[meteorite-list] Valera - documentation?

From: Darryl Pitt <darryl_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon, 21 Nov 2011 05:42:11 -0500
Message-ID: <B7553491-322B-4DD4-AC56-394A7945B51B_at_dof3.com>

Hi Again,

Trust me---it's revisited! ;-) Every couple of years or so this comes up and I find myself writing an iteration of the following---but then, maybe not to the Meteorite List in some time (and this is getting me to thinking that a comprehensive story for, say, METEORITE should be done).

MD, with great respect, your citing details as being particularly relevant which I find to be off-target.

I recall Professor Ferrin being so exasperated with collectors who questioned the veracity of his claims due to the greater value Valera would have as a result of such claims. The thing is that Ferrin didn't place a greater value on the meteorite as a result of such circumstances---for him it was just an interesting sidebar. When Ferrin contacted me and informed me of the events surrounding the Valera impact, I was the one that informed him "You know, this could be the first fatality to be so thoroughly documented,"----and obviously Dr. Gonzalez (and his family) didn't have a clue as to value of meteorites at all! When I determined this WAS the first such instance, Valera was introduced with a headline that was completely inconsequential to the owner and merely a fun tidbit to a Venezuelan researcher.

While I have no knowledge of any newspaper article---since when does a newspaper account become the arbiter of reality...and particularly as it regards meteorites?!! The track record here is pretty weak [let's not already forget The New York Times and Gebel Kamil debacle---and that's for starters]. And I don't mean to be chauvinistic here, but you would necessarily have an account by a small paper that would publish anything its fed. (Still, in the spirit of wishing to pursue a comprehensive Valera piece, I will check to see whether any such article exist.)

I also question your thought that the documentation of the clavicle information would be key---and there is actually an inside joke here. Well, it's a bit of a boring joke (and embarrassing) but it does illustrate a point with which I would like to conclude.

I was informed that the cow was hit behind the head...on the shoulder. And in my early auction descriptions I went with "shoulder" (I don't recall if it was for Phillips or Butterfields). Now, this bothered me because as far as I was concerned, cows didn't have shoulders and this was a translation problem. However, I continued with the term until I had to write a description for a competing auction house. Understand, auction houses dealing in natural history work with provided descriptions and do not want to publish precisely the same description as their competitor, so I had to make minor edits---and here was my chance to get rid of that shoulder problem. Clavicle! Someone later pointed out the more precise anatomical reference, and I said something to the effect of, "I know cows don't have shoulders but I was too lazy to change it up until I had to do a rewrite." I was then asked if I ever heard of....shoulder roast? (Eeeek.)

In closing, we have to be careful of those details to which we assign value---and conversely, we should not be suspect of something because it was not assigned a value which we believe is deserved. It's was a drag Valera had been impugned by some solely because of a detail that was of little or no consequence to the original chain of ownership....combined with it being flipped inexpensively because of my financial circumstances at the time.

This reminds me (and sorry for this being so long, but I'm marking time in an airport as my flight had been canceled), yesterday afternoon I had the pleasure of seeing Peter Marmet who provided me with a fun little allegory. A Swiss cheese was split in half with one piece selling for 1 Swiss Franc per portion and the other selling for 10 Swiss Francs for the same sized portion. Which one is better?

On some level, I think many of us need something that costs more.

Yeah, I wish that Gonzalez had a greater appreciation for what he had, and that plasticizing technology existed and that we had a Valera Cow that would be worth far more than the Claxton Mailbox or the Peekskill Car. But then, had that been the case, Valera would not have been widely distributed and become one of the best meteorite values of all time.


All best / Darryl








On Nov 21, 2011, at 3:35 AM, MexicoDoug wrote:

