[meteorite-list] New Meteorite Gallery In Texas Includes Rare Pieces Of Solar System

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:18:25 2004
Message-ID: <200302061750.JAA25738_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/nation/5119763.htm

New meteorite gallery includes rare pieces of solar system
BY ALEXANDRA WITZE
The Dallas Morning News
February 6, 2003

Oscar Monnig used to pay anyone who brought him a meteorite.

Starting in the 1930s, Monnig scoured Texas for funny-looking rocks. He would
enlist the help of ranchers, leaving fliers and materials from his dry-goods store
with a request for meteorites.

Now anyone can see this collection of space rocks - one of the best in the country -
free.

This week, the new Monnig Meteorite Gallery opens on the campus of Texas
Christian University. The museum showcases decades of work by the Fort Worth
businessman, who died in 1999.

"He was the meteorite man," says Arthur Ehlmann, a retired geology professor
from TCU and unofficial curator of the collection.

The new museum displays about 10 percent of the collection of 1,055 meteorites,
some gathered by Monnig and others acquired by Ehlmann. It's the scientific analog
of a fine art collection, featuring some rare and spectacular pieces of the solar
system.

There is one meteorite from the moon, and three from Mars. Also, a
basketball-sized chunk of the rock that blasted Meteor Crater in northern Arizona.
And a piece of the meteorite that crumpled a car's trunk in Peekskill, N.Y., in 1992.

Representative samples of all the major meteorite types are included. It's also the
world's biggest collection of Texas meteorites, containing 201 of the 278 that have
been identified in the state.

Meteorite researchers consider the Monnig collection a valuable study resource.
Several scientists visit Fort Worth every year to look at the rocks, while many
more request samples by mail.

"The Monnig collection is one of the finest university-based collections anywhere
in the world, not just in the United States," says Tim McCoy, curator of meteorites
at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.

The Smithsonian and many other institutions tried to persuade Monnig to donate
his collection to them. But he insisted it stay in Fort Worth and gave it all to TCU
between 1978 and 1986. On his death, he left the university $4.2 million to help care
for the collection.

The geology department decided that building a public museum would be the best
use of the money, says Ehlmann.

"We wanted it to be educational, not just a bunch of meteorites to go ooh and aah
over," he says.

Yet there is a big "ooh and aah" factor in the new museum. Its displays were
designed by Gallagher & Associates, the firm that created the Smithsonian's gem
and mineral hall.

Other universities, including the University of New Mexico and Arizona State
University in the Southwest, also have meteorite museums on campus. But many of
those are outdated and poorly designed, McCoy said.

"What really sets TCU apart is the quality of the exhibition," he says.

A bright mural of an asteroid sets off the entrance to the new museum, flanked by
two meteorites that visitors can touch. There's also a game of identifying the real
meteorites from a set of five rocks in small glass cases.

Inside the museum, visitors learn about where meteorites come from - the asteroid
belt, the moon or Mars - as well as several meteorite myths, such as the notion
that meteorites are hot when they hit the ground. They're not, says Ehlmann;
although the surface of the rock is heated by friction as it passes through Earth's
atmosphere, the interior retains the frigidness of space and keeps the entire rock
chilly.

Famous meteorites fill the gallery's historical display. There are two pieces of the
meteorite that fell at Ensisheim, in Alsace, in 1492, and three other rocks that were
seen to fall in Europe during the late 1700s and early 1800s - finally convincing
people that meteorites were indeed space rocks and not rocks that had been
somehow tossed up, Ehlmann said.

The collection contains a piece of the 1807 meteorite from Weston, Conn. - the first
witnessed fall in the United States. When Yale scientists vouched for the incident,
Thomas Jefferson retorted that he would rather believe that Yankee professors lie
than admit that stones could fall from heaven.

Modern science takes precedence through the rest of the Monnig gallery. Several
exhibits outline the major types of meteorites: iron, stony-iron and stony,
depending on their chemical makeup. Other exhibits feature the markings that
meteorites can acquire while traveling through the atmosphere, such as a dark
fusion crust or thumbprint-shaped depressions on the surface. Polished slices of
other meteorites reveal the so-called Widmanstatten pattern, cross-hatched
marks created by the growth of crystals.

One entire room describes the importance of meteorite impacts on Earth. Visitors
can see how, when a meteorite hit the desert in Libya, the energy that was released
fused the sand to a greenish glass. An interactive computer display lets anyone
construct a virtual meteorite, then aim a colossal one at Earth and watch havoc
reign as it hits.

Another area displays modern meteorites with a story: a piece of the rock that hit
an Alabama woman in 1954, bruising her leg; an iron chunk that tripped a
14-year-old boy hunting rabbits in Oklahoma; the Pena Blanca Spring meteorite,
which plunged into a pool in Brewster County in 1946.

The final room is the Texas meteorites' hall of fame, starring a chunk of the rock
that created a large impact crater near Odessa. Because Monnig had a statewide
reputation for always buying meteorites - even if he already had one of the type -
this part of the collection is incredibly thorough, Ehlmann said.

For example, Monnig acquired more than 500 pieces of a meteorite that fell near
Tulia in Swisher County; many of those Ehlmann later traded or sold to gain other
important specimens for the collection.

Still, Oscar Monnig's dedication helped build a world-class collection, scientists
said.

"He was a very humble person, always saying that he was just an amateur,"
Ehlmann said. "But he knew a hell of a lot about meteorites."

---
The Monnig Meteorite Gallery is on the ground floor of the Sid Richardson Science
Building on the Texas Christian University campus, near the corner of Bowie Street
and University Drive, Fort Worth.
The museum is open to the public, when TCU is in session, on Tuesdays through
Fridays from 1 to 4 p.m. and Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. There is no admission
charge. For more information, call 817-257-7270.

Received on Thu 06 Feb 2003 12:50:03 PM PST