[meteorite-list] Ownership of Apollo samples

From: dean bessey <deanbessey_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:47:09 2004
Message-ID: <LAW2-F215k1Ed28kIN400013bcb_at_hotmail.com>

>This is a fine program and one of NASA's education
>objectives. I attended such a program but have always been somewhat
>reluctant to actually request a sample, due to the tight security and
> >their value. If I had one of the discs, I don't think I would sleep
> >until it was returned safely.
>Ron Hartman
>
I went to a mineral show a couple years ago and NASA had a promotional booth
at the show and one of those discs were filled with lunar samples that Ron
is refering to. There were two guys guarding the disc and they were not even
letting anybody actually touch the disc. It was lodged on the base of a
microscope and the public could only move the base of the scope and not play
with the disc itself. If one of the guys had to go to the bathroom they
packed up the disc in a max smart looking briefcase and they both went
together (Just like two wemon).
The two NASA guys were actually a lot of fun otherwise and were particularly
good as far as getting the public interested in what they had and good at
promoting NASA. NASA scored really good with an excellent display that
pretty well made all visiters at the show happy .
I showed the NASA guys my Mars and Moon rock (Zagami, DAG476 and DAG 400 - I
had a nice ultra thin Al Lang cut tenth of a gram piece of DAG400 moonrock
on display at the show that was really nice) and the NASA guys let me (And
my friend Robert Szep) actually pick up the disc of the apollo rock (We were
the only two people at the show becides them to actually touch the disc
itself) and pose to take photos of it. If anybody wants to see a photo of
what the discs actually looks like see my webpage (www.meteoriteshop.com).
As far as their value though they are priceless (Which has the same meaning
as worthless since you cannot sell them).
My understanding though is that you can actually own an apollo rock. In 1971
(I think 1971 - ot is close to that year anyway) the US president gave a
bunch of heads of state a apollo promotion (Or goodwill or whatever
governments call these things) kit that included among other things 3 grams
of apollo rock. My understanding is that 3 of those kits have been broken up
and if you can get your hands on it it is legal to own (Although illegal to
cross the border of any USA jourisdiction so if you have it in the USA you
would have a hard time explaining how it got back to the US without crossing
the border). A while ago I knew where to get some for $2000 per milligram.
Cheers
DEAN


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Received on Thu 08 Nov 2001 12:05:58 PM PST