Musso Bowie Knife

[Va.Manuf.06]

Well see thats where my real ignorance comes in ... it is a subject I know very little about as well. So are you saying the bauxite would be present in the sand as a by product from other mining practices? Is that it? It does not come about from any other procdess, or ... occur naturally? I simply do not know! :hmm:

Davy

Well no, and Mike being a geologist will have to answer your question acurately, but as I understand it, the bauxite was naturally scattered throughout the soil in very small quantities. That is one of the reasons that aluminum was so difficult to extract and the reason that it (aluminum) was considered a precious metal until relatively recent times historically speaking. (Mike, help!)

 

The reