Strata Gem

September 2003

 

President’s Message

 

We sure a good turn out at our Steak Fry Saturday August 16. There were about 59 people up there.

 

I would like to thank my husband Don Smith and Henry Chavez for getting all the equipment hauled up there and back again, Don for getting the ice and steaks up there. Many trips had to be made. Thanks to Jay Woods for getting the drink carried up there. Thanks to Phil & Dixie Salm and Larry & Ardith Higley for getting the corn & shucking it.

 

Our show chairman says everything is ready to go. Thanks to Janet Nix who is doing great.

 

We need lots of help setting up our show on Thursday morning September 25^th at 9:00 o’clock. Please come out and help us, we really need lots of help.

 

I also found a pair of glasses up the canyon, and a plastic spoon and Spaghetti lifter, I will take them to the meeting next month.

 

I would like to thank our paper editor. He does such a great job for all of us. A big thanks Dennis Chapman.

 

Good Luck Always

 

Ruth S. Smith

President

 

Charter Member Dies

In Sympathy

 

Our thoughts and prayers go to the family of Jean May, one of our charter members who died around July 13, 2003.

The club sent flowers and had a ribbon put on the front reading “Charter Member”.

 

Wilma Jean Dodson May died July 13, 2003. She was born July 24, 1926, in Bartsville, Okla., the daughter of James Verno Dodson and Ruth Ola Hayes, and she was raised in Gainesville, Texas.

 

Wilma was married to James L. May, Sr. on Dec. 1, 1945. She and her husband moved to Benicia, Calif., in 1945, and then moved to Tooele, Utah, in 1962. They were charter members of the Gem & Mineral Society. They attended the Tooele United Methodist Church.

 

She was preceded in death by her husband, brother, parents and one great-grandchild. She is survived by James L. May, Jr. and his wife Kathie Swenson May from Roy, Utah; Oler Gene May of Tooele, and Dolores V. Pullen and Larry R. Pullen of Sunset, Utah.

 

She is also survived by her three sisters, June, Ruth and Maredice, seven grandchildren, six great-grandchildren, four step-grandchildren and two step-great-grandchildren.

 

Funeral services were held on Friday, July 18, 2003, at 11 a.m. at Tate Mortuary. Interment in the Tooele City Cemetery.

 

Letter From The Editor

 

I forgot to mention at the Steak Fry that the club newsletter got honorable mention in the American Federation newsletter competition. That means the newsletter was in the top 3 in the Rocky Mountain Federation competition. I haven’t received anything yet from them so I don’t know how the articles & newsletter did.

 

It is getting harder & harder for me to get the newsletter out. If no on wants the job I could use some help. If someone in Tooele that has email, I could use them to type up the president’s message, minutes and other club articles, and email them to me. I could use someone to handle the folding & mailing of the newsletter. My copy person picks up & delivers the newsletter, if you live in the west side of the Salt Lake Valley I might be able to have her drop them off to you. The club will reimburse you for the coping supplies & stamps. Hopefully things will get better, if not, I will do the best I can but I don’t know if I can the job I have done in the past.

 

Dennis Chapman

 

Tooele Gem And Mineral

August 16, 2003

Pavilion In Settlement Canyon

 

The meeting was called to order by president Ruth Smith, everyone was welcomed. The treasurers report was read and approved.

 

Our show preparations are about completed, we were reminded that we need wheel prizes, we also need door prizes, the door prizes should have a minimum of TEN DOLLARS VALUE..

 

Jay Woods was in the hospital he is feeling better and is here today. Lida Chapman has been in the hospital , she is back with us today. Ruth Shinkle has been ill. Wilma Jean May has recently passed away she and her husband were part of the original founding members of this club she will be missed, Joyce Richardson has passed away. The show posters are available please take some and post them where people will see them.

 

We will need help in setting up the show you should be there on Thursday 25th of September at 9:00 This is our combination stake fry and meeting, the steaks were excellent as was the dishes that were brought, a good time was had by all who attended.

 

The work schedule for the show was passed around everyone was asked to sign up for the jobs and the hours they could work, if you don’t sign up you will be assigned jobs and hours.

Minutes submitted

by Larry Wilson Secretary

 

Rings Around The Planets

by Gerald J. Little

 

Four planets have rings — Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, and most spectacular, Saturn. Thanks to the Voyager Satellite, astronomers were able to detect ringed systems on the first three mentioned planets. The exact composition of this phenomena is not known, but many interesting theories exist. I leave this to your own research, since the main topic of this article is Saturn itself.

 

Galileo first observed Saturn in the early sixteen hundreds. His primitive telescope gave him a picture of something round, with ear-like structures on each side. How thrilled he would be to see present day pictures from the Voyager Satellites or the Hubble Telescope. No words can describe the breath-taking views we now see on this beautiful planet.

