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Finding Lost Moon Rocks Is His Mission
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)
Alaska's moon rocks disappeared on Sept. 6, 1973. A fire set by an arsonist had torn through the state transportation museum in Anchorage, where the four rocks had been on display.
The fragments, each smaller than a pea, were among 48 pounds of lunar material retrieved four years earlier by astronauts aboard Apollo 11. President Nixon gave samples to each state to celebrate man's first walk on the moon.
The Alaska museum curator's stepson, 17-year-old Arthur Coleman Anderson, sneaked inside the disaster scene to poke through the debris. He came across a Lucite ball mounted on a walnut plaque featuring the state flag. Inside the ball were four rocks. Anderson figured the plaque, once cleaned up and polished, would make a neat souvenir. And so, as clean-up crews set about their work, he walked away with a national treasure.
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