Club Meeting

Beals Senior/Community Center, 240 Stafford Ave., Bristol, CT

Ted Johnson to speak on Mineral Collecting in Greenland

Join me on this registered Polar Expedition with 15 scientists, mineralogists and collectors.  Under the direction of Ron Peterson of Queens University in Kingston, Ontario we’ll travel thru the artic circle for a unique collecting experience.  There are no accommodations in remote Greenland so we’ll be dropped off by boat and camp under primitive conditions. You’ll see icebergs in every shape and color!

*Our first stop is the Kangerluarsuk fjord which is part of the Ilimaussaq Intrusion.  This is one of the classic geological settings that is referenced in most textbooks.  The minerals found here are very similar to Mont St. Hillaire , Quebec. We’ll hike into the hills and collect rare minerals like Eudialyte xls, Polylithionite, Narsarsukite and others.  Besides minerals, this is a wonderful place to go fishing.  We catch abundant Artic Char in a frigid stream next to our base camp.  Great eating!.

*Next we travel the fjords to Narsik and set up another base camp at the foot of the famous Tarseq Slope and Kvanefjeld.  This is still part of the Ilimaussaq intrusion. Lots of rare minerals to collect here, including Tugtupite, Villiamite, Sorensenite and more.

*Well move to the Igaliko Intrusion for our last collecting spot… the famous locality of Narsarsuk.  After a rugged climb to the site the collecting is wonderful.  We collected Arfvedsonite, Elpidite, Zircon and more.  Last of all, we’ll search for the Nanna pegmatite to collect the very rare mineral Nafertisite.  Also, we’ll gather samples of an unknown mineral that will later be identified as the new mineral Micheelsenite!

*Finally, we’ll spend a day sightseeing at the Viking settlement of Brattahlid, settled by Erik the Red over a 1000 years ago.  Get a unique view of how the Vikings survived  (for awhile) in this inhospitable land.

Ted is well known in Connecticut.  He operates Yankee Mineral and Gem Company and used to operate a shop in East Hampton, Connecticut. He has been a field collector for many years with extensive experience collecting in Connecticut.  He has purchased collections, including the collection of the late Ronald Januzzi who ran the shop with the pink Dinosaur near Danbury, Connecticut and Brewster New York   Ted is also known for traveling the world in search of minerals.  He likes to get to see the locations which produced the minerals which gives him a great appreciation for what has been found in those mines.  We know he has traveled to Russia, Greenland, and most of the Scandanavian countries.  Ted has also spoken on the Tilly Foster Mine in New York.