Unearth a treasure at Idaho Falls Gem and Mineral Society’s annual sale

The Idaho Falls Gem and Mineral Society is gearing up for its 14th annual membership sale at the Bonneville County Fairgrounds on Saturday, Sept. 19.

Over 35 members of the club will be selling jewelry, decorative pieces, and rocks that they have collected over the past year. The sale will begin at 9 a.m. and will end at 5 p.m. There will be a $3 admission fee for attendees over 12 years of age.

Many club members have collected materials on field trips to club-owned claims. The items have been sawed into slabs and finished into jewelry. Some members feature rocks from Idaho, while other members have collections from all over the world. Visitors will find members who have targeted mostly one or two stones, like Idaho’s fire opal from the Spencer area, or knappers who have created knives and arrowheads from obsidian.

Different types of rocks appeal to different collectors and this sale will be a place for collectors to find most of those rocks. Fossils, moss agate, crystals, fire agate and even walking sticks will be found at this sale. Table decorations made with rocks and wire and wire-wrapped gems will be featured by some members of the club.

For me, one of the most interesting aspects of the sale is visiting with members about their rock-hounding experiences. They may not reveal where the rocks are found, but they love to answer questions about their experiences out in the wild collecting them.

Each member’s booth should be visited because of the gems that you might find there, but there are some booths every person interested in rocks should visit. There are some real characters that belong to the IFG&MS. Here are some of them that you should meet there:

• Bill Thielbahr is the club’s gemologist who will have a wide variety of stones from around the world in rough, slabs and finished work. He is an expert and often finds samples presented to him at our meetings when we cannot identify a stone.
• Dave and Yvona Gunderson, who just opened a rock shop in Spencer, will have rough rocks from all over the world for lapidarists to cut and finish. Yvona is an expert wire-wrapper and will feature her beautiful work there.
• John Nicklas and Jim Donovan sell beautiful fire opal rocks and jewelry. Both of them are expert silversmiths that enhance the stones that they create.
• Judy Morris, at 83 years old, will also be there with the beautiful pendants that she and her husband, Dick, have created over the years.
• Curtis Stoddard will be featuring different types of jade that he has collected from Wyoming and surrounding states.
• Jeanne and Steve Hammond have made and will sell high-quality jewelry mosty made of agate and jasper, also set in silver. Their good friend, Kathy Moedl, features jewelry and world-wide specimens.
• Rounding out my top “must-see” booths will be past president, Rita Cooper, with her rock-wire tree decorations. The current president of the club, Mike Bruton, will feature mostly Idaho gems and rocks. His collection of tube, moss and plume agate from the Gem State is one of the best. Paul Fullmer, newsletter coordinator for the club, also has a great collection of Central Idaho rocks.

Anyone interested in rocks and collecting them should visit this membership sale. There will be a club booth where people can obtain information about the club and join if they want to become a part of it. With the weather cooling down, now is my favorite time to hunt those elusive rocks. I’m always looking for the perfect stone.