[Rockhounds] Flint / (was Not your father's Mineral Collecting)

Sat Apr 25 14:47:18 PDT 2009

Erich,

The chalk from SE England has been used for industrial purposes throughout its history (such as cement), unfortunately I don't know about mining for slate usage (couldn't think of a better term) although I'd assume that any chalk would be processed in the UK before being exported (we could make a lot more money out of it that way!), removing any flint nodules; I'll do a bit of research though and see what I can, excuse the pun 'dig up'.

The whole of the Sussex and a fair proportion of the Kent coast is littered with pebbles derived from flint nodules, seems really strange after walking over beaches made of millions of pebbles that someone would want to take them home to California to collect! pretty cool though!

Jack Dann
Plymouth, UK (originally from Sussex)
________________________________________
From: rockhounds-bounces at lists.drizzle.com [rockhounds-bounces at lists.drizzle.com] On Behalf Of erich kern [efkern at earthlink.net]
Sent: 25 April 2009 22:30
To: Rockhounds
Subject: [Rockhounds]  Flint / (was Not your father's Mineral Collecting)

Jack,

Thanks for that info. Do you know whether the chalk in the cliffs was mined for the chalk for writing on slate, and if so, was it exported to the colonies in the period 1650 to 1800 AD? In powdered form or in blocks which would also contain flint nodules?

I visited Dover beach and gathered a pocketful of flint pebbles to take home to California about 15 years ago, before I was really serious about mineral collecting.

Cheers,
Erich Kern
Murrieta, CA

----- Original Message -----
From: (s) Jack Dann
To: Rockhounds at drizzle.com: A mailing list for rock and gem collectors
Sent: Saturday, April 25, 2009 11:36 AM
Subject: RE: [Rockhounds] Not your father's Mineral Collecting

Coming from the SE of England where Chalk is the main shore face rock forming the cliffs of both the White Cliffs of Dover and the Severn Sisters I feel that I'm in a fairly good position to explain what the flint is used for, some flint can be hewn out of the Cliffs, as it was and until fairly recent times since the 'Stone Age'; when the chalk cliffs are eroded to form the beaches (such as in Dover) around 95% of the beach is composed of flint that has been weathered into pebbles, which would be perfect for boats to use as ballast, better speimins (such as those not tarnished by the waves or diagenitally altered) could be used to produce rifle flints so admired.

Jack
________________________________________
From: rockhounds-bounces at lists.drizzle.com [rockhounds-bounces at lists.drizzle.com] On Behalf Of DonH [donhalterman at q.com]
Sent: 25 April 2009 18:00
To: Rockhounds at drizzle.com: A mailing list for rock and gem collectors
Subject: Re: [Rockhounds] Not your father's Mineral Collecting

Lawrence Rush wrote:
> BTW, I think most everyone has seen the Dover, England flint, from the
> famous chalk "White Cliffs", but if you haven't, I have posted a photo
> of this one at the bottom of the page at the following URL:
>

One last thought: doesn't this material come from the white cliffs of
Dover?  I would imagine a lot of this was simply weathered out and could
be picked up.  This would have made sense for ships leaving from the
Dover area.  They would have needed *something* to use as ballast
(though one wonders why they weren't carrying trade goods).

On a similar note, I've heard that divers off California have found
fluorescent Franklin specimens on the bottom.  Apparently some ships
used the mine tailings as ballast when traveling from NY/NJ to CA.  So
it does happen.

Now that I'm thinking about it, the flint nodules could have been mine
tailings from local operations.  There are plenty of uses for calcium
carbonate besides chalk.  In any case, someone using ballast is going to
want something cheap, preferably free, and taking away mine waste would
have been a mutually beneficial activity for both parties.

Best,
Don
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