HomeMy WebLinkAboutZurich Citizens News, 1977-08-10, Page 9Beauty in strange places
- the story of two rockhounds
Kenneth and Dorothy Breakey
of Zurich have rocks in the
livingroom, kitchen, basement
and garage of their South Street
home. They even have rocks in
their heads, in the sense that
they think and know a lot about
them. The Breakeys are
enthusiastic rockhounds, who for
the past seven or eight years
have belonged to the Sarnia Rock
and Fossil Club.
Their hobby has added many
dimensions to their lives —
enriching their marriage,
cementing friendships, yielding
exciting experiences and bring-
ing them a high degree of
specialized knowledge.
Kenneth has his own way of
summing it up: "There are no
atheists in the club — when you
dig up something that's been
there a couple of million years —
when you cut open a rock and
there's all that beauty inside."
As Shakespeare said, there are
sermons in stones.
Rocks and fossils belong to
almost unimaginable expanses of
time, not to calendars or sweep-
ing second -hands of clocks or
watches. They tell the story of
creation.
Imagine _holding a tiny grey
blue creature which existed over
400 million years ago — a snail
the size of a thumb -nail. This
fossil, with a name bigger than
.itself — Platycreas, lived not far
from Zurich. Kenneth found it in
a gravel ridge near The Pinery.
He grew up thinking rocks
were just something on which
toes were stubbed, and only
became a rockhound when ill
-health forced retirement,
Dorothy's interest in rocks was
bred into her. She was born in
Levack, a mining town north of
Sudbury. As a child, she played
at mining in the backyard with a
toy rig made by her father, lif-
ting and moving lard -pails of
rocks with pulleys. Her husband.
calls her Clementine, after the
many trips, often camping in
gravel pits and quarries, which
are prime sources of rock and
fossil specimens. Sometimes
enthusiasm got the better of
them: they came back from a
�..
vacation in Montana with almost
400 pounds of rocks in their car.
Old clothes, hard hats,
hammers, chisels and picks are
basic equipment. Dirt,
scratches, bruises and torn gar-
ments are badges of honour.
Dedicted collectors will wade
through knee-deep muck for
hidden treasures.
Behind every good rockhound,
according to Kenneth, stands a
machinist with a touch of genius.
His is Lloyd Klopp of Zurich, a
self-taught man, who has helped
him create the grand -daddy of alt
rock -saws. It weighs a half -ton,
has a lid which weighs 150
pounds, and a vise that will hold
a 26 -pound rock. It is hydraulical-
ly operated. A 24 -inch diamond
edge blade is to be installed un-
der a plexiglass top which per-
mits viewing the saw in action.
The variety of machinery
Kenneth himself has evolved by
adapting discarded motors
makes the head swim. There is a
four -barrel wooden tumbler,
which holds 15 pounds of rock at
different stages in each barrel.
An old table with a kitchen sink
sunk in it has a foot -operated
rotating shaft through the drain -
hole. Grit and water are used in
this to shape spheres. The motor
from a barbecue turns the table
of an old record-player, which is
used to create bowls or concave
shapes. A dishwasher motor runs
a drill. Rube Goldberg would be
envious.
A plaque on the Breakey
livingroom wall reads, "Old
rockhounds never die. They just
slowly petrify." These people
love to joke. The funny thing
about rockhounds is that they are
far less petrified than those
without such insight into nature.
In the past they have taken
miner's daughter in the old song.
The rock display in their
livingroom stands behind a
rustic sign, reading "Clem's
Claim". The basement is known
as Clem's mine.
A pet rock in this home is not
one of those lacquered object
bought in shops. It is a favourite
specimen, like the Thunder Egg
from the Priday Beds at Red-
mond, Oregon. Indians called
them that, believing when the
volcano erupted that angry gods
were hurling rocks. To saw open
one of these is one of the greatest
pleasures of rockhounding. They
often contain astonishing
patterns, designs and colours,
produced by the cooling of layers
at different temperatures and
the presence of water and
various minerals. When buffed,
they take on a satiny sheen.
The rock collection is a win-
dow on a world of wonders too
numerous to describe. There is
the multi -coloured agate, crazy -
lace, from Mexico; amethyst
from Thunder Bay; tiger iron, a
blend of tiger eye and iron from
Australia; East Indian jasper
and Baltic amber. From the clay
beds of Forman in British
Columbia's Fraser Valley comes
a specimen resembling a sleep-
ing cat. This is a natural clay
concretion, formed by swirling
mud.
The fossil collection includes
dinosaur bones from
Drumheller, whalebone from
California, a shark's tooth from
Kansas (where there was once
an inland sea); coral from
Georgian Bay (which was once
tropical), a prehistoric animal
bone from .the Sarasota
swamplands of Florida, and
ironwood from Arizona. Oddest
Citizens News, August 10, 1977
Page 9
THE GRANDDADDY OF ALL ROCK -SAWS -This 24 -inch
diamond -edge blade will be part of a powerful half -ton
hydraulically operated rock cutting apparatus. Ken Breakey
examines the blade in the basement of his home, where he
stores thousands of rock specimens. He has adapted a number
of smaller machines for cutting, shaping, drilling and
polishing them.
of all is the thin agatized slab
which the Breakeys say is
petrified dinosaur dung. (It has
been identified by chemical
analysis. )
DOWN SHE COMES -- Arena manager Rollie Vanstone and son
Dave were hard at work tearing apart the interior of the old Hensall
arena Thursday. The interior of the north end has been stripped and
Vanstone hoped to be working ort the south end by Wednesday.
A SPECIAL KIND OF BEAUTY — This is not a king's ransom in gems,
as might at first appear. Some of the choice specimens in the rock
collection of Ken and Dorothy Breakey are displayed here. The variety
of shapes, colours and patterns would dazzle an artist.
CORRESPONDENTS
PLEASE NOTE
Please include either two
initials or the proper name
for each individual referred
to in your columns. Readers
have great difficulty iden-
tifying individuals referred
to merely as Mr. or Mrs.
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