> Thanks you Darryl, I wouldn't say 'Valera revisited' as this addition has never appeared in public to my knowledge and shed a lot of additional light on the subject. Is there any newspaper article of the time of the fall vintage to your knowledge, or did the consigner ever write a report of his findings to your knowledge? Or does it all basically hinge on his word as a gentleman and researcher? Specifically the documentation of where the 'clavicle' information came from would be key.
>
> Again Darryl, thanks and it sounds like there could have been a better way to do this, but I fully understand that in the heat of the moment lots of things get sticky when such a prize changes hands and the stakes are high.
>
> Kindest wishes
> Doug
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Darryl Pitt <darryl at dof3.com>
> To: MexicoDoug <mexicodoug at aim.com>
> Cc: Meteorite-list <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Mon, Nov 21, 2011 2:07 am
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Valera - documentation?
>
>
>
> VALERA REVISITED
>
> Hi,
>
> While not among my favorite stories, as you'll soon discover---I have no doubt
> whatsoever Valera killed a cow. In brief, there was far more data collected
> than the affidavit (which was one person's mere summary of events).
>
> Here's the story:
>
> Shepherded by Marty Zinn---the impresario of the Tucson Mineral and Fossil
> Shows---Valera was first offered at the Macovich Auction 11 or 12 Tucson's ago.
> Professor Ignacio Ferrin---a Venezuelan astronomer...and quite the
> gentleman....acquired the meteorite after word of its existence wound its way to
> him. Marty heard from Professor Ferrin who directed him to me, and he consigned
> Valera to our auction.
>
> For those who are unaware, the clavicle of an otherwise healthy cow was
> shattered and odd stones---only much later determined to be meteoritic---were
> found near the carcass. The sonic phenomena associated with a meteorite fall
> were experienced. Two large fragments from one mass were recovered (~35 and 7.5
> kg), and left outside, one of which was used as a doorstop over a period of
> years---I imagine the lighter of the two. A third smaller specimen which I
> vaguely recall as being pretty much complete had been brought inside and was
> quite fresh. The specimens in circulation come from the larger fragments.
>
> Professor Ferrin gathered far more information other than his procurement of the
> affidavit. He has long been exasperated by the ongoing questioning of Valera's
> "killer" provenance by the meteorite collecting community, and has gone
> on-record addressing this topic more than once.
>
> There are two important points worth mentioning here---both of which are rather
> ironic.
>
> 1. It's important to recall that Ferrin was informed that the farm owner on
> whose property the meteorite fell, physician Argimiro Gonzalez, didn't think
> anything at all of this event. Dr. Gonzalez was well aware that rocks fell out
> of the sky, and so it seemed entirely reasonable to him that such impacts would
> occasionally result in fatalities. Without the rocks ever having been analyzed,
> Gonzalez, and later his family, considered the rocks as extraterrestrial
> curiosities---a conclusion which resulted from a dead animal which had been
> pulverized by blunt force trauma whose instrument rested nearby. It was the
> simplest explanation and somewhat a different tack than would be taken by the
> meteorite community: simply expressed, Gonzalez concluded as a result of a
> death that what he had must be a meteorite. It was many years later that Ferrin
> heard the story, confirmed Gonzalez's hypothesis and facilitated Valera's
> classification.
>
> 2. Every few years I have to admit to having undermined Valera's exceptional
> provenance, and here's how:
>
> The larger of the two massess did not sell at our auction (it was a big rock and
> pricey---while extremely inexpensive on a per/gram basis) and Ferrin suddenly
> found himself in an unexpected financial bind. He did not have particularly
> high expectations for how much it should sell---but he absolutely expected it
> would sell, and now he was stuck---and he didn't want to take 40+ kg of rocks
> back to Venezuela. I felt badly as I was confident it would sell, and informed
> Ferrin of the same prior to his decision to bring Valera to Arizona. So I
> decided I would purchase it---but by doing so I now put myself in a huge
> financial pinch. So what did I do? The most foolish thing I've ever done in
> meteorites: while I don't recall the precise numbers, I sold a portion of the
> rock to another dealer for about my cost...perhaps a dollar a gram, as I recall,
> and then we both sold Valera super-cheaply. Percentage-wise we made a nice
> return, but the fact is that by having offered it so inexpensively, a perceived
> valuation was created for a meteorite that should be selling today for easily
> $250+/g.
>
> If you have a specimen of Valera---treasure it. If you don't have one, you
> might consider getting some from somewhere as the price has been rapidly
> escalating of late. This past June at a Heritage Auction, a 309 gram specimen
> sold for $5,975 or about $20/g. I'm informed that small specimens today
> typically sell for $25/gram and more---and as you know, getting from $2.50/g to
> $25/g is the hard part.
>
> I'll never forget when I was on the exhibit floor at a Bonhams sale a couple of
> years back and someone declared, "I don't think Valera killed a cow---it's
> selling for MUCH too little for having done so." That was such a funny notion
> to me...how MY screw-up fueled an inaccurate impression. (I did not mention my
> role to the fellow ;-)
>
>
> All the best / Darryl
>
>
>
>
> On Nov 20, 2011, at 12:51 AM, MexicoDoug wrote:
>
>> Dear List;
>>
>> I have a question about the cow killing incident.
>>
>> The meteorite fell in 1972. I understand from rumors that it is
> absolutely a
> confirmed cow killer. But the document doesn't read as an absolute fact, but
> rather circumstantial evidence (which as a meteorite collector appreciating the
> size of the mass I want to believe quite strong).
>>
>> The affidavit was signed in 2001, after the Doctor on whose property
> the
> meteorite landed had died.
>>
>> Yet when I heard this, it was explained to me that a doctor had
> pronounced the
> cow dead and there was injury visible on the cow caused by the falling mass (a
> 50 kg stone). I always thought that a Doctor actually swore to the wound on the
> cow and was convinced it was caused by the stone, since a doctor would be
> expected to have a good idea of what such a wound would look like.
>>
>> This thread just prompted me to me read the affidavit. It doesn't
> say
> anything about wounds on the cow.
>>
>> The affidavit was by the Doctor's visitor, and specifically does not
> even
> mention that the doctor made any opinion about the meteorite killing the cow.
> But does mention the doctor had owned the property and passed away subsequently.
> No one from the Doctor's family, just the visitor, Juan Dionicio, commenting 30
> years later says it "appeared" (presumably him since he doesn't mention the
> doctor) the cow was killed by the rock when he saw it the next day. It does not
> mention any injuries or wounds to the cow at all. Just "it appeared the cow had
> been killed by the rock" and also that "the cow then eaten".
>>
>> Yet I heard at the time I bought this that the cow had sustained a
> mortal
> injury the injury I recall being described at one point. Why this is not in the
> document? ... has me thinking something must be missing?
>>
>> Is this the only document that discusses the claim of a cow being
> killed?
> Because it seems to me people have much more information than is contained in
> the affidavit. (But I've run up enough against rumors to believe that it's
> easily possible for the rumors to just be taller tales down the line). Was
> there a newspaper article in the 70's or anything predating this, or were there
> any other witnesses besides Juan Dionicio, the mysterious guest who it sounds
> spent several nights on the good doctor's ranch? I'd really like to know.
>>
>> Kindest wishes
>> Doug
>>
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Received on Mon 21 Nov 2011 05:42:11 AM PST