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6 THE PACIFIC MINERALOGIST

school trips, and the requirement of ers to the Dominguez Field of Union
being in good standing by paying Oil Co. in South Los · Angeles, and
monthly dues of ten cents, to go on built up a treasury of about $30.00,
trips, provides a small fund to be in addition to an investment of $15.00
spent for the purchase of certain in laboratory equipment.
items of special equipment which The Los Angeles Mineralogical
will enable the club to perform chem- Society is in a position ·to aid the
ical assays of student samples in a formation and ease the teacher burd-
special laboratory set-up. Most of en of carrying on such clubs. They
the general chemicals and supplies could invite teachers, whether mem-
can be secured through the chem- bers or not, to avail themselves of li-
istry department, but the ~lub needs brary loans of booklets and trip plans
a vacuum filtering flask, six inch distributed through school mail to
filtering funnel, and suction pump to schools without cost to either the
be attached to a water faucet to LAMS or the teacher. They could
provide vacuum and reduce time keep a file of mimeographed sketch-
required to filter a solution to one es of local field trips to be mailed
minute, so that the solutions and on request to schools, and invite
precipitates of a complex qualitative teachers and students at a nominal
analysis may proceed with dispatch. fee to join LAMS and go on trips,
If it takes most of the period to filter although the latter are often either
a single solution, interest cannot be too long or expensive for students or
maintained in the process. teachers to attend.
An ore pulverizer that will reduce Sufficient interest was exhibited
a sample to 200 mesh dust in one by teachers in a mineral field trip
operation takes most of the hard institute session, about one hundred-
work out of grinding specimens. fifty requests being sent in by sev-
Water bath, special reagents, and enty-three schools with reservation
cooking dishes add to the list of limited to forty, that the board of
materials required. An energetic education is planning to repeat the
club can arouse sufficient interest offering and possibly expand it to
on the part of students to have trips two or three trips, and the LAMS
so it can finance and carry on a through its mineralogy in the schools
number of interesting projects. Con- committee could help immeasurably
trary to belief, students will not go ~ith suggestions and plans to ac-
on trips unless they are genuinely quaint interested teachers with min-
interested. The willingness of fifty eral locations in the areas surround-
to seventy students to go on trips ing Los Angeles and accessible to
and pay dues for that reason only, students on one-day trips. Members
provides funds to enable those of could be invited to attend and serve
more consuming interest to carry as guides to increase the value of
on the more academic interests of these trips, and could sponsor trips
the club. The San Fernando High especially adapted to teachers needs
club, probably very strategically lo- and interests as part of its regular
cated as regards access to minerals, field trip program throughout the
but decidedly not in respect to the y e a r , and thus sponsor the in- '----
time consumed in transit on club creased interest of teachers in form-
trips, nevertheless conducted numer- ing these needed contacts with out-
ous successful trips probably aver- side of school groups interested in
aging about three per semester, in common problems.
school busses, besides field trips in A list of certain minerals of Mint
private cars as far as Bakersfield, Canyon prepared for this year's insti-
and took one ±rip of seventy mem- tute trip includes many which the