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These are the folks the started the Dry Mesa story. Eddie owned a small saw mill in Delta and Vivian was a stay at home mom. They had two kids, Cheryl and a son who was a cat skinner. Eddie and Vivian were avid rock hounds and, like avid rock hounds, they combed hundreds of square miles around Delta hunting for whatever they found that intereste them. One of their prime interests was opalized or garnatized dinosaur bone which made lovely jewelry when cut and polished.
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On one of their trips probably as far back as the mid 1960’s, there were camping in Escalante canyon which was about 20 miles north of Delta. One of these days they decided to scout the south face of the valley above the deserted ranch. PErhaps a thousand feet above the floor then encounted a good sized well preserved dinosaur bone. They didnt know what it was but they took it back home. They scouted up the mountain above the bone to see if they could find the site where it originated, where it was washed loose after which it rolled down hill. Bones are not usually sitting at the place of origin if they are found lying loose on a steep slope.
Later dad paid them a visit, one of his annual rounds checking up on rockhounds to see how they were and to find out if they had found anything interesting. They showed him varius things, among them this large bone from the Escalante canyon. He was very interested in it and had them explain carefully where they had found it. He understood their explanaion but told them that it didn’t make sense because the bone was far too large to be from the Cretaceous. It was a large therapod like T Rex but millions of years too early. They were sure of their location and he was sure of the geology so they arranged to meet and make a trip into the same location.
That’s how it all started. They visited the quarry faithfully all of the years (perhaps 15?) that he worked Dry Mesa.
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