[meteorite-list] "Who is Dr. LaPaz"

[al mitt]

Hi Shawn and all,

I am sure that some people will disagree with my assessment of LaPaz, but he 
organized the collection at the UNM in Albuquerque, New Mexico and seem to 
want to discredit Dr. Nininger every chance he got. While he did contribute 
some to the understanding of meteorites he was no giant in the field and 
didn't contribute as much as Nininger was by any means.

A lot of his fame is the Norton County Meteorite that he outbid Nininger on. 
Nininger was standing on top of the main mass of the Norton County Meteorite 
when LaPaz and another museum head came onto the site. My understanding that 
Nininger used some of LaPaz's information to triangulate the fall but it 
takes more than one set of observations for this.

He help organize the Meteortic's Society with Nininger but later tried to 
get Dr. Nininger thrown out of the society. I believe that Nininger 
resigned. He did spend a great deal of time trying to make Nininger look 
bad. The two were obvious rivials but not in a healthy sense. Probably 
because Harvey Nininger was making his living finding and selling meteorites 
in order to fund his hunts and research. BTW Harvey made attempts to get the 
scientists and museums of that time to fund his program in order to add to 
their collections but no one thought it would work except Farrington. 
Farrington was older and had health problems but wished he could help in 
Nininger's pursuit.

LaPaz was also a hypocrite who frowned on anyone collecting meteorites but 
after his death a sizeable collection was found in his basement, he was an 
obvious closet collector. While he didn't help Nininger out, I have always 
felt that he might have been one of Nininger's inspirations to keep going 
and not letting anyone get in his way. Same with no one wanting to give 
Nininger a grant or position at any of the main museums or scientific 
institutions of that time. It might have drove Nininger to work harder in 
order to get it done.

--AL Mitterling


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Shawn Alan" <photophlow at yahoo.com>
To: <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 27, 2010 12:26 AM
Subject: [meteorite-list] "Who is Dr. LaPaz"


Hello Listers,

Its been a crazy day in NYC today with the snow and slush but all has melted 
and I received a package in the mail today of a Norton County meteorite, 
weighing at 2.33g from Dr LaPaz collection. Within the package, I also 
received copies of news paper clippings From the Norton Daily Telegram, 
dated May 1, 1948 from the meteorite fall, and Dr LaPaz comes up in every 
article. In one of the clippings there is a photograph of him standing by 
the meteorite being lifted out of the ground. I haven't read anything about 
Dr LaPaz till a week ago and was wondering what significance had he had in 
the meteorite community? I also Wiki him and from what I saw on Wiki, Dr 
LaPaz was smart guy and got his PhD at a young age. Lastly, along with the 
meteorite specimens I also received a trinitite fragment weighing at 1.79g 
that he had collected from the Trinity project and was wondering if people 
on the list knew much about this stuff.

Shawn Alan
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