CompuServe Messages

I'd rather deal with a private owner than the government, any day. I'm sure you know how it works: a smile, respectful or helpful appearance, a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend, and you can get permission to visit many sites. But at my local office of the USGS, it's tough work to get these people to get out of their chair to approach the counter to "serve" me. Where's the outcry about the devastation and neglect of fossil and mineral sites that are already on private land? In another message, I mentioned the loss of the Hartung Quarry in Milwaukee. It's now a city landfill, but for years, it's provided zillions of trilobites with nearly zero scientific value but immense value in terms of educating people about science and geology. I've seen these trilobites for sale in shops around the country. And I know of another quarry nearby that has soft-bodied fossils reminiscent of the Burgess Shale… Morris has been there, S.J. Gould mentions it in "Wonderful Life", yet it's a working quarry that's crunched a lot of this layer into oblivion. I don't like the provisions that require licensing and permits for collection. It smacks of elitism. It's better for who? Certainly self-interest and "profit" in different forms raise their head in both situations. An "academic" can be movitivated by greed for recognition, or by the desire to increase ticket sales because they have a new dino exhibit.