World of the rockhound #5: Agate in a Bean Field
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I knew it I knew it was here but I didn't know you and I didn't know what it was.
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I did go wrong.
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The second largest craft hobby in America today is said to be rock hounding with all of
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its branches of interest some of which are Jim cutting making jewelry and
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the collection of gem stones rocks minerals and fossils. This universal
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hobby has grown to astonishing proportions in the last 25 years and shows
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signs of even more rapid growth as the need develops for more people to pursue
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more leisure time activities due to the fact that they are working fewer hours
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have more days off and get more vacation time.
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Rocks and minerals as specimens are of extreme importance to the rock out. However
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most people do not realize the important role rocks and minerals play in
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everyday living. For example you are right used in toothpaste and clothing.
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This series of programs is designed to give an overall picture of the rock.
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Offer encouragement to the newcomer and this hobby and present
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information of general interest to everyone. All of this will be
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examined as we explore the world of the rock.
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Today's program is entitled I get into being field but
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Narita is Len for many bracelet
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tied clips earrings paper writing pen holders have come from a beam field
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on a farm in the area of Rock trace Tennessee for a long
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time. The owner of the farm Mr. Vail Mercado didn't know he
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had acres and acres of land covered with agate. He would not wait until the
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rock hands began visiting him in increasing numbers asking permission to pick
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up rocks and being field. Mr. CARRO thought this was a rather silly thing for anyone
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to want to do. But after a while he subscribed to a lapidary magazine
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and learned the value of his crop which was more agate than blooms
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it was then with the being poor became known as Carbo rock Ron used
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to Carbo put up a sign and allowed collectors to come on the property and pay by the
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pound for the rock that they carried away with them into Ben's
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program we present an account of a day spent at the Cobo rock for
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an example of the informal type rockhound field trip.
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As one drives down Higgins road going from Shelbyville Tennessee hard rock
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trace he sees a homemade sign which says road rock
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and if a person stops and spends some time there as some 50 members of the Middle Tennessee
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rock out of bed one day we learn much about agot
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and in all probability he will come away with a cople or at least a collecting
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bag full of white covered chunks of rock which will prove to be beautifully banded
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agate on the inside I go it is a type of Cal
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scrutiny which is one of the varieties of courts. It was first
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discovered on the banks of the Acadians river in Sicily from which the name agate
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originated. There are many places where Agatha is found in the United States
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and all over the world with the most famous agate coming from Brazil.
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As the rock hands gathered in Mr Kerberos front yard he explained something about the agate on
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his land gave some instructions. Then the group of men women and
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children spread out across the bean field. It was muddy that day
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because of a recent grind but that was good because the rain had brought
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more of the agate to the surface.
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You know quite a bit Don't don't you know that I'm your
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brother no more Americans that don't like
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you I don't think I want to.
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Get up right before the Matrix you know the way. I see you I don't
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like that around here they won't think you know
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some of them have you know
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what I don't know.
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We're all going to. Work
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but I don't want to get rid of it really.
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Yeah on a good note.
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Most of the I get found on this field trip was banded agate know Masaryk it was
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their most I get does not really have moss in it it contains
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dendrites of another mineral which appear like Masi feathery material within stone
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and that particular kind is not generally found in Tennessee Tennessee kind is
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a good grade of agate. The colors are gray blue or
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yellow or sometimes red and they are mostly banded or
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sometimes clouded or often the colors will be distinctly grouped in some
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way. Sometimes the agate is artificially colored later by the
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collector and some really beautiful effects are obtained. But first one has to find
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the agate and it was spread all over this being field when you're out
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in a field be that.
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For you when you get out of your life you know the proof.
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And it may be may be.
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Where do you think we need to quote When
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you lay down you knew. And.
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It's got already broken you know. Yeah.
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Good Lord don't
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know you know I don't know what I mean Mr Carbo
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showed us hunks of agate with holes in them and these holes were filled with crystals.
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And his back yard was full of large chunks of rock which he had collected some of these were
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filled with what he called not get more land out and
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then got a big morning.
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How big is your field here.
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This guy don't you are living here on this farm and you didn't know that you had an idea.
