Our Tuesday, August 15 program meeting will include a presentation by several junior members who were participants (and winners) in award competitions related to our rockhounding and lapidary hobbies. (We love how our young members inspire other kids to follow suit.)
This program meeting will also include a slide presentation related to our upcoming annual gem and mineral show, presented by PLS member Marcia Goetz.
Doors open at 6:30 pm in the Fellowship Hall at the Santa Anita Church located at 226 West Colorado Boulevard in Arcadia, CA 91007. Program starts at 7:00 pm. Free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. Come join us and see what we’re all about!
Pasadena Lapidary Society member Paolo Sanchez will be the featured speaker at the Tuesday, June 20th Program Meeting. Paolo is currently a graduate student at Caltech’s Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences.
The Roman Empire lasted for about 500 years, from its founding in 27 BC to the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD. Throughout this time, the famed ancient civilization incurred a vast amount of mineral wealth that included numerous mines of industrial and precious metals in Europe and the Mediterranean, some of which are still mined today. Additionally, the trade and status of gemstones — from Baltic amber to European agates — have had a profound impact on the lapidary world. This talk will combine history, geology and lore as the mineral world greatly impacted the Roman world as it does to our world today.
This program meeting takes place on Tuesday, June 20, 2023 at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Take a step back into antiquity with us. Admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. Hope to see you there!
Tuesday, May 16, 2023 at 7:00 p.m., Fellowship Hall of the Santa Anita Church
This lovely agate jewelry image was provided by Tarun Adlakha.
This month, Tarun Adlakha (who is from India), will speak about pareidolia and the wonderful world of Indian Dendritic agates. Tarun is known to have the finest hoard of natural dendritic agate in the world with over 300,000 cabochons and specimens, some of which have been displayed at prestigious gem shows and museums around the globe and used by some leading designers. Tarun has accumulated a large number of stones with unusual patterns mimicking birds, animals, landscapes and mythical characters in a sort of fantasy wonderland in agate. His talk will focus on the history, mining, and cutting of these agates followed by a descriptive slide show of the unusual stones from his collection.
What do pearls and the desert have in common? Find out when PLS member Sue Pang provides the May Rock of the Month Talk, and explains how to identify cultured pearls from fake pearls, give some pointers on wearing a pearl necklace, and advise as to the best season to buy pearls. Before Sue Pang earned her engineering degree and worked in the Aerospace industry, she worked for one of the largest pearl companies in California.
This program meeting takes place on Tuesday, May 16, 2023 at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Join us for what promises to be a very interesting evening! Admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. See you there!
What do the Cady Mountains and the Marble Mountain Fossil Beds have in common? These are sample sites Pasadena Lapidary Society (PLS) members and other rockhounds visit to collect rocks including but not limited to chalcedony and agates. The aforementioned sites are also an example of places within the boundaries of the Mojave Trails National Monument (MTNM) in San Bernardino County, California. PLS members have visited public lands and collected rocks since our Society’s establishment in 1946, while the MTNM was created in February 2016 under the Obama Administration. Some national monuments have banned rockhounding or removed access to rockhounding areas. Currently, rockhounding at the MTNM is still allowed while the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) develops the monument’s management plan. As rockhounds, we need to continue to have road access to collection sites and be able to collect rocks within the MTNM. Gregor Losson, our gem and mineral collecting representative on the MTNM Subgroup of the Desert Advisory Committee (DAC), will be the guest speaker for our April program meeting. Having recently attended the BLM California Desert District Advisory Council meeting, he will illustrate what’s happening and what we need to do to continue enjoying future access to the MTNM.
The April Rock of the Month presentation will be about a junior member’s rock hunting experience. Daniel Nishimura is a PLS junior member. He is eight years old and has been rock hounding since he learned how to walk.
This important and informative program meeting takes place at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Join us to learn more about the future of rockhounding in one of our favorite locales. Admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. Hope to see you there!
Pasadena Lapidary Society member Paolo Sanchez will discuss the elusive Lapis Lazuli from Mount Baldy (aka ‘Old Baldy’ or Mount San Antonio) for our March program meeting. Paolo will cover the science behind lapis, its significance to lapidary, and his adventures in search of one of the only lapis mines in North America. He has been an active member of the Pasadena Lapidary Society since 2011, yet his passions for geology and rockhounding stem from kindergarten. He has written numerous award-winning articles on minerals and has been a guest speaker for various California Federation of Mineralogical Societies (CFMS) programs across California. He has received his bachelors in Geology and Geophysics from UC Berkeley and is now pursuing a PhD in geochemistry studying mineralogy and petrology at Caltech.
The March Rock of the Month presentation will be on Septarian Nodules and provided by PLS member Sue Dekany.
This program meeting takes place on Tuesday, March 21, 2023, at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Come join us! Doors open at 6:30, admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. We hope to see you there!
Kris Rowe, front and center, surrounded by PLS members from L to R, Liz, Sue, Steve and Shirley. Photograph provided by Sue Pang.
