The meeting began with the Juniors Chair handing out the tradeable earth science specimens. Then he introduced the speaker, Finn Lutz. Finn is a senior at Oak Park River Forest High School. He talked about the display that he brought, which was his Eagle Scout project for ESCONI.

The project began years ago with a dilapidated old show display board that someone found in the ESCONI warehouse. The display board was about 4’x2′ and had a map of Illinois and its adjacent states in the middle. Rock, mineral, and fossil specimens found in those states were glued around the edge of the board with strings running from each specimen to the area of the state where they were found. The display board was faded and dusty and many of the specimens were broken off.

Finn built a new display board from scratch utilizing some of the specimens from the old board, some specimens donated by the Juniors’ Chair, and some specimens provided by the ESCONI curator, Chris Cosart. Finn added LED lights to this new display. These lights show the time periods that different specimens could be collected at public collecting sites and where you can collect today. Finn did a fabulous job and he and his creation can be seen near the Kids Corner at the upcoming ESCONI show in March. The display is not just for kids, though. All are welcome to stop by and meet Finn and see his ESCONI display.

Next, the Juniors’ Chair introduced a ’zine, or a mini magazine for the Juniors to make. The Juniors’ Chair’s wife made the zines using an old mineral coloring book and a program called Blue Beam. It’s an 8.5″x11″ sheet of paper with a slice in the center to create eight locations on the paper, each with a picture from the coloring book. The Juniors drew pictures, or wrote information or stories on each section, then folded and “scrunched” it into a booklet.

Minerals and Rock & Gem Magazine covers were on display to show what the minerals really look like. This was to inspire the Juniors to draw the texture, color, and highlighting of these minerals using colored pencils. Some terrific ‘zines were made and fun was had by all.

There won’t be a Juniors meeting in March due to the ESCONI show. The next Juniors meeting will be on April 11th. The topic will be Sand and Sediment collecting. ESCONI board member Katherine Howard will be the speaker. The Juniors will do a sand related craft or experiment afterward.