February 2020 Meeting Minutes

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New Business:
Scott Duresky invited us to a special presentation about the (now closed) Rutherford Mine. He and our president, Mike Pabst, along with some other professional mineralogists have completed the study of and classification of old (and a few new discoveries) minerals from this famous location. The study has been ongoing for almost a decade.

Scott will be making a presentation on Monday March 2 at the McCormick Observatory in Charlottesville. There are a LIMITED number of spaces for interested persons. The talk will include photographs with some of the chemical analyses of several of the finds. (somewhat technical)

This is a preview presentation that Scott will give at the annual meeting of the Atlantic Micro-mineral Conference in April. Debbie has sent out an email; please respond if you want to attend.

Program Report:
Mike Pabst presented “Atlantic Micro-mounters’ Conference Auction – Beautiful Small Minerals from the George Reimherr Collection”.

Mike has been photographing some of the 500 specimens for the conference and shared some of the photos with us. The site for information about the conference is http://dcmicrominerals.org/ The conference is April 3-5 in Alexandria.

A portion of George Reimherr’s collection will be sold at the auction during the meeting. He mounted his specimens in clear plastic boxes lined with black paper, which sometimes failed to securely attach the mineral. However, some folks appreciate the original mounts by Mr. Reimherr. He was an organized and professional collector of micros who was revered in the mineralogist community. Mr. Reimherr passed away in 2017.

Mike gave us some information about studying and photographing micros. A good stereo microscope is a must, and good ones are around $500. With a stereo microscope, it is easy to view the specimen, and the specimen can be easily turned to get the best angle.

Although it is possible to take photos through the stereo microscope, Mike prefers to use an Olympus digital camera with a macro lens and Raynox DCR-250 “supermacro lens” that attaches to the filter threads of the macro lens. With one click of the shutter button, the camera takes 25 separate single shots at different depths of focus so that each may be viewed separately to ensure that the best selection be chosen.

Photos may be cropped to obtain a desired FOV (field of view), and with these good lenses, not too much resolution is lost. (Mike compared the letter “I” from “In God We Trust” on a dime to explain that this width is about 0.25 mm, which is the size of some of the smaller micro crystals.)

Depending on the color of the mineral, LED, colored, incandescent or natural lighting may be used to obtain the best photo. Certain minerals are of such unique and high-intensity color that no camera can reproduce it. And some color quality is lost in transition from the camera to the computer, and especially to the projector.

Mike had some truly awesome photos to show us. I’ll mention a few here:

• From the DR Congo – dewindtite, a uranium mineral with FOV 2 mm
• From Northern Ireland – gmelinite, which looks like a glass decanter and stopper with FOV of 5 mm
• From Gold Hill, Utah – a very rare mixite that looks like yellow-green sea urchins with a FOV of 3 mm
• From Indian Mountain in Alabama – strengite, a beautiful red-violet mineral with a FOV of 3 mm

Deborah Grimm, Secretary

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Club Officers and Staff 2016-2020
President – Michael Pabst
Vice President – Leo Cloutier
Show Co-Chairs – Dean Hostetter/Scott Gregory
Educational Outreach -- Deborah Grimm
Secretary/Newsletter -- Deborah Grimm
Field Trip Coordinators - Scott Steele
Co-Treasurers – Scott Gregory/Deborah Grimm
Web Site Coordinator – Jack Glenn

Club web site: www.shenandoahvalleyrockclub.org
Club Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ShenandoahValleyGemMineralSociety
Club email: svgem-min-club@live.com

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