[meteorite-list] Re: Owens Valley Iron 1913

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From: Howard Wu <freewu2000_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:22:33 2004
Message-ID: <20030601191806.67474.qmail_at_web9301.mail.yahoo.com>

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Thanks! This is very helpful. I knew about Lincoln Ellsworth giving this to the National Museum but thought he was a local. None of my native seniors, local historians or paiute friends knew any Ellsworth or about the find for that matter. This in itself was strange. This is a very isolated rural county in California that hasn't changed much since 1913. One woman I asked at the Death Valley NP information station thought she remembers hearing something about a famous meteorite but no details. I searched through the library microfliche of the Inyo County Registar for the entire year 1913 and was surprise to see no mention of such a important event as the handoff to Washington. Will try 1922; this had to create a local whoplaa unless this happened in the dark of night.

Before I bought my copy of Grady the only clue I had for a location was when a paiute friend told me that they made the sheppards cross the Owen's River south of town. I know this now to be in a on the other side of the White Mountains, 22 miles from me. The Topo's put this in Lymman Canyon beyond Owen Valley proper towards Fish Valley, NV. One of my client's grandfather use to deal with the Basque sheppards and himself is familar with the area;extremely rugged country but confirms that this was a favorite area for these herdsmen in the spring. "Very mineralized ground so forget your metal detectors." Gold country out here, historically. Desolete wilderness today. The White's are almost as tall as the Sierra Nevadas and home to the famous Bristle Cone Pines. Big Pine is home to an array of Radio Telescopes.

This is one very classic looking iron if anyone has seen the Smithonian plate. or visited the Museum ( I haven't). A google search reviled Montana Labs have claimed to cut some of this for a private party whom I've contacted in January, but haven't heard back from in a while.

Howard Wu

Hello Howard, Steve

bernd.pauli_at_paulinet.de wrote:
> Hello list,

Hello Howard, Steve and List,

> Any articles about this too would be appreciated.

Here is part of what Buchwald offers in his trilogy on irons:

BUCHWALD V.F. (1975) Handbook of
Iron Meteorites, Volume 3, pp. 957-958:

Owens Valley, California, U.S.A.
Approximately 37° 28' N / 118° 0' W; 1800 m
Medium octahedrite, Om.
Bandwidth 1.15±0.15 mm.
Recrystal-lized. HV 167 ± 10.
Group IIIB. 8.60% Ni,
0.51% Co,
about 0.25% P,
21.5 ppm Ga,
45.9 ppm Ge,
0.15 ppm Ir.

History

A mass of 193.2 kg was found by a sheepherder in 1913, some 22 miles
northeast of Big Pine, Owens Valley, in Inyo County. It passed immediately
into the hands of Lincoln Ellsworth, the Arctic explorer, who in 1922 donated
the whole mass to the U.S. National Museum. Merrill (1922d) cut an end from
it and described it with excellent figures of the exterior and of etched slices.
Nininger (1933: figure 17) and Nininger & Nininger (1950: plate 5) reproduced
photographs of the exterior and of another, etched section. The meteorite is
erroneously listed as a coarse octahedrite in Hey's catalog (1966: 365).

Collections

Washington (157.7 kg main mass),
New York (32.63 kg endpiece),
Tempe (430 g),
London (277 g),
Paris (50 g).

Description

The elongated mass has the average dimensions 65 x 35 x 27 cm and weighs
193.2 kg. It is boldly sculptured, displaying several large bowl-shaped pits and
numerous smaller pits. The largest pits are 18 x 10 cm across and 9 cm deep;
15 x 10 cm across and 4 cm deep; and 13 x 13 cm across and 3 cm deep. The
smaller pits are 15-100 mm in diameter and 5-10 mm deep. Common to all these
bowls and pits are the sharp ridges that separate them. They are covered with
terrestrial oxides, 0.1-1 mm thick; and no fusion crust is visible. It appears that
the original regma-glypts are significantly modified by long exposure to weathering.

