This is Mazon Monday post #315. What’s your favorite Mazon Creek fossil? Tell us at email:esconi.info@gmail.com.
From time to time, we run across some old book inscriptions. Back in Mazon Monday #18, we highlighted a few…
- A book purchased by Roy Plotnick that was given away at an ESCONI meeting in 1961.
- Bill Allaway’s book that ended up in Oregon and then back in Dave Carlson’s hands.
- Jack Wittry has John McLuckie’s copy!
- And, another one that was owned by Jim Konecny. I’ve seen at least two with his sticker.
Well, here’s another interesting inscription… Tom Testa had a copy of the golden edition that given to him by Melbourne McKee!
Tom Testa in a much less overgrown Pit 11 around 1987.
Melbourne McKee (1910-1995) was a chemist with the Peabody Coal Company. McKee is standing in the photo below. The sitting man is Robert Tarman, assistant Chemist.
A more famous photo of McKee shows him standing in front of the Colchester No. 2 Coal seam in Pit 14.
The photos in this post are courtesy of the Carbon Hill School Museum‘s Tom Testa Collection. The museum is located in Carbon Hill, IL. It has many historically significant photos, artifacts, and documents of the Coal City, Braidwood, and Wilmington area. The curator, Michele Micetich, is very knowledgeable. Visit her this spring for a trip back in time to the coal mining days of yesteryear!
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