Java Lisper wrote:
I found the story. Did he buy it for ten or ten
thousand? Or was it a hoax?


Good digging -- on finding versions of the story!

According to his story, he bought it for somewhere around
ten dollars. A chunk of rough star sapphire does not show
a lot of promise -- unless you know what you are looking at.
That's part of what makes the story so good. Someone who has
cut and polished a few star sapphires, would recognize
the potential from the crystal shape, hints of asterism,
relatively heavy weight, etc. In classic fairy tales, it's the
prince (or princess) disguised as a frog -- and an ordinary
bumpkin smart enough to see through the rough exterior. Great
stuff!

The ordinary person might just assume it's another chunk of rock,
especially if it's the size of an egg. Don't believe anybody
wanted to come out and call the tale a hoax. It provided a lot of
free PR -- and fun. And I don't remember any PR about how he
found a buyer who would pay the price.

A related story came out a few years ago when somebody went
around selling a "gem material" that emerged from some debris
from an oil well being drilled in Wyoming. According to the
story, it came from a depth of some 2000 feet, so there was an
extremely limited supply, etc. Apparently somebody unloaded
a lot of this to rock shops, etc., throughout the southwest.
These folks, in turn, passed the story along to their
customers. Believe the material turned out to be glass.

There was another one, true, where some boys found some clear
purple rocks in the nearby excavation for the cellar of a new
home in Bellingham, Massachusetts. The kids called it
"The Purples," and proceeded to smash every piece they could find.
One of their fathers brought a piece to an local rock shop to
have it identified, out of curiosity. Turned out to be gem amethyst.

And another, about a girl whose dad admonished her for having an
overactive imagination -- seeing dinosaur footprints in the
flagstones he was quarrying in the back yard. Fortunately, he
had them checked out....and ultimately, quit his job as a tool
and die maker, and went into the fossil business. We used to
do shows with these folks, and often wonder what happened to
them. Mom and dad may be gone by now, but the daughter may
well be telling her kids the story of how she recognized the
footprints and later how she got to meet famous geologists from
all over the world.

There quite a few true stories of treasures in disguise.