February 2022 Meeting Minutes

• It will be held in the large room at Augusta EXPO, which will give us plenty of room for vendors and our activities for the kids.

• We will have room to do our club display cases as well.
• There is a snack bar there, but it will not be available for our use.
• We are investigating inviting a volunteer group, such as Scouts, to perhaps sell snacks and drinks for Sat and Sun.
• We will still have our vendor dinner on Friday night.
• Scott has received confirmation for 74 table spaces, with a projected 111 pledged.
• We have invited 8-10 new vendors as well.
• If any club member wishes to set up as a vendor, please contact Scott at sgregory357@hotmail.com
• We decided to raise our admission donation to $4 as most other shows charge at least $5.
• The money we make is used for educational projects.
• The last show's project is to purchase high quality loupes for the geology department at JMU. The students really appreciate them.

• We will need folks to distribute fliers, posters, and put up yard signs as well as displaying magnetic signs on our vehicles.
• Because we are using the large room, the ticket selling can be in the vestibule at the entrance, where the restrooms are located.
• We need volunteers to oversee the children's treasure hunt sandbox and the water sluice for the younger crowd.
• We will need lots of helpers to set up on Thursday, and tear down on Sunday

• Most of the quarries are completely closed to visitation now.
• Charlie said his last trip to Rose River only yielded a small piece of unakite and that the stream was roped off.
• Scott mentioned the possibility of a trip to Martinsville to visit the Natural History museum. (He noted that progress is being made on the new second location in Waynesboro.)
• A trip to Charlottesville to visit Virginia Energy (renamed from Va Dept of Mines and Minerals) to see the rock displays was suggested.
• Visits to Excalibur in Charlottesville or David Lipscomb's shop were mentioned.

• The "old guard" wanted to keep the organization the way it has always been.
• Voting became convoluted & ZOOM meetings became the new norm.
• A new group formed which tried to break away and form a new structure.
• Lawyers got involved, and the new group backed away. This explains the reason you received 2 newsletters from the groups for a while.
• We send our club insurance to this group, and they allow us to use their access account to ZOOM.

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Program Report:
For our program, we enjoyed a "Valentine's Red" mineral show and tell.

• Jack brought some awesome red jaspers with variegated colors - the Imperial jasper from Mexico was extremely hard to cut.
• Jilly had some polished pink quartz, pink rhodonite, and pink opal.
• Mike presented some nickel microminerals which included gersdorffite, annaberganite and ahlfeldite. (You can check these out on mindat or go to www.dcmicrominerals.org to read some of Mike's articles that are published in their newsletter)
• Debbie had a chunk of very heavy copper from Adam Co PA and a piece of vandanite.
• Marcia brought some staurolite and iron ore with garnets from Patrick county.
• Wayne H. had a gorgeous piece of lapis from Afghanistan.
• Kelly had a piece of deep blue glass that he had polished for his wife.

Deborah Grimm, Secretary

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Club Officers and Staff 2016-2022
President – Michael Pabst
Vice President – Leo Cloutier
Educational Outreach -- Deborah Grimm
Secretary/Newsletter -- Deborah Grimm
Field Trip Coordinators - TBD
Co-Treasurers – Scott Gregory/Deborah Grimm
Show Team Leaders – Scott Gregory/Jack Glenn
Web Site Coordinator – Jack Glenn

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

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