Washington is made of three huge pieces of land that smashed together millions of years ago when the plates they were on moved together.                     

Tools
When you’re going    out to collect and discover new specimens you need to be prepared, so you will need a hard hat to prevent getting hit on the head by falling rocks. You will also need protective goggles to prevent getting hit in the eyes by rock chips sent flying by your pounding of a chisel and hammer. A pocket lens and identification tape is needed to help identify your specimens.
 
Mining
Mining is a big part of excavating rocks and minerals.  What is new in the excavating of minerals is that people don’t do as much underground work anymore.  They do something called open pit mining where the miners find a rich deposit of gold and then they take a huge chunk of dirt out of the ground. They pour cyanide in the hole to leach out the gold. Then the miners remove the gold and melt it to make gold bars. 

One of the biggest hazards of mining is getting your fingers blown of when blasting with affo, which are little white pellets about the size of bee-bees rolled in diesel fuel.  A couple of things will probably change in the future of mining.  The machines used to excavate will get a bit smaller.  Also it will get more mechanized, less people will have to move also it will get harder because of growing regulations.  Mining will get harder as it gets easier. Machines will probably do most of the dangerous work maybe even all the work for the miners.

SILVER and GOLD
Silver is one of the best conductors of electricity in the metal mineral family. Its melting point is 961.93 degrees it starts to boil at 2,212 degrees.  Gold is very heavy and forms in hydrothermal veins and is usually associated with quartz and sulfur.  It starts to melt at 1,064 degrees and boils at 2,807 degrees. There are many types of gold, but the rarest type is wire gold in which it can only be found in two places in the whole world and one of the places is Liberty, Washington.

FOSSILS
The rarest fossil found in Washington was an elephant fossil. Also up by Dry Springs some explorers found a cast of a rhinoceros in some compacted lava. The bones were intact, nothing was missing.  The bones in the museum are fake they are nature’s copy over time. The actual bones disintegrated and left a cast. Over time minerals seeped in through cracks in the casts and formed the “bones” you see today. Recently in Africa a girl’s skeleton was found and it is about 3 million years old! The girl weighed about 65 lbs and was about 3 feet 8 inches tall.  The most common fossil found in Washington is petrified wood.

HISTORY
The oldest rock found on earth is 4.3 billion years old.  The oldest rock ever found is 4.6 billion years old. The rock that is so old is a meteorite. In certain meteorites are two rare and valuable minerals are found, Cohentite and Schreibersite. These minerals are so rare they can only be found in meteorites.
 
PLEOCHROIC
Pleochroic is a classification of minerals that when they are turned on a different axis it turns a different color. Tourmaline is one of them it is commonly green and black but can be blue.  Tourmaline is used in gauges in ships and submarines.
      
USES of ROCKS and MINERALES
Rocks and minerals have many uses.  The biggest one is in the field of construction.  Rocks and minerals are some of the biggest resources in building. They can be used to form walls and the foundations of buildings. Back in the Stone Age many things were made of stone especially tools. Rocks and minerals are important. No matter where you are you will see them doing something whether it’s holding up a bridge or being part of a home for somebody

TYPES of ROCKS
There are three main rock types: Igneous, Metamorphic, and Sedimentary.  The rock cycle is never ending it starts at Igneous that either gets blasted from a volcano or just sits inside the lava chamber and cools.  The rock then gets rubbed and pushed into fin grains of sand.  Over millions of years these actions take place.  The grains of sand get blown or washed away into a lake or an ocean.  The sediments keep piling up and eventually the sediments will compact enough and form Sedimentary rock. Than over another million years if there is enough pressure and heat the Sedimentary rock will form metamorphic rock.

ROCK CYCLE
 The rock cycle helps to change rocks and make new ones.  Underground there is metamorphic rock and it starts to melt.  It then gets blasted from a volcano and turns into igneous rock. The rock then gets compacted to form sedimentary rock or heat and pressure form metamorphic rock.

WASHINGTON HISTORY
Along time ago Idaho was the most Northwestern land in what we now call the U.S. Out in the Pacific Ocean there were three landmass and they were gigantic, also when the plates they were on moved they moved to.  Eventually the chunks smashed together to form Washington State, as we know it now.   

Who I Interviewed And What I Learned On December 10, 2004 I interviewed Mr. Jim Langdon at the Selah High School about rocks and minerals around Washington State.  I asked him how long had he been involved with rocks and minerals and he answered about fifty years.  I was curious how he is currently involved with rocks.  He answered that he is a member of the Yakima Rock Club.  What made him interested rocks and minerals was that he found an old cow skeleton long ago.  He enjoys rocks and minerals because he likes to find things nobody has ever found and he also likes just finding things.  I asked him about the history of mining and the geological history of Washington.  Mr. Langdon said that Idaho used to be the most Northeastern state.  Where Washington is now was just the Pacific Ocean.  On the ocean floor there were three landmasses.  They were GIGANTIC and they smashed together when the plates they were on shifted and formed what is now Washington state. Mr. Langdon said that there is a gold mine out side of Republic, Washington and there is another by Ellensburg called Liberty.  There is also another mine in Randle, Washington where he has a gold claim.  I was curious about what has changed the most about mining in recent years. Mr. Langdon said that they don't do as much underground work; they do something called “open pit” mining.  Miners find a rich deposit and then they take a big chunk of dirt out.  The miners pour in cyanide to leach out the gold.  They then remove the gold from the solution and melt it to make gold bars.  He said that studying meteorites and the minerals they contain and finding new minerals on Earth and in space was the most recent thing to be studying in the field of rocks and minerals.  I wanted to know what some major hazards facing miners are and he said that it was getting your fingers blasted off when using affo.  Affo is little white pellets about the size of bee bees, rolled in diesel fuel.  I asked what would he predicted for the future of collecting rocks.  He said it was getting brighter for rock hunting because more and more places are being found everywhere.  Mr. Langdon would like to rock hunt in Iraq and Pakistan.  I wondered what things would change the most in mining in the near future.  He said that the machines they use might get a bit smaller, might be operated by robots or could be operated by themselves or remote control.  He also said that mining would get harder because of certain regulations. He said that wire gold is the rarest rock found in Washington is wire gold and there are only two places in the world you can get it. One place is from Liberty, Washington.   I also asked him what the most common rock found in Washington is.  He said that it is Basalt and that it is all around us and continues 8000 feet below us.  Mr. Langdon stated that the most common fossil found in Washington is petrified wood.

Bibliography Crawford, Luis Maria “Rocks and Minerals.” World Book Encyclopedia. 2004. Gallant, A. Roy Fossils. New York Benchmark books, 2001 Hawthorn, Christopher F. “Rocks (Minerals)” Encarta Encyclopedia 2001. Landon, James. Personal interview. December 10, 2004 Symes, R.F. and Harding, R.R. Crystal and Gems. New York Knopf Alfred Knopf 1991.

Menu of 2005 SOAR Projects

Back to the Selah Homepage