There are a lot of places where people with claims have decided to do for fee mining by the general public. You can look for opal in Nevada, tourmaline here in So. Cal, gold up north, and the list goes on.
Yeah, you’re probably not going to get rich (though I did find quite a large aquamarine in Pala…)
This kinda thing’s been going on at this park for decades. Some years I’ve seen 4-5 stories about decent-sized diamonds’ being found there, occasionally more than one over the course of a month. Some dime-sized ones were found during the late 90s-early 00s; even some the size of a quarter! I suppose the park gets overrun w/diamond hunters shortly after news stories such as this, but there’s normally quite an interval between 'em, and the crowds thin out again. Some folks have made multiple finds, but they spend a lotta their time at the park poking and digging around.
I’ve read about places where you can even buy a bucketful of earth and stones to pick thru, including a gold mine.
Even someone who knows nothing about gems and minerals can tell most of the material found there is of pretty low quality. The one this story’s about looks like it’s got a great big (sorry about the technical jargon) booger in it, and several fractures, all of which would have to be worked around/discarded by a lapidary. It might polish up a little better and look clearer, but, ehhhh.
This might seem odd but I’ve always thought diamond jewelry was ugly, since I was a kid (before I knew enough to be contrarian and long before I knew about how they are mined). It might actually be the way they are cut, because I’m not overly fond of any cut gemstones.
Nothing beats malachite, turquoise and lapis lazuli.
Now you’re talking!!
Yeah, I never understood the whole “Let’s celebrate our love and the beginning of our life together by - or buy - going massively in debt.” Fortunately, I too escaped that trap as all my wife wanted was an inexpensive gold band. A good call, since she’s prone to losing them we are now on band number three. Or maybe four?
Traditionally, it served as part of the dowry and sometimes the sale of which could help stave off hardship due to widowhood or a slacker husband.
I guess “traditionally” is the key word there. I am admittedly practical to a fault, so from my perspective, traditions come, traditions go. As a young television producer in a former life, I had a colleague, a production grunt who was making less than $15K a year, who was stressed out of his gourd because his fiancée had picked out a ring in the $7-$10k range. He went through with it, but I have no idea if they are still married. Still seems a little shallow and somewhat twisted, but I totally get that tradition, and marketing, can be very persuasive.
Is that true? Most of what I’ve heard about dowrys in Western cultures was that it’s a payment made by the bride’s family to the groom or his family. There may be other cultures with the opposite tradition with grooms paying for brides but my impression about the “tradition” surrounding diamond rings is that it was 100% due to a very successful marketing campaign cooked up by De Beers less than 100 years ago.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/385376/
This part is true, but I’m getting my “traditions” info from Wikipedia because a simple Google search comes up with a buttload of marketing websites. Also, stuff I learned in an intensive course on Rome and Italy when I was in college, and about women being viewed as “property”.
Given the low resale value of all but the finest examples of diamonds, a hefty gold ring with no stones at all would serve much more effectively as a dowry. I can’t imagine that diamonds were always common in engagement or wedding rings.
Before DeBeers, it was often just precious metals, right? Besides, DeBeers hired a company just to get the idea of an “engagement ring” started.
Yeah, I think the term “dowry” isn’t quite right, but giving women jewelry was a way for them to possess their own wealth when no other avenues were available to them. So the engagement/wedding rings were a good start, and later gifts of jewelry essentially added to their “bank account” throughout their lives. It offered them something durable to sell in times of need, and something to independently pass down to other females in the family.
Now that we get to have our own money, it’s (IMO) stupid. The Mr. gave me a ring with a local tourmaline stone in it, but mainly so when I traveled for work I wouldn’t get creeped on as much at airports and hotels. It’s a signal.
From the article above…
Diamonds Are Forever: The slogan perfectly captured the sentiment De Beers was going for – that a diamond, like your relationship, is eternal – while also discouraging people from ever reselling their diamonds, as mass re-selling would disrupt the market and reveal the alarmingly low intrinsic value of the stones themselves.
I believe so, and I think that is still the best way to go. 3,000 bucks can get you a small loop of gold with an okay diamond, or it can get you a couple of full ounces of gold. In countries where dowries are still a thing, it usually is just gold or mostly gold.
For sure, but the tradition of gifting women with jewelry of precious metals and gemstones pre-dates De Beers. I was talking more broadly, not just diamonds, since it seemed the “tradition” was being discussed.
Maybe I went too far back. 
No, not at all. I was trying to point out the distinction between tradition and fake-marketing “tradition” also.
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
