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Approximately forty years ago, Helen Propst found a, flat "hex outline" rock in her garden. It was
identified by a local jeweler(?) as a sapphire. Soon
after, she found another. Thinking they were parts of
the same crystal, she "tried them together, but they
wouldn't fit". Soon afterward, word got out
and the "Propst Farm"
became a favorite dig site for rockhounds. The
locality has been open for casual digging ever since, and
for a nominal fee you can still park your car on the grass
under the big oak tree and have at it! (See picture to
right.) |
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The farm is on the
Startown Road, south of Conover, Lincoln County, North Carolina.
I will get exact directions and insert them later.
Doug Hess and I
spoke with Helen when we visited the site on May 29,
2007; so the above anecdote is from the primary source. |
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sapphire distribution began in the center of the second
photo, where crystals and clusters occurred in a thin layer
about a foot below the surface. It continued to the
left, around the big oak tree to the barn in the background
of the first photo; and onward how far nobody yet knows.
Off the first picture to the left is an area of secondary
growth that covers numerous old pits; and although there
might be some material left between them, you would surely
earn what you got - bring mice to bribe the rattlesnakes!
(The grassed portions have been thoroughly worked, reworked,
and reclaimed; so forget them too!) I recommend you go
behind the barn and into the woods, where Doug has been
digging recently. He's the guy in the first picture. |
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The pay layer seems
to be buried more deeply as you go farther to the left, and it can
sometimes be identified by a greyish to yellowish clayey layer
immediately above it. It seems to contain larger milky "bull
quartz" cobbles (to about 3" diameter) along with the sapphires.
Doug's pits above reveal about 4' to 5' of overburden, and he tells
me the stones recovered seem to be "not as good." It may be
that the best of this "vest pocket" deposit has already been found.
Regardless of its size, it is an important American corundum
locality. |
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THE DOUG HESS COLLECTION |
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I met Doug Hess at
the Asheville Mineral Symposium in June, 2001. He showed up
with a fishing tackle box full of carefully wrapped stones, which we
carefully unwrapped to reveal some of the most unusual and
attractive corundums I have ever seen. It, and the
collector, were featured in a video on North Carolina's natural
resources (I will get details and publish here). If
ever a collection defined the material a locality produced, this is
the one! On May 23, 2014, the collection became ours, and it
will remain intact for at least a while. Here are a dozen of the more than eighty pictures
I took of it on May 29, 2007. They are thumbnailed, so you can
click on any image to see it in high resolution. |
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In all, there are 63 specimens in
the collection. Here are some pictures taken on June 5, 2014. |
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