[Rockhounds] Smelter Nickel

[Kreigh Tomaszewski]

I have a similar specimen that came from one of our club members at a 
silent auction a couple years ago. Mine also came without a locality.

What is interesting is that on the bottom there is the imprint of a 3/8 
inch square support rod. It was obviously formed from molten drops 
falling onto the bar and hardening.

Kreigh



On Tuesday, Jan 6, 2009, at 15:34 America/Detroit, Lawrence Rush wrote:

> OK...this time I DO have a  real puzzle..................
>
> In the 1980's, I used to attend a swap session every summer in New 
> Hampshire. For several years there, a gentleman would approach me (he 
> did not have a booth), and offer to trade me a Nickel specimen. These 
> came out of a smelter somewhere, and were attractive, being kind of 
> globular, and kind of dendritic, and shiny metallic. It was maybe 
> 4x8cm in size. No label, and I wasn't sophisticated enough to ask for 
> one.
>
> I re-traded one of these (don't remember what happened to the rest) to 
> a friend in Arkansas. That owner died and this particular one recently 
> showed up on an auction site on the web, and was sold to another 
> collector. Since it had my label on it, he contacted me for locality 
> information. I know nothing about the specimen or the person who 
> originally had it.
>
> Is there any member who knows anything about this trader? Would anyone 
> know where Nickel might have been smelted in the 1980's, and how it 
> might have got out into the hands of a mineral trader? I would like to 
> be able to add something to the label besides the specimen (and my) 
> name.
>
> Thanks.....Larry Rush
>
> -- 
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