 

Saturn’s mean distance from the Sun is 886,281,264 miles. Its mass is about 95 times more than Earth’s. There are eighteen named moons, but a few more have been discovered tucked in and around the famous rings. If we compare a year on Earth to Saturn’s year, we find it is 29.46 Earth years. One day equals 10 hours and 14 minutes.

 

About every thirty years, Saturn has a huge 15,000 mile great white spot. Last seen in 1990, it eventually spread into a white wavy stripe which circled the entire planet.

 

Saturn is primarily composed of gases. Its possibly rocky core is about the size of Earth. Like Jupiter, Saturn is wrapped in bands of clouds composed of crystallized ammonia. They are less turbulent than Jupiter’s.

 

The moons of Saturn are a story unto themselves and will be a part of a future article on the moons of our Solar System.

 

As this series of articles unfolded, it is apparent that not much geology is evident. Yet astronomy is part of the Earth Sciences which reach out beyond our Solar System and into our galaxy, the Milky Way, and even into the universe itself In this immense vastness lie the answers which may tell us more about Earth’s geological origins, history, and future.

 

(From The Trilobite 11/96 via ARKANSAS, ROCKHOUND NEWS 9/00)

via T-Town Rockhound 10/00

 

Assertive Recruitment of New Collectors

By Claus Hedegaard

 

Collecting minerals is a diversified hobby, where you may combine intellectual insight, physical activity, aesthetics, and social interaction to suit your own taste. This sounds like the model for a modern hobby, following views on upcoming trends and fashions. Particularly younger generations get more devoted to 'real' pastimes rather than 'virtual', any hobby requiring personal involvement in and interaction with real events rather than a sedentary and passive role, will suit the favored life-style of the immediate future.

 

With a dedicated effort, we can make collecting minerals a trendy hobby in the immediate future. If we wish it to become true, everybody in the hobby - collectors, dealers, show organizers, etc. - must join in an active effort to recruit new collectors. There are two requirements for recruiting new collectors, irrespective of their age:

 

a) it must be possible to get started without excessive expense, and b) particularly in the early phase it is important to be exposed repeatedly to relevant activities.

 

This paper outlines a strategy how show organizers in collaboration with local clubs can recruit new collectors and increase show attendance appreciably. I outline a procedure that will attract additional visitors to mineral shows, new members to clubs, and ultimately recruit new collectors by applying resources that are already available in the community, and costing 'nothing' to the parties involved. To do this, you will need:

 

1) Children.

 

2) A major retailer with multiple outlets (super markets, gas stations, maybe just a widely circulated news paper) in the recruitment area.

 

3) A well-organized show, offering activities for newcomers and non-collectors.

 

4) A generous selection of interesting, inexpensive mineral (or fossil) specimens, with labels.

 

5) A local club, offering dedicated activities for newcomers. The 'trick' is, that to ask the retailer to circulate vouchers to children, giving them free access to the show, a years membership of the club, and a specimen of their choice at the club booth at the show.

 

Children

1) "Child" = somebody too young to drive. They have parents, who are happy to drive, and ultimately you may wish to recruit them rather than the children, but from a marketing perspective "educational effort" goes much better with "child" than "adult" - scary when you come to think of it! It gives good Karma to educate a screaming six year old, but much less so somebody who can vote. Real scary.

 

Your only target the children, offering free children's tickets, not adult. Why? If successful, you will loose pretty much all your sales children's tickets, but that is set off by increased sales of tickets for adults. Adults drive, kids don't, but they are very good at making adults drive!

 

Retailer

2) The retailer should start distributing tickets at least 1-2 months before the show. You want them to issue as many vouchers as ever possible, a few hundred thousand are just fine! From their point of view, this is "free" - they get a high-value educational product free of charge, that substantiates involvement in the community. Present the package at a fair, realistic price. It is not a "$200 package FREE!!!!" if show entrance is normally free, the kids get a tumble polished rock, and club membership cost $5 annually. Be realistic. But say entrance is normally $3, annual membership $12, and then assume fair retail value of the rock is $5, you do have a $25 value package. That is not a bad deal, when it is free for the retailer, free for the kid, and that is actual, real value, no hype.

 

The retailer’s obligation is obviously to present the package in advertising, and actively promote it among the clients. If they only want to dump the vouchers on a shelf, go somewhere else. This will only work, if people are made specifically aware of the program. When possible, tickets should be given directly to the child, not the parents! The point is to have the child persuade the parents to go to the show, and the parents pay full price, obviously. You 'lose' some children's tickets, but hopefully gain many adults.

