Mines Magazine Turns 100 - the Timothy and Bernadette Marquez ...

Inside MinesPhotos: Joel BachMoon Rock Lands at MinesThe Mines Geology Museum recently became home to a rare moon rock,long thought to be missing. Its value estimated at more than $5 million,the specimen was one of 360 rocks to come back to Earth in 1974 aboardApollo 17, the sixth and final lunar landing mission of the Apollo program.President Richard Nixon awarded each state and 160 countries a set of twogoodwill moon rocks. Of the two rocks Colorado received, one is on displayat the State Capitol, and the other was recently found to be in the care offormer Gov. John Vanderhoof. The moon rock’s discovery made news when agraduate student at the University of Phoenix, working with that institution’songoing Moon Rock Project, traced the sample to Vanderhoof.At the ceremonial unveiling of the new exhibit, Gov. Bill Ritter thanked theuniversity for putting the specimen on public display, saying, “Residents,visitors and students alike will now have an opportunity to learn and beinspired by this new moon rock display.”Admiral Richard Truly, a Mines trustee and former astronaut, joinedPresident Scoggins and the governor in welcoming the historic exhibit tocampus. Truly served as a NASA astronaut from 1969 to 1983, supportingall three of the manned Skylab missions in 1973 and the Apollo-Soyuzmission in 1985. Truly first flew into space in 1981 as a pilot of the spaceshuttle Columbia, and in 1983 he was commander of the Challenger forthe first night launch and landing of the space shuttle program. After theChallenger disaster in 1986, Truly was placed in charge of the investigationand of getting the program back into space. He served as a NASAadministrator from 1989 to 1992.“Of all the NASA programs, it’s Apollo that is the magic moment,” saidTruly. “It occurred in a decade when not much good was going on in ourcountry … But one magical thing that was going on was that for the firsttime humans were leaving the Earth. That a piece of the lunar soil that waspicked up by Apollo 17, the final mission to the moon, is now here at theColorado School of Mines Museum … is just a marvelous occasion.”—Trisha Bentz KendallClockwise from top left: close up of moon rock exhibit;Governor Bill Ritter (L) and museum curator, Bruce Geller,unveil the moon rock; Admiral Truly speaks at unveiling.In Brief...Mines Trustee Vicki J. Cowart MS ’77 has beennamed the 29th recipient of the Medal inMemory of Ian Campbell for Superlative Serviceto the Geosciences. Cowart was presented thisprestigious award at the Geological Societyof America Presidential Address Ceremonyin October. She worked in the industry for16 years and served as the Colorado stategeologist from 1993 to 2003. Cowart holds aDistinguished Achievement Medal from Mines.Mines was awarded a $2.3 million grant fromthe National Science Foundation to developthe Dynamic Atom Probe—the first instrumentof its kind to enable 3-D imaging and chemicalidentification at the atomic level with ultrafast8 Fall/Winter 2010