"The Mazon Creek flora is renowned for being almost completely collected by amateurs. Since 1858, in an area covering approximately 100 square miles, untold numbers of collectors have gathered fossils in quantities unprecedented in North America."
In the mid-1990s when our family first became interested in collecting fossils, one of our neighbors told us to check our electric bill for the location of a collecting area right at the Braidwood nuclear power plant. Later, we would learn that this was the famous Mazon Creek collecting area. The area, which had once been the Peabody Coal Pit 11 was now a cooling pond for the Braidwood nuclear power plant. Another interesting note, this area happens to be the location of our own Illinois State Fossil, a strange wormlike "Tully monster" named after its collector, Francis Tully.
We gathered up our family, backpacks and bikes and headed out to the area where we met a boater who told us about ESCONI when we asked where to look for fossils in the area. New to the hobby, we found ESCONI to be the best way to meet with others who share our interests. My husband has just taken a break this year from serving as president of ESCONI and is working on a website devoted to the unique Mazon Creek fossils. Members since 1996, our family has been active in ESCONI for over a decade now.
Junior's Booth at the annual ESCONI show held the first weekend in March.
Each family has its unique way of making the most of their time together and for us, with a home school family and a home business, we probably had the most freedom as well as time to work with. I’ll never forget our first year we set this whole idea into motion, it was early June and we packed up our van with educational books and maps and set out West to explore history, geology, nature, and even visit family along the way for almost three weeks.
My daughter, Allison, with her "best of the best" grand champion 4-H project of Mazon Creek fossils.
That year we attended the MAPS show and continued on with various events with ESCONI as well as trips to Ontario Canada and St. Paul, Indiana. We would also attend field trips to Ohio for trilobites, and Kentucky for flourite, and Missouri for barite to name a few.
Don Auler and my family in Canada 1997.
We had the great opportunity to become friends with the late members Don Auler and Andy Hay. Don Auler, known in the rock hound community with his wife Dorothy for donating much time and effort to further the earth sciences, would illustrate books and personally teach our children how to watercolor paint and Andy would go on to illustrate the Richardson’s Guide to Mazon Creek with Dr. Charles Shabica . Through organizations and clubs like ESCONI,Boy Scouts, 4-H, and museums like The Field, Lizzadro, Burpee, and The Elgin Public Museum, we have oulets to express and share what to one may be a mere favorite pastime to what to another may be a great scientific advance in understanding our world around us.
The Richardson's Guide was dedicated to the late Field Museum paleontoligist Eugene Richardson who founded the Mazon Creek Project in the 1960s.It was a program sponsored by Northeastern Illinois University whose main goal was to keep the Mazonia-Braidwood Conservation Area open for collecting by scientists, school children, scout groups, visitors from other states and others. It was also an attempt to encourage more communication between paleontologists and amateur collectors.
Why not make your history include some time with ESCONI? Whether your interests involve family, community, education or just personal fun, guests are always welcome at ESCONI. Stop in at our general meeting the second Friday of each month at 8pm at the College of Du Page or check out our annual show in March.
