<http://www.cadillacnews.com/articles/2004/09/13/news/news01.txt>
Former Cadillac man's life centers around meteorites, precious stones and adventure
By DALE KILLINGBECK, CADILLAC NEWS
Former Cadillac resident David Freeman knows a hot rock when he sees one.
"I've found two diamonds in Wyoming and hunted gold for a while," he said. "You always are aware of what is around you. You become an opportunist."
But a constant focus when he heads out once per week on forays into the dry lake beds around Rock Springs, Wyoming, are meteorites.
He is the proud owner of a 40-gram chunk of space that a California laboratory classified as a meteorite that once flew somewhere close to the sun.
"It was the first new meteorite found in Wyoming in 56 years," he said. And it is just the 13th one discovered in the state.
Freeman is part of the world of meteorite hunters and chasers and rubs elbows with NASA scientists and university professors at mineral shows - not bad for someone who admittedly did not spend a lot of time focusing on studies when he was at Cadillac High School.
"I found it on public land," he said of the low-iron rock. Knowing what he had, Freeman took the meteorite to the Bureau of Land Management and they let him keep it. He sent it to the laboratory where they sliced off a small sample to catalog it and sent the rest back. It now sits in a display case at the Bureau of Land Management building in Rock Springs.
Freeman estimates it would bring about $2,000 from a collector. He should know.
"I making a living selling rocks on the Internet," he said.
Freeman graduated from Cadillac High School in 1971, spent five years in the U.S. Navy and returned to the Cadillac area to work at a sand pit near Yuma. His father, who at the time was working at the Jim Bridger Power Plant in Wyoming, encouraged him to seek his fortunes there. He went and worked in coal mines for eight years then started hunting for gold. He said he was about to become president of the state association of gold miners when his interests changed.
"At that time, I didn't know anything about meteorites," he said.
But around 1998 he became interested and started educating himself with books and by attending mineral shows and talking with other collectors and scientists who work with the space rocks. The quest for his own piece of another world grabbed hold of him.
"I assembled my own collection to get samples to hold and feel. It led me to find my first Wyoming meteorite."
Freeman said meteorite hunting in Wyoming is different from hunting space rocks in Michigan or Florida. When someone goes "cold" hunting as he does, he picks dry lake beds where the dark meteorite rock wlll stand out.
He uses a magnet and his eyes as his primary tools going after the rocks.
Parts of the West offer some good hunting. He said the space rock hunters flocked to Nevada and Arizona in recent finds and some people found chunks of space in a weekend hunt that could net them $10,000. He said scientists estimate about 20,000 meteorites fall into the oceans or hit the Earth's surface each year.
"NORAD tracks these things coming in," he said.
When he returns to Michigan for vacations to see family in the Harrietta area, he said he usually goes over to the sand dunes on the Lake Michigan shore for a meteorite hunting excursion. Hunting in the woods and forest is too difficult. He said in Michigan or states such as Florida where there is high humidity and moisture, the rocks will rust over time.
Some states, such as Kansas, offer easier finds. Freeman said there are lots of discoveries there because the state does not have a lot of rocks in its wheat fields and plains.
More on Meteorites, Page A2
Freeman sells meteorites and other rocks on the Internet for a living
"They hit a rock with their plow and 'bingo,'" he said, - it is probably a meteorite.
Freeman sells meteorites, fossil fish, Wyoming jade and other lapidary rocks on the Internet. He also will take a load of anorthosite to the Colorado Mineral and Fossil Show this month to sell. About 200 dealers of rocks, meteors and fossils will be at the show.
He said he sells slices of the anorthosite to people who own moon dust or expensive meteorite dust as a means to display what their dust would look like in rock form. He said the rock is volcanic rock that cooled slowly and resembles lunar rock.
If he sells 15 or 20 slices, it will pay for the trip, he said.
At the show a couple of meteors are set for display and usually scientists and hobbyists get excited looking at the rocks under a microscope at the show.
While some people label him a "rock hound" for his relentless search for rocks, Freeman said he also enjoys country dancing, square dancing and the general atmosphere of life in the West.
"I came out here and fell in love with this place," he said. Retirement is a ways off unless he is able to find a piece of Mars or Venus on his hunts. Some Mars meteorites sell for $4,000 per gram. A chunk of Venus could bring more.
At 51, he said he will still follow his dreams into the high desert landscape around Rock Springs.
"No, I haven't grown up yet," he said. "I'm still playing with rocks." ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