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I knew it I knew it was here but I didn't know you didn't know what it was. Just go
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rock.
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Miles I mean the house that I'd be glad won't go in look at.
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Them I wake him up and you know I'm not doing that a lie when
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I do you have many groups like this that come out here to find a head to have about for what he
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had most of it one. And only.
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You can find plenty to smile a lot now you've done plenty of doctor for
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my for your game. One day last week and we
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go down about 120 when we came in my he had.
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My mount and he'd been going on new levels and no downtime like you had
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when he got home the weight of it would back a letter and a dollar you know I said
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Oliver. And so they have
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got a way a way around the world. I mean Arabia and
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if you know anything like 10 cents.
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And I reckon. Yeah they have back on the whale please
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baptise bravely Yeah I haven't done much abdominal leg and one
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group got me but I did have some card rain event from
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stamp you know. And I remember.
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Who it was give them told me and if they had to be able to Nicklaus what I
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give him 30 current crown for when they'd meet. Well they didn't pass them out.
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Other club members would be they know. And I know damn well I'd give
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them some pants and a car and.
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You say you have been an Arabian Now how did I get to have a right to have a thought of going back yeah I don't know.
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He might tell you the name that they could mean yes and so somewhere
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around he had been arrested and they heard about it. And they came back and he said
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that they want £15 but £15 back
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waited on plane until he get him back. But he'd been back a
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second time. And he brought another one which
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got people yelling they. Got all the
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names record and you know it now. And it's a
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great hobby that day.
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And. A lot of forum that I do you know what the people do with the agot after they take it
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home do they make it in did you make it yes Cruden necklaces
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bracelets and belt buckles arraying said.
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And I'll kind of wrote that the visitors
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from other states and other countries have rocked over this being fair than probably made the same
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comments about it as club member needed Kreider who happens to be a farmer's daughter.
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I have no regular been a rock picked up
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and worked up. Sure no family ever and I'm going to just walk
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up and go.
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And then and if you can pick up any of.
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Them and I didn't get there with them to be and tell them if I don't get some I'm a
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rocker I know I'm a farmer Don't you know I'm saying that right.
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Sure you're good alright without. That known
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thing with children you know they get excited and they don't want.
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Out in the field we followed some of the people around Bill Mangrum and his right found
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agate and they also found some other things.
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Got really good. Separate and
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bike separate keep it together.
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You know this is a band wagon great band wagon sort of a
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bluish kind of pretty. No might with it is the reason of that.
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Right.
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I think that if things don't put us right about your sayings don't
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see the sandstone and. It's a mere take.
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More than a do as I and then I got a piece I want
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now that banned it saying. Knowing tested by water.
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And by lapping it up with you crying a bit and you can tell it becomes her glasses.
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Not sure if they know that. Thank
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you this is too much irony you know much about that little thing
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that's a little bit wages added receipts are here.
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While we're on the field trying to decide where we had agate our iron ore it began to
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rain and we all ran into the farmhouse and there we had a chance to talk with
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Mrs. curb.
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You go
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and then you came for one thing
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and this is your dining room. I get your
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room in the back.
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We were talking about where
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you are right
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and which are the rainbow.
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How do you was it. And. You
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know did you feel you always.
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Got the wind blowing in and then with the third night. They get the wrong boat.
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Now that Martha rocking I'm fair may not mean the one I don't
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think think of me and now you have to hold it up to the light.
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Right. Yeah I mean it's why. And it might
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be and then slide but not whack that now this one fine on that
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day. But man back. Mr. Cardwell here got to
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see what he's got.
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That's Rock right is it with all of
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the time or did you put it there. Like I found it. Well how do you
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think. That's. Like to have more of the good Lord put
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that.
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And that's how the home got there that gives them a tone that petrified
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won't say whether we're coming.
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You're kidding. Peter.
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Do you find many with how thin the life is on one and been forever.
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Well now you're sticking to what is this tragic that you're taking a load
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off of that thought and work of a thing
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like you know where you were but yeah.
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Yeah.
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You know you want there.
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I wouldn't really have to talk a lot more ROCKS Yeah. On the outside and this
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is about what in diameter and then it goes
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down the rocket's Rapids amount to an inch and a half there and it looks
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around it doesn't like around it.
