This is Throwback Thursday #65.  In these, we look back into the past at ESCONI specifically and Earth Science in general.  If you have any contributions, (science, pictures, stories, etc …), please send them to esconi.info@gmail.com.  Thanks!

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This week, we have two poems from the July/August 1964 issue of the newsletter.  The first is called the “Rockhound’s Plight” and comes from a husband lamenting complaints from his wife.  The second is the wife’s answer.  These were originally published in the Des Moines Treasure Chest and were written by Leona Leonard.  Unfortunately, no details could be found for an Des Moines Iowa rock club with a newsletter called the “Treasure Chest”.  If you have and information, please pass it along!

ROCKHOUNDS PLIGHT

Gather ’round me, Hear my story;
  I’m a Rockhound in distress
I’m a Rockhound bathed in trouble;
  I’m an outcast, more or less.

I have fossils in the kitchen,
  I have crystals in the hall,
I have minerals in the bathtub,
  I have relics on the wall.

I have tin-oxide on the carpet,
  I have oil upon the floor,
I have black light in the parlor,
  I have bones behind the door..

Attic rooms are fairly sagging,
  Books pove the cellar floor,
Pockets bulge with gummy places,
  All of this and millions more.

Wifey thinks that I am goofy-
  I don’t know, she may be. right,
She insiste I’ve silicosis
  Or some contagious for of ‘ite’.

Says my head is lined with agate,
  A freak replacement of the bone;
Says my brain is just a nodule,
  Says my heart has turned to stone.

Threatens me with separation,
  Storms about our Rock-bound home,
Says life to me is just a Geode,
  Or hunk of mammal bone.

Are you rated as a fossil?
  Are you obliged to live alone?
How do you maintain a hobby
  And still maintain a Happy Home?”

— Des Moines Treasure Chest — 

AN ANSWER TO “A ROCKHOUNDS PLIGHT”

Listen to me Mr. Fossil,
  Throw your troubles out the door!
Make a Rockhound out of Wifey,
  You’ll have peace forever more.

Take her to a jolly rock hunt,
  Attend a meeting with her too,
Help her find a few choice pebbles,
  She may even trade a few.

Soon the Rockhound bug will bite her,
  She’ll forget the oily floors.
She may add to bone collections,
  And make it hard to open that door.

She’ll read your books, and polish Agates,
  Threats will now be in the past.
Attend conventions, beg for rock hunts,
  You’ve a Mrs. Rockhound, hard and fast.

— by Leona Leonard from the Treasure Chest —