a
fight with him and was subdued by the cop and some by standers and hauled
off to jail. A search of their room turned up a lot of cheap gem rough for
which they had no receipts but they were apparently not arrested but were
kicked out of the hotel. The last Saturday of the show one of the dealers
loaded out into his trailer and when he woke up in the morning his trailer
was gone, apparently have been hooked up to a vehicle during the night and
driven away. One of the new venues was broken into during the night and all
of the specimens with labels were taken. This particular new venue, in a bad
part of town was hit twice by thieves at night.

One of the new surprising things mineral wise that showed up at the show
were some nice big orange single spessartine crystals from Tanzania. Some
were selling for thousands of dollars each. The old collectors were
complaining about there being too many zeros on the prices of specimens they
liked, but an auction held on Friday night during the Tucson Gem and Mineral
Society show probably sold more than 200 specimens at more than $1000 each
and some were in excess of $50,000 each. At the Westward Look Resort show,
where the high end dealers were happily adding to zeros to the prices on
their specimens, there was a program with a panel of about five women
mineral collectors who each gave a different perspective on mineral
collecting. Something unique to any gem and mineral show thus far. Gail Span
from Houston was responsible for organizing this program. It was quite
interesting. I think the program was recorded and can be purchased by
interested parties.

The Tucson Gem and Mineral show in the Convention center was a block buster
this year because of the 50 or so display cases full of the best minerals
that could be found from about that many classic mineral localities. This
was an exhibit that will probably not be repeated in our lifetimes. Some of
the cases were stronger than others and some localities that should have
been represented were not and some that were there should probably not have
been included. I wondered what in the world the case from Eden Mills Vermont
was doing there. There were a number of other localities that could have
replaced it with more significant material. That is however hind sight and
all in all, the exhibits were remarkable. Many pictures of the cases were
taken both with still cameras and video. I think the results of some of
these efforts will be available for sale. Dave Wilber was the narrator for a
video about various aspects of the show and this will be for sale sometime
in the near future. There was a fine book about the show with a lot of
wonderful pictures of many of the specimens that were on display in the
cases and the initial shipment of thousand or so books was immediately sold
out. Most people I know bought at least two copies and more than a few
people were running about the show asking various people that were mentioned
in the book to sigh their autographs at various places in the book.
Certainly the book will be sold out but I don't know if a second printing
will be made or not.

Rock