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But then the light is far like.
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Crystal and you get out in light in the sunlight.
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Yes a little bit spark of that. Yes and all over.
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And you found that out here. How did you happen to pick up that one.
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I just I don't Littlefield you know it was relayed around yeah I guess a year.
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And one day in the dirt roads full of dirt until I got me
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down his hole in it and I was going to get out and form
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and that. Got me a bass your piano straightness very few look at and I just kept
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adding that to date at it and I wanted around and
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again. And find out what it was and you know when
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you get very heavy.
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Yeah you know I feel it. Oh it is heavy.
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I've got ring hollow it would be lawyers credit do I get
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that Mr. Ms curveball were made honorary members of the Middle Tennessee
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Rock Around the happening which does not often occur on the usual type field trip.
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Also they donated a large piece of I get to the children's museum
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after the presentation.
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Mr curveball explained about a slice of agate he had which resembled a pork chop
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removed or just you know Kurt Cox who asked me if we were but.
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I'm going to demand proof of I get another slice of agate and it's shaped like a pork chop
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chop.
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And out of jail in this my pork chop and. I
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will go and beat it out of the drug would have sought out from Sam and I.
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When I say good bye to their.
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Many slices would you do that out of a seven and a half.
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Oh I know telling. Yes that's a.
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Point where you play a bit like cutting your
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do you have to deal with me I'm a boy.
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And. I have felt I want to buy.
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Him a portrait of a dragon. And.
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That will help me out a dollar. And dug out my modem
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blade I have.
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It be nice that you have a lot of labor in it that down to
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this rock here. I don't know what you call it. That a
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band that I get it from. Yeah that's the band you know. And yet this
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rock I think if it was bad so it s other way go here and
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cut the band into here. I think that's where you get you.
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Rainbow.
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And. For that ranger you only come across here you cut me points
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off. But like I saw it I was cut it with HEAR YOUR HEART OF you're
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out here but I was cut and with a heart at it and if I don't
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I mess away and come this way.
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Points out I think that I write about where you were cutting across the group.
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And I knew yourself when you go with the ground.
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That you want to cut it with a grain and when you get in and say hey wait
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I'm to the heart by then you center your out. You want that. Don't you
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know one of us at that back.
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Isn't that when you can find these
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beautiful things inside. You mean a genie I would get
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when you don't know really my throat and I don't.
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Yes ma'am the lack of it is going to rock. That is solid
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white like white coat and I wanted a bright red
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Canadian.
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But you know what.
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Let me try to move the curb a minute.
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Do you have I think you have since moved down through your MS curve. New work.
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Now I don't work here. It's
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been given to me. And I'm a rock.
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You know I think back and not in fact the
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Coloradoan from buying a
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million. From one.
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Do you keep records of the people we come to
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when people bring in someone.
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Who they are. They will
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not go
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there to have their way.
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And.
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That way. Why do you have any children I have one
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by one pray for now my. Prayers and I am and
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my money are very nice. For you and your husband stay here and keep the rock
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up.
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But we have a lot of got me to do anything there would be to have my park in my
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camp. We are ready to get married. How can you help
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me.
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Mighty nice of you to make all the available
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that was Mrs. Hillmer Kerr about becoming some of her experiences with visiting
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rock hounds who came to get agate at the Cobo rock fun Mr
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Cabo then showed us a piece of Polish Dagget which appeared to have a sailboat and it
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really messing about.
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With I do not look like a sailboat in that's got me going and they threw me.
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Threw me anything about. It looked almost Oh yeah don't.
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You know you say oh yeah you go down you know three minutes.
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Now a baguette from on would that be some kind of a piece of dirt in the
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raw.
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I just saw that rock Never. Like I'm
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going to have you. We were here during the war in
[22:12 - 22:17]
Iraq. Well you know. I would have bought a lot of walk about
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Herman.
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The Birchmere but rather go out further.
