If you go to Clinton today, you can see a plaque on the local bank recognizing Buell and his many accomplishments including being a lapidary, perhaps the first lapidary in this country.
AN AMERICAN PATRIOT
Abel Buell was an associate of Paul Revere. He met Paul when both were learning to be silversmiths from Ebenezer Crittenden who also became Buell’s father-in-law. Revere convinced Abel to join the Sons of Liberty, a group dedicated to resisting the English rule in the colonies.
Abel and his bride lived in the family cottage in Killingsworth. One night the local sheriff saw a light in the loft window of Buell's home. Curious, he got a ladder and climbed up to peek into the lighted room. There he saw Abel sitting at a table busy counterfeiting English bank notes by changing the denominations to a higher amount.
Abel was arrested, tried and given a life sentence on house arrest. Before he served this sentence he had to be branded on his forehead. This was done by cutting off a piece of his ear. This was placed on his tongue and held there while he said, “God Save the King.” The branding iron with the letter C was held to his forehead as he recited the phrase. Luckily, the letter C was branded high on his forehead so it could be hidden by a forelock of hair.
LAPIDARY WORK EQUALS FREEDOM
This story is from the June 2023 edition of Rock&Gem Magazine.
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This story is from the June 2023 edition of Rock&Gem Magazine.
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MORGAN HILL POPPY JASPER
In California, there are very few places to collect semi-precious stones. Many locations from the past have been either exhausted of the material or the land has been developed.
THE ACORN
The briolette gemstone has the same design attributes of a regular gemstone, however, the pavilion is elongated and the crown is usually domed. This is perfect for an elegant pendant, earrings or a pendulum.
HOW TO PUT A PROTECTIVE CAP ON A CAB
To protect a specimen cab, often a cap is needed. In my case, I had a slab with the because of the color of the background and the pattern. This background had a more silicified consistency than most sandstones. It had no graininess like most sandstone, so I'm inclined to compare it to a jasper. The pattern was typical of a dendrite.
The Resilient Revival of Anne Brontë & Her Stones
For the first time, the Anne Brontë rock collection underwent complete description and identification, and along with Professor Hazel Hutchison of Leeds University and Dr. Enrique Lozano Diz at ELODIZ (a company specializing in spectroscopy analysis), an analysis of that collaboration, Anne Brontë and Geology: A Study of her Collection of Stones, was published in April 2022 in Volume 47, Issue 2 of the peer-reviewed journal, Brontë Studies & Gazette.\"
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