[meteorite-list] The other Brenham hunter

From: Darren Garrison <cynapse_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu May 11 01:27:24 2006
Message-ID: <1mi562h34mi203rfagbmn65c37b9kr0ee9_at_4ax.com>

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/2006-05-10-meteorites-kansas_x.htm?POE=TECISVA

Meteorites mark fields of dreams
Updated 5/10/2006 11:03 PM ET
By Judy Keen, USA TODAY
HAVILAND, Kan. ? Don Stimpson peers into a 3-foot-deep hole on his farm as
friends help dig up a 150-pound meteorite. "Interesting shape," he says. The new
find will join the collection of meteorites sitting on foil-covered chairs in
his garage.
Stimpson hopes that his trove will soon be housed somewhere more suitable. He
envisions a museum here that would lure people off U.S. Highway 54 and make this
town of 590 the "meteorite capital of the USA." He'd like to give tours of his
excavation sites, where small plastic swimming pools cover the impressions made
when the meteorites, which are fragments of asteroids, plunged from space about
20,000 years ago and fell across a 6-mile-long "strewn field."

"If you look at small towns in rural America, a lot of them are struggling,"
Stimpson says. "We'd like to see the community benefit from the meteorites found
here." Mayor Jeff Christensen agrees, and Haviland will hold its first meteorite
festival on July 8. "I'd like to see an educational center located here,"
Christensen says. "I see busloads of children coming for field trips."

Haviland has competition just down the highway. Greensburg, 10 miles west of
here, has a head start when it comes to turning meteorites into tourist draws:
It's home to the "world's largest hand-dug well" and a 1,000-pound meteorite
found nearby in 1949. A big arrow on the town's water tower points to the
attractions.

Greensburg's well, 109 feet deep and 32 feet wide, was completed in 1888 and
opened as a tourist site in 1937. For $2, visitors can walk to the bottom.
Inside the gift shop, past the T-shirts, the half-ton meteorite can be seen for
free.

Last year, about 28,000 people stopped to see Greensburg's Big Well and
meteorite, manager Richard Stephenson says. Greensburg Mayor Lonnie McCollum
wants to create an educational center with a mural and explanatory video to
highlight "the space wanderer."

Hefty rocks, hefty prices

Until last year, Greensburg's 1,000-pound rock was the largest meteorite found
in the area and one of the biggest pallasites in the world. Pallasites are rare
meteorites that contain green olivine crystals as well as nickel and iron. But
last October, Steve Arnold, a professional meteorite hunter, found a 1,430-pound
specimen 1? miles from Stimpson's property.

Arnold's discovery dented Greensburg's bragging rights. His rock will be
displayed at Haviland's festival in July. But Arnold is a businessman, not a
tourism booster, and his find is for sale. He says the meteorite is worth at
least $1 million because of its size and rarity.

Arnold leases exploration rights from area farmers and pays them royalties on
meteorites he sells to museums and collectors. "The price is now well over $1 a
gram," he says.

Stimpson, 53, a biophysicist who moved here with his wife, Sheila, in 1994 from
Gurnee, Ill., hasn't sold any of the dozens of meteorites he has found. He grew
up wanting to be a test pilot and is fascinated with space. He bought 1,000
acres because of the meteorites first discovered here in the 1880s by Eliza
Kimberly, a farmer's wife.

"We assign a different value to these meteorites than monetary," Stimpson says.
To finance his quest, he leases part of his property for cattle grazing. He has
taken temporary jobs in other states so he has enough money to continue
searching for meteorites.

There are enough meteorites buried in the flat fields to satisfy both Stimpson
and Arnold, but it's uncertain whether both Haviland and Greensburg can turn
meteorites into profitable tourist attractions.

Stimpson thinks the competition between the towns stems in part from their high
school teams, the Greensburg Rangers and the Haviland Dragons. Christensen says
the rivalry has existed "since long before I was even born." However, he plans
to invite Greensburg to take part in the meteorite festival. "I really hope we
pack their hotels and restaurants," Christensen says.

Haviland is home to Barclay College, a small religious school, but has little to
offer tourists. There's a farm co-op, hardware store, bank and rehabilitation
center in town, but no hotels or chain restaurants. Christensen plans meteorite
displays, lectures by scientists and food vendors at this summer's festival. He
says he'll invite VIPs, including former Kansas senator Bob Dole and President
Bush.

Greensburg has 1,486 residents and a thriving business district with a Pizza
Hut, hardware and grocery stores and the Kiowa County courthouse. Besides its
well and meteorite, the town has Hunter Drugstore, a 1917 store with a lunch
counter where drinks are still mixed by a soda jerk. Still, the population is
declining. "That's just a fact of life out in this part of the country," says
McCollum, Greensburg's mayor.

Solid competition

McCollum thinks a bigger, more sophisticated meteorite display can help his
town's economy. "We can make something out of this," he says. Asked about
Haviland's competing plans, he says, "We don't care." Because the two towns are
in the same county and separated by so few miles, he says, anything that helps
Haviland also benefits Greensburg.

Stephenson, who manages the Big Well tourist site in Greensburg, dismisses
Haviland's plans. Greensburg, he says, simply has more to offer. "They do not
have the Big Well, and there's no way they're going to get it. It doesn't move."

Stimpson is less interested in battling over tourist dollars than in sharing the
pleasure of holding the heavy orange and brown meteorites.

"It is just a rock, but what's unique about it is how far it's traveled and the
knowledge we've gained from it. It's billions of years old. It came from the
asteroid belt," he says. "Just holding it ? that's the value."

Arnold shares Stimpson's fascination with meteorites, which still fall to Earth
but are rarely seen making impact.

"It's a buried treasure story," Arnold says. "If you own an acre of property,
you've got as good a shot at finding a meteorite as anyone."
Received on Thu 11 May 2006 01:29:26 AM PDT