Posted on 06/11/2021 11:51:04 AM PDT by Red Badger
At 563 carats, the Star of India is the world’s largest gem-quality blue star sapphire, and is approximately 2 billion years old. (Image credit: D. Finnin/Copyright AMNH)
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What does the legendary Star of India — a 563-carat star sapphire the size of a golf ball — have in common with a 35-million-year-old petrified redwood slab; a massive cluster of sword-like crystals that looks like it came from "Game of Thrones;" and a 5-ton (4.5-metric ton) stone pillar that can "sing?"
You can see all of them, along with 5,000 other amazing stones, in the newly renovated Mignone Hall of Gems and Minerals at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City, which is reopening after a four-year closure on Saturday (June 12). There, one-of-a-kind precious gems appear alongside odd-looking rocks — some of which date to billions of years ago — that have been uniquely warped and twisted by extreme temperatures and pressures.
Individually and together, these objects tell a story of the diverse geologic processes that shape minerals on Earth's surface and deep inside our planet, beginning when the world was young and continuing to this day, museum representatives told Live Science.
Related: 13 mysterious and cursed gemstones
The Star of India, which formed about a billion years ago, was discovered in Sri Lanka in the 18th century. It is one of the best-known gems in the world, in part because it was famously and brazenly stolen from AMNH in 1964, along with several more of the museum's prized stones, by a pair of thieves named Jack "Murf the Surf" Murphy and Allan Kuhn, Smithsonian reported in 2014, on the heist's 50th anniversary. (The one-of-a-kind sapphire was recovered and went back on display in 1965).
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Good morning!
Eagles are so much fun to watch. And so HUGH!
I love watching films about raptors of any kind, but eagles are my favorites.
Another day to be a slug. But it’s OK. ;o]
We were on a boardwalk over the inlet, and the eagle flew overhead north to south.
Happy Humph Day!
Looking for something tas-s-sty in the ocean perhaps?
Thanks, ArGee!
It works. The trees are losing their leaves here, so...
Miercurea fericită!
Thank you.
Ai grijă la pisicile de toamnă.
LOL!
I’ll do that!
Now that you’re here, I can finally share the news.
It looks like I’ll be in my “new” apartment in Dogpatch, AR for Hallowe’en. There is a vacancy coming the 2nd of October, and since they have to clean, paint and make repairs, it will put me out of here around the 15th, maybe a little later.
I’ve been packing a little at a time, and I’m almost done, so life is good! I’ll be ready to go when the time comes.
All the best on your move!
Golly!
I’m sorry I didn’t include you in my ping! (My bad.) I’ll get used to you being here, I promise. Most of the Undeaders bailed out when the Helmsman did, but what we’re left with is quality!
Thanks! It’s probably my 120th move (no exaggeration) if one counts moving from apartment to apartment in the same town, so I think I have it down to a science. There were quite a few military moves in there, too, and they were the most fun. ;o]
OK, Undeaders. I need your attention, please.
Since there are fewer and fewer of you who post here with any regularity, I would appreciate it if you would let me know if you want on or off the Undead Thread Ping List.
I would start cutting names arbitrarily, but the ones I cut would probably be the very ones who want to stay on it, just in case the Helmsman comes back and we move out of orbit and into Deep Space.
So please, let me know and I can begin to remove your names.
And yes, you can let me know by FReepmail!
(happy dance)
I hope this move will be the last one.
I’ve been trying to put out fires in my life, haven’t been able to post much.
That’s why I’m not around much other than lurking.
Until I next delurk.
Thanks!
It is, unless I can buy my own place, but that will take place before I’m really settled, if it takes place at all.
It will be a relief, just to get there. It probably should have happened ten years ago, but I learned long ago that things happen in their own time. So it’s time.
hi Face, i’ll stay
I know, Darks. And I wouldn’t take you off the List, just as I wouldn’t take your dad off. You mean too much to me. <3
Feel free to delurk whenever you want! You know where we are! LOL!
Thanks, Chode!
I’m glad! :o]
I’m a keeper...
You most certainly are, Nully! :o])
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