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Oh. We then went out to a shed in the chicken yard and we looked at the
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soffits Mr. Carville had previously described. This is the saw he made for
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himself at a cost of $5. Later he was offered a hundred dollars for it but it
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wasn't for sale. For I benefit mystic herbal clamped a
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large piece of the agate in place in a shop and the diamond plated a saw with a
[22:45 - 22:50]
brick. Some of us stayed there to watch this work and others went out into the
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field again to gather more of the agot after that going.
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Well I don't know I just recommend building one to broke free of her
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leverage road through. Ramadan or rebuild or be
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done to work I don't already. Have a piece of that in there all ready to
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be fried.
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You know. What do.
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What you like and if you want.
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To get it started.
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As a dear all rock outfit and it would work it out.
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That I never make.
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It. Every. Week you saw this and I think.
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You're saying. Let's start it.
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I want to climb on that car to you know please just a rude
[24:16 - 24:20]
crude right never to go back down and I
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will go down in flames big diamond. You're
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going to get down a different down in about the poem.
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Well if you look at Rockwell I want the kind of person.
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Whether to have damaged and put it in that blade.
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And it's just a mood it won't get a cut a rug we want a good life.
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We were going you know at the moment. You run to.
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The shop meaning.
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It took five minutes for the carriage to travel one inch and the rock being saw it
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was about four inches in diameter. So back 20 minutes later we crowded around the
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saw when it's through that last bit of agate.
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It is a looker.
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But she did look like you look like a bonus and been so into the man who had made a
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new thing you want to like.
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Yeah yeah no good glad you know you've made it and I see things get done and who did for Imagine
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you see the view that the finished lab of agate did look like
[25:56 - 26:02]
a bone or like the pork chop which Mr. Kerber had referred to previously.
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If this lab work cleaned with detergent to remove the oil it could then be polished
[26:07 - 26:11]
and made into a paper white or pen holder and as Belmar
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Crowborough observed looking at slices of agate can be very much like looking at
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clouds. The shadow some pieces which were sliced into strips that resemble
[26:21 - 26:26]
blabs of bacon once Rice had an Eskimo in an igloo
[26:26 - 26:30]
in it. Turn it over and Mr. Brown saw a mermaid
[26:30 - 26:36]
one piece was cut something in and was so clear that a person could read a newspaper
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through it. But we saw more than an agate that day
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we saw farm machinery and we saw beings actually growing instead of the way we
[26:46 - 26:51]
usually see them in vegetable markets. Some of the children have never been on a
[26:51 - 26:56]
farm before or had never heard of a live rooster crowing and that in
[26:56 - 27:00]
itself was an experience many of us had never seen a
[27:00 - 27:05]
killdeer nest out in the midst of the being fewer brown
[27:05 - 27:10]
speckled eggs in a neat pile on the ground. This was the killer as nest
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which was really known as did all the eggs were so perfectly camouflaged as they lay there
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on the ground that they were not discovered until they were nearly stepped on.
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And there's no doubt that none of us had ever been so muddy before. The modern rooms
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with the instep to our shoes. But as we said previously that was
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good because the running that had fallen the night before brought more agate to the surface.
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This has been an account of an informal type rockhound field trip to find agate
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in a bean field. An excursion which not only yielded valuable addition
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to murmurous rock collections but provided its proposed and with time for
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relaxation with an opportunity to get out of doors and get close to nature
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but also bourbon the pleasure of meeting Mr. and Mrs. Bellmore Kirby at the cobra rock
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farm near Rock trace Tennessee in the program to
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brew observed rock hands as they take part in the more formal type of trip
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run which was conducted by a geologist and which took brides in the heart of the
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Kentucky Illinois bar area.
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This has been another in the series of programs exploring the world on.
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This series was produced by the saviors of the public library of
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Davidson County Tennessee. Next week Mrs. folk will
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discuss the fascinating aspects of this hobby on a program entitled. Searching for fluorite.
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This is Charles Mitchell.
[29:36 - 29:40]
This is NPR. The National Education Radio Network.
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This program has been transcribed using automated software tools, made possible through a collaboration between the American Archive of Public Broadcasting and Pop Up Archive. Please note that no automated transcription is perfect nor is it intended to replace human transcription labor. If you would like to contribute corrections to this transcript, please contact MITH at mith@umd.edu.