A minor part of the surface, 20 x 20 cm in area, appears to have survived the corrosion
relatively intact. The original regmaglypts here form low depressions, 25-35 mm in diameter
and 5-10 mm deep. They are separated by rounded ridges. In four places there are small,
hemispherical holes, 12-17 mm in diameter - presumably left after troilite had ablated away.
The fusion crust is, I believe, preserved in these holes, while the remainder of this part of the
surface is faintly checkered, reflecting the octahedral structure below. No cut through this part
has been made, but it seems to me that it represents a far less corroded part of the meteorite,
possibly the result of its projecting a few centimeters above the soil level. Etched sections show
a medium Widmanstätten struc-ture of straight, slightly swollen kamacite lamellae with a width
of 1.15±0.15 mm.

Taenite and plessite cover about 40% by area, partly as comb and net plessite, partly as black
taenite ... Schreibersite is present as 0.3-0.5mm wide and 5-10mm long lamellae; they are
monocrystalline but brecciated and enveloped in 0.6-1.5 mm wide rims of swathing kamacite.
The larger schreibersite crystals are frequently sheared and the shear zones are filled with
1-20 µ wide troilite veinlets.

Troilite occurs, in addition, as 2-15 mm rounded nodules, ... A few Reichenbach lamellae, typically
25 mm long and 0.01 mm wide and consisting of troilite with precipitated schreibersite flags, are
also present.

The overall impression of the etched sections is that of a structure which was plastically deformed
while still hot. Thereby the large schreibersite crystals were sheared and brecciated, and troilite was
squeezed into open fissures in the schreibersite and the metal. The metallic matrix, however, later
developed a normal, undistorted Widman-stätten structure in which more phosphides precipitated.
The local, severe corrosion is mainly concentrated around the fissures - partially filled with troilite -
of the schreibersite and the metal.

Owens Valley has a primary structure corresponding to Aggie Creek, Baquedano and Cleveland.
Its secondary structure of recrystallized kamacite with finely dispersed taenite particles resembles
particularly Plymouth and Withrow. Chemically, it belongs to those meteorites that are transitional
between group IIIA and group IIIB.

To: freewu2000_at_yahoo.com
Cc: Meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com

