[Rockhounds] Smelter Nickel

[Mark Stanley]

Dear Larry:

An old friend and collecting partner of mine, used to always carry several
flats of the Nickel specimens to rock shows for trading.  He called them
"Nickel Dendrites".

I remember he told me that they came from the chrome plating tanks in a
factory that make car bumpers, in either Detroit, Mich., or Windsor,
Ontario.

Mark Stanley
Norwood, Ontario, Canada

----- Original Message -----
From: "Lawrence Rush" <larryrush at worldnet.att.net>
To: "Rockhounds at drizzle.com: A mailing list for rock and gem collectors"
<rockhounds at lists.drizzle.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 06, 2009 3:34 PM
Subject: [Rockhounds] Smelter Nickel


> 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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