 

You (the show organizer) give the retailer a high value promotional tool, and in return you get dedicated advertising for your show of a quality and magnitude, you can not buy. It is a win-win proposal.

 

Good show

3) You invite the children, but remember you have to recruit their parents as well! Go ahead; make 'gold panning' in a basin with sand and brass pieces in the parking lot, but that does not really help you. You want as many people buying indoors as possible, and you don't want them bored if they are not in a buying mood - because they are probably with somebody, who is!

 

Present a range of short seminars (about 30 minutes each) during the show, covering diverse topics - don't just recycle Pete's talk on collecting Agate in the creek, please. There should be some, where just the title appeals to people who have been dragged along, and are really eager to go home - a title like "Russian Imperial Gems" will, "Murzinka Pegmatites" will not ... though the topic is practically identical. You may have 'tricked' the parents into bringing the kids, but they also have to bring them for club meetings and field trips, so do get hold of them.

 

Do have activity booths with fossil preparation, gem cutting, mineral identification, whatever comes natural to the local club, who should ideally staff these booths. This is where first-time visitors to the show can build social contacts and learn more. Actively encourage show dealers to bring a range of inexpensive, worthwhile specimens, priced at the equivalent of $1-5 per piece. Beginners appreciate them, and need them to "start playing ball." I no longer own any of my early specimens, but I enjoyed them while I did even if they were obviously "worthless". They weren't to me, because they encouraged me to study, learn, and appreciate, they set me in contact with other people, who helped form my future and view of the World. It is pathetic to say a dinged Amethyst kept this kid off the street, but there is a grain of truth in that.

 

Rocks

4) Most collectors and dealers have something worth having; they are willing to donate to children. This can be excess stock, duplicates, a few tons of Rose Quartz (this is surprisingly cheap if you know how to!), or whatever. It shouldn't be unsorted rubbish, it must be something that appeals to the uninitiated, inspire them, and their mothers will let them keep! The children should also get a folder with a little information about the minerals (Rose Quartz, why is it pink, where does it come from, etc.), names and addresses of all local clubs offering a special youth or introductory program for new members, maybe titles of 3-5 popular beginners books, and the date of next years show. This will prepare them to take the next step: you have seen a lot of rocks, you have your own rock, you have listened to somebody who collected something fantastic, and you know where to go for more.

 

Club

5) The clubs have the staying power. They have usually been in business for years, and offer activities on a continuing basis. The club keeps the show-goers "alive" and interested until next years show. As part of the package, the club offers one year of free membership to children (non-members only, obviously) and accompanying parent. It adds value to the ticket, and increases club membership and future interest. It is essential the club offers activities for new members – not just children! - something like a "guided tour of the hobby", a series of lectures or visits to collectors, introducing collecting minerals, fossils, books, cutting stones, and obviously field trips. Sort of 5-10 events, aimed exclusively at new members, interspersed between meetings so individual activities are not more than 2-3 weeks apart at the most. Obviously, a comprehensive program with many activities is necessary to retain members. You can not expect to keep all, but if you experience declining membership, you recruitment is too poor and your program of activities too thin. Sorry. It must be necessary to choose, miss some points of the program, and still take part in something on a regular basis. When newcomers show up at the show and later at the club, there has to be something appealing to them at their level of abstraction. They are not stupid, may be ignorant, but by coming they show an open mind and interest. You almost got them! Have outsiders (teachers are good) review the activities, suggest changes, and do adopt those suggestions.

 

Does it work?

Yes! My father used this 'trick' to open a zoo. A large super market at in the city gave away free children's tickets for the zoo. The super market used it in advertising, and the cashiers gave the tickets directly to the children (not the parents!). It was only supposed to run for 2-3 weeks, but they liked the added value and asked to continue for 3 months (dad happily let them!), and they eventually gave away over 250,000 tickets! Most were duplicates, lost, etc., but I believe we got about a quarter of them back eventually. And obviously, kids brought their parents (who paid), and they bought ice cream, sodas, pop corn, peanuts for the monkeys, etc., etc. It helped having one of the nations largest advertisers (the super market) advertise for the zoo, and it cost nothing. For a mineral show, you will not get a similar return (60,000 kids with accompanying adults), particularly because shows take place over one weekend only, but with proper marketing through the supermarket you do run the risk of a few thousand additional visitors. Would that help? Suppose you manage to recruit just a few hundred new members to the local club?

 

Feed-back please!

I would love to hear about your activities, experiences, and results - good or bad. Feel free to contact me for additional input and to discuss your own ideas. I often travel and can be hard to get hold of, but the web site http//:www.hedegaard.com/ gives contact information and generally shows my itinerary, when I am gone for an extended period.

 

From Kyana Gemscoop, 7/02

Via THE RockCollector 10/02