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Thanks! This is very helpful. I knew about Lincoln Ellsworth giving this to the National Museum but thought he was a local. None of my native seniors, local historians or paiute friends knew any Ellsworth or about the find for that matter. This in itself was strange. This is a very isolated rural county in California that hasn't changed much since 1913.  One woman I asked at the Death Valley NP information station thought she remembers hearing something about a famous meteorite but no details. I searched through the library microfliche of the Inyo County Registar for the entire year 1913 and was surprise to see no mention of such a important event as the handoff to Washington. Will try 1922; this had to create a local whoplaa unless this happened in the dark of night.
 Before I bought my copy of Grady the only clue I had for a location was  when a paiute friend told me that they made the sheppards cross the Owen's River south of town. I know this now to be in a on the other side of the White Mountains, 22 miles from me. The  Topo's put this in Lymman Canyon beyond Owen Valley proper towards Fish Valley, NV. One of my client's grandfather use to deal with the Basque sheppards and himself is familar with the area;extremely rugged country but confirms that this was a favorite area for these herdsmen in the spring. "Very mineralized ground so forget your metal detectors." Gold country out here, historically. Desolete wilderness today. The White's are almost as tall as the Sierra Nevadas and home to the famous Bristle Cone Pines. Big Pine is home to an array of Radio Telescopes.
 This is one very classic looking iron if anyone has seen the Smithonian plate. or visited the Museum ( I haven't). A google search reviled Montana Labs have claimed to cut some of this for a private party whom I've contacted in January, but haven't heard back from in a while. 
Howard Wu
Hello Howard, Steve bernd.pauli_at_paulinet.de wrote:
<BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid">> Hello list, Hello Howard, Steve and List, > Any articles about this too would be appreciated. Here is part of what Buchwald offers in his trilogy on irons: BUCHWALD V.F. (1975) Handbook of Iron Meteorites, Volume 3, pp. 957-958: Owens Valley, California, U.S.A. Approximately 37° 28' N / 118° 0' W; 1800 m Medium octahedrite, Om. Bandwidth 1.15±0.15 mm. Recrystal-lized. HV 167 ± 10. Group IIIB. 8.60% Ni, 0.51% Co, about 0.25% P, 21.5 ppm Ga, 45.9 ppm Ge, 0.15 ppm Ir. History A mass of 193.2 kg was found by a sheepherder in 1913, some 22 miles northeast of Big Pine, Owens Valley, in Inyo County. It passed immediately into the hands of Lincoln Ellsworth, the Arctic explorer, who in 1922 donated the whole mass to the U.S. National Museum. Merrill (1922d) cut an end from it and described it with excellent figures of the exterio
r and of etched slices. Nininger (1933: figure 17) and Nininger & Nininger (1950: plate 5) reproduced photographs of the exterior and of another, etched section. The meteorite is erroneously listed as a coarse octahedrite in Hey's catalog (1966: 365). Collections Washington (157.7 kg main mass), New York (32.63 kg endpiece), Tempe (430 g), London (277 g), Paris (50 g). Description The elongated mass has the average dimensions 65 x 35 x 27 cm and weighs 193.2 kg. It is boldly sculptured, displaying several large bowl-shaped pits and numerous smaller pits. The largest pits are 18 x 10 cm across and 9 cm deep; 15 x 10 cm across and 4 cm deep; and 13 x 13 cm across and 3 cm deep. The smaller pits are 15-100 mm in diameter and 5-10 mm deep. Common to all these bowls and pits are the sharp ridges that separate them. They are covered with terrestrial oxides, 0.1-1 mm thick; and no fusion crust is visible. It appears that the original regma-gl
ypts are significantly modified by long exposure to weathering. A minor part of the surface, 20 x 20 cm in area, appears to have survived the corrosion relatively intact. The original regmaglypts here form low depressions, 25-35 mm in diameter and 5-10 mm deep. They are separated by rounded ridges. In four places there are small, hemispherical holes, 12-17 mm in diameter - presumably left after troilite had ablated away. The fusion crust is, I believe, preserved in these holes, while the remainder of this part of the surface is faintly checkered, reflecting the octahedral structure below. No cut through this part has been made, but it seems to me that it represents a far less corroded part of the meteorite, possibly the result of its projecting a few centimeters above the soil level. Etched sections show a medium Widmanstätten struc-ture of straight, slightly swollen kamacite lamellae with a width of 1.15±0.15 mm. Taenite and plessite cover about 40% by area, partly a
s comb and net plessite, partly as black taenite ... Schreibersite is present as 0.3-0.5mm wide and 5-10mm long lamellae; they are monocrystalline but brecciated and enveloped in 0.6-1.5 mm wide rims of swathing kamacite. The larger schreibersite crystals are frequently sheared and the shear zones are filled with 1-20 µ wide troilite veinlets. Troilite occurs, in addition, as 2-15 mm rounded nodules, ... A few Reichenbach lamellae, typically 25 mm long and 0.01 mm wide and consisting of troilite with precipitated schreibersite flags, are also present. The overall impression of the etched sections is that of a structure which was plastically deformed while still hot. Thereby the large schreibersite crystals were sheared and brecciated, and troilite was squeezed into open fissures in the schreibersite and the metal. The metallic matrix, however, later developed a normal, undistorted Widman-stätten structure in which more phosphides precipitated. The local, severe cor
rosion is mainly concentrated around the fissures - partially filled with troilite - of the schreibersite and the metal. Owens Valley has a primary structure corresponding to Aggie Creek, Baquedano and Cleveland. Its secondary structure of recrystallized kamacite with finely dispersed taenite particles resembles particularly Plymouth and Withrow. Chemically, it belongs to those meteorites that are transitional between group IIIA and group IIIB. To: freewu2000_at_yahoo.com Cc: Meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list Meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com http://www.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list</BLOCKQUOTE></DIV></DIV> <hr size=1><a href="http://uk.rd.yahoo.com/evt=8613/*http://uk.yahoo.com/mail/tagline_plus/?http://uk.promotions.yahoo.com/yplus/yoffer.html">Yahoo! Plus - For a better Internet experience</a> 
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Received on Sun 01 Jun 2003 03:18:06 PM PDT

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