Hello everyone!
We are now rapidly approaching the 2026 FM National Symposium to be held at the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show in the Convention Center, Saturday February 14, 2026. Symposium Chair Mark Jacobson has assembled a slate of 8 great speakers and talks on a wide variety of subjects, and we hope you can attend in person, but if not, The symposium will be hybrid this year for the first time ever! The theme for this year is “Red, White and Blue Minerals” in honor of our country’s 250th anniversary. Registration will be online soon. Remote attendance via zoom will have a small charge to cover our costs to connect to the Convention Center’s system and required IT support. Don’t forget, if you need credits for your professional geologist (PG) license requirements, you can get 6 credits for full attendance whether in person or online.
Also, this year we will have a table in the Galleria for the duration of the Main TGMS Show and I’m working with my Board to select some things to sell and information to distribute at the table.
The Pacific Northwest and Pennsylvania Chapters have held their respective Symposia this fall. PNW was not hybrid this year, so I did not get to attend but I hear it was fantastic. FMPA was back at its original venue, West Chester University (WCU), for its annual symposium. We have been hybrid since 2019, and this year was an exceptional year for attendance, including 17 PGs from as far away as Kansas. Returning to our core membership region in southeastern Pennsylvania and our social media campaign brought in more than usual, and our field trip to the Phoenixville mines, with some excavation work ahead of the trip bolstered our field trip attendance to 40. As usual, New Jersey and Midwest Chapters had many great field trips throughout the year.
The General Membership meeting will be held at Mineral Nexus Friday, February 13 in the morning as usual. I trust all of my board members will be able to attend in person, but for those that cannot, it will be hybrid as it has been the last few years. Each year we vote on 4 of the 12 director/officer positions that rotate on a 3 year cycle. The entire board includes the National at-large directors and the chapter Presidents or their designated representatives. This year the four at-large directors and the secretary are up for election. The Vice President executive position will be open as well. The results of the voting will be announced at the Board meeting. Meanwhile, our affiliate periodicals are being judged by our team for best article from each, the results to be announced at the gala at TGMS after the Symposium.
As I have reported, the Board has been exceptionally busy this year, having completed major revisions to the Operating Regulations, minor revision to the bylaws, removing references to California and its State Seal, creating and adopting a new logo thanks to Tama Higuchi for her assistance and mad skills 😊, voting and beginning the arduous task of moving the corporation to Arizona, developing a social media campaign for membership and symposium attendance, and updating the website to name a few. We voted to add the Young Mineral Collectors (YMC) and Minerals in Context (MIC) to our roster of affiliates and I am actively engaged with YMC as a mentor. YMC officers have joined our Board of Directors and bring some much needed skills and energy to our organization. We changed banks and moved our accounts to the new bank and cleared up issues with our California non-profit status. See more detailed explanations of each accomplishment and goal in the newsletters from the last 12 months.
We have several significant goals for the coming year. First, we are planning fields trips to various locations around the country throughout the coming year including a machine dig at the Hogg Mine in Lagrange GA for rose quartz and beryl/aquamarine, and a trip to Treasure Mountain in Little Falls New York for Herkimer diamonds, including scepters and other unique quartz specimens. We are also instituting a social media campaign which along with the field trips and hybrid symposia, will keep us engaged with our members and followers throughout the year, and we anticipate these efforts will bring in new members and keep us engaged with YMC and other active affiliates. Third, we will be reinforcing our educational mission with enhanced outreach techniques and broad in-person and social media presence. We will be coordinating with our chapters to help enhance their presence and draw members as well.
I’m very excited to announce the formation of the Herkimer Diamond Research Institute (HDRI), recently formed and already active as a research team dedicated to understanding all aspects of the formation of “diamond” quartz in the Herkimer District of New York, the host rock and its implications for our understanding of the geology and mineralogy of these deposits, and other similar deposits. I’m pleased to be a Board of Directors member of this newly formed research organization which currently consists of myself, Bob Borofsky, several professors at Rutgers and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, well known Herkimer authors and PhD candidate David Tibbitts who many of us know. I’ll be asking our Board to recognize HDRI as an affiliate at our annual meeting.
Happy Hunting, Stay Tuned and hope to see you in Tucson!