World Hot
Topics Blog
Family discovers doorstop is 4 billion-year-old
meteorite
The
33-pound rock, something of a family heirloom, was found in a cow pasture near
Tazewell, Tenn., in the 1930s by Donna Lewis' grandfather, the late Tilmon
Brooks.
The
object of curiosity, which long served as a doorstop and a garden ornament and
had even been painted green, turns out to be a very rare and very real
meteorite, possibly 4.5 billion years old.
It wasn't
until George Lewis put a metal detector to the object—and it read off the
charts—that the couple realized this was no ordinary rock. World Hot Topics Blog
When the
Lewis family brought the object to Jerry Cook, chair of the Department of
Physics and Astronomy at Eastern Kentucky University, he suspected it was
special.
According
to the school's press release, "tests at the
University of Tennessee confirmed the object's origins: it was probably part of
a known meteorite strike that had first turned up evidence in Tazewell in
1853."
The university has since purchased the
meteorite, the remains of a meteor that fell to Earth, from the family. The
former doorstop will now be on display. It already made its debut at a science
fair on the campus over the weekend. "We don't want to lock it up somewhere," Cook said in a statement. "We want kids to be able to touch it, lift it, and understand what it is. Part of our job is to get kids interested in science, and this ... will stir their curiosity."
Cook added, "We're extremely lucky to find something like this, and to find one locally is a real plus for us."
The discovery is the second-largest known meteorite from the Tazewell strike. The first weighed in at 100 pounds.
For her
part, Donna Lewis is thrilled that the space rock will be available to students
for study.
The school
secretary said, "I saw how excited kids at our school got when they saw
it. It's good to know that Eastern will keep it in one piece and students will
be able to study it."
Family discovers doorstop is 4 billion-year-old
meteorite
http:// news. yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/family-discovers-doorstop-4-billion-old-meteorite-143746674.html
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