My name is Donald James.
My Wife Andrea and I own a rock, fossil, & gem store here in Roswell NM.
We also sell Christian novelties and supplies. Many people have asked ; how do we mix rocks and God in our store. My first inclination is to say “We’re in Roswell. A lot of strange mixes happen here. :-) ”
Then I quote John 1:3 – "Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made" (NIV).
Minerals are just one form of God’s art work.
Collecting rocks & minerals is a childhood fascination that was revived about 12 years ago in my adult life. In 1968, my sister and I were attending a science club at the Buffalo museum of natural sciences.
In the museum was a gift shop that had minerals and fossils for sale. My favorite was the trilobite fossils. Back then there were only about a couple hundred known species of trilobites. So they were considered very rare. (Now there are over 5,000 different known species.) A small broken trilobite was selling for about $25.00. In today’s terms that’s equivalent to about $250.00. So needless to say, that for a poor eight year old inner city boy to come up with $25.00, was impossible. They might as well have been asking for $1,000.00.
As time passed I had discovered a cliff in my neighborhood that had fossils in it.
I started digging there pretty regularly, in hopes of finding a trilobite. I found a lot of shells and corals, but never the big prize :-(.
(There are hundreds of shells and corals in these rocks)
When I brought them home to show my parents, I got no encouragement. My father said “That won’t get you anywhere in life with that stuff.” When my mother found out that my dig site was near railroad tracks, she put an immediate stop to my digging adventures.
While I still had a fascination, as I got older my interest became almost non-existent: until fifteen years ago....
I was an appliance repair man for a local company. I was doing washer repair job at an elderly gentleman’s home. In his front yard, is a marine anchor, the size of a car, with a chain. Each link of the chain is about 12” long. I quickly found out that this man used to salvage things out of lake Erie. This was one of the things he salvaged.
He took me down in the basement where the washer was. As we we walked there, we passed through a dark room and in the faint light I could see what looked like gold glittering on one of the tables there. We went into the room with the washer which I quickly repaired ( a simple fix). As we were walking out I asked him if he also hunted for gold on his salvage trips. With a puzzled look he said “No, why?”
I told about seeing what looked like gold in the dark room. With a hearty chuckled he said “That’s not gold, those are pyritized ammonites.” With that he turned a light on and I saw several tables full of fossils. “I dig for these at the old Penn Dixie Site” He explained that it was an old rock quarry that they used to make cement and concrete from. The company folded and stopped digging just above the Permian layer.
“I dig fossils and make shadow boxes with them” He promptly showed me one of the boxes. Inside it were mounted shells, corals, and two trilobites (one flat and one rolled). I quickly asked how much he was selling them for. He said $25.00. My mind immediately went back to 1968 when I couldn’t buy one broken trilobite for $25.00, and here this guy is selling a box of fossils with two whole trilobites in it. I pulled out my wallet, gave him twenty five dollars and said “ When will it be ready?” He said “By the weekend.”
Now I had my trilobite.
A year or two later we moved to the south side of Buffalo. As I was driving down a street on this side of the city, I noticed a store with a huge Triceratops skull sitting in the front yard. My curiosity got the best of me, so I stopped to investigate. It turn out to be a rock and fossil shop.
I was hooked. Before I knew it I was going there every time I had extra money to buy something. Within a few months I had accumulated several hundred specimens in my collection. I also found out more information about the Penn Dixie site and it’s location. I went there and signed up for a membership to Hamburg mineralogical society (which now owns the Penn Dixie site). After a few outings and a lot of digging I unearthed my first Trilobite.
It is now a treasured piece in my collection.
In 2009, We relocated to Roswell NM, bringing my entire collection, as well as a 100’ truck and 2 vehicles full of personal belongings. After settling into our new home, I began setting up my collection displays in the front room with our pool table in it. I wanted to call it my “man cave” but Andrea said “No way in H...” :-(
I continued collecting, mostly by buying on line. One day Andrea jokingly said “ You know, you need to do something to support your “habit”.” I took her seriously and started selling out of our garage. I later tried a flea market that didn’t work out so well. Then we rented a booth at an indoor flea market. We did alright there for a few months.
Then one day, a store front right on the four corners of downtown Roswell became available. I told Andrea, if we couldn’t make it work there, we might as well give up trying. So we took out a loan and rented the store. We’ve been here four years now. It’s been a rough ride, but praise God, we’re still here. I retired from the appliance repair business last March to devote more time to the store. We weren’t sure of we could afford such a drastic step, but we took a leap of faith...
Business has trippled since then.
I’m still collecting and have accumulated over 700 specimens. I have no more room to display new pieces so if I find something I absolutely can’t live without, I have to trade one of my existing specimens for it. That makes for a good system of checks and balances. I will continue to sell and collect as long I have strength and breath.
So much for early retirement :-)
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If ever you're in Roswell New Mexico, I'd be honored to have you drop in and tell me you learned about us from this Hive Blog! Email me to let me know you're coming: info@ancientsodays.net, or just call anytime 575-623-2222. Our website is www.AncientofDays.net, if you've an interest in collecting geodes, fossils, petrified wood, etc.