The February program meeting will feature Kris Rowe, a lifelong rockhound and 40+ year field geologist, who will present a talk on Rockhounding in the Mojave. Kris has led fieldtrips throughout California for decades, with many outings focused in the Clear Creek area and all over the Mojave Desert. Recent trips have been out to the hills of Hinkley, CA to a private turquoise claim, near where the picture at right was taken. During the Thanksgiving 2022 week, Kris led a 9-day long ‘Odyssey’ to numerous sites including the South Cadys, Lavic Siding, Opal Mountain and Boron. He can be found on Facebook as ‘Roadside Rockhound‘.
This program meeting takes place on Tuesday, February 21st, 2023 at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Come join us! Doors open at 6:30, admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. We hope to see you there!
The January 17th, 2023 Pasadena Lapidary Society Program Meeting will feature Dick Weber, who will introduce us to the colorful world of Fluorite. Due to a spectacular range of colors and well-developed crystals, this mineral is highly sought after by collectors. Clear and colorless when pure, fluorite can exhibit every color of the spectrum from the deepest purple to bright oranges and reds. In addition to its aesthetic and scientific value, fluorite is a critical industrial mineral used in the production of thousands of commercial products.
Dick Weber was first introduced to the fluorite deposits of the Mississippi Valley while working on his geology degree. Actively collecting specimens for the last 15 years, he will bring a display showcasing pieces from famous locales.
PLS member Curtis Schurer will present the second part of his Rock of the Month Talk on Jasper.
This program meeting takes place at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Join us for an illuminating evening as we begin our 2023 Program Meetings! Admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. See you there!
Join us at our Tuesday, October 18 Program Meeting where award-winning mixed-media artist Linda Queally will discuss the rich history of Pearls in the Americas, and how they’ve been associated with Mermaids since the first Siren’s Song was heard.
Linda works in acrylic and fine art paper on claybord in her vibrant mystical paintings, and with cultured pearls and mixed metals in her simple, elegant jewelry designs. She studied Art and Design at Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles, is a Certified Pearl Specialist with the Cultured Pearl Association of America, and holds a Certificate of Gemology from Santiago Canyon College in Orange.
This program meeting takes place at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007.
Join us for an enchanting evening! Admission is free; open to the public. Enjoy refreshments while checking out the display table; bring a rock specimen you’d like identified. See you there!
The August general meeting will feature a talk by member Paolo Sanchez who will focus on large-scale landscape geology. The presentation should be helpful for understanding Earth science, and to an extent, minerals, from the viewpoint of the window seat of a plane. While flying across the state and the country, Paolo took many pictures of geologic landscapes. He plans to talk about prominent geologic features such as the San Andreas Fault, Cascade Volcanoes, and the Colorado Plateau. We hope to see you there!
This program meeting is at 7:00 p.m. at Fellowship Hall of The Santa Anita Church, 226 W. Colorado Blvd., Arcadia, CA 91007. Come to learn and make new friends; open to the public, free admission.
Flint Knap-In and Paleo Tool Demonstration at Chilao School in Angeles National Forest
The July 2022 Field Trip will feature an educational visit to Chilao School, 40 minutes from La Canada. (Note that Chilao School and Chilao campground are different locales.)Chilao School is located next to the US Forest Service Chilao Fire Station. To get to Chilao School from La Canada, take Angeles Crest Highway 25.1 miles to the Chilao Campground loop. Turn left into the campground. Drive .9 miles past the Little Pines and Manzanita loops and turn left at Mt Hillyer Road (3N141). Proceed down 3N141 for .5 miles to Chilao School. The one room school is on the right BEFORE you get to the fire station. Some of the roads may not have names on them, so please look at the map before starting your journey.
Though the field trip is Saturday only, we’ll be camping ¼ mile down the road at Chilao campground on Friday night so we can get an early start on Saturday. There will be a potluck at the school or campground on Saturday night. Expect daytime temperatures in the 80’s and nighttime lows in the 50’s. If you want to camp overnight, you should arrive ASAP on Friday afternoon to claim a campsite. Better yet, arrange with someone who is going to be up there on Friday morning to reserve you a spot. Campground use is heavy especially in the summer. The cost is $12 a night. Water is provided along with a vault toilet. Note that the Station Fire ravaged Chilao about 13 years ago and new trees are now starting to repopulate the area.
We’ll be learning how to make spear tips, arrowheads, hatchets, and knives similar to what prehistoric man used thousands of years ago. This paleo tool get-together is casual; there is no schedule for instruction, hence there is no official meet up time. You can arrive and go when you please. I recommend getting there by 10AM.
I’ll bring obsidian slabs to practice on. You can contact me at rexch8@yahoo.com.
There is no charge, but a small donation to the nonprofit Redbird/Chilao Visions is recommended. Our hosts are Corina Roberts, founder of Redbird, and Gary Pickett, flint knapping artist.
GPS coordinates for Chilao School: 34.3341764547053, -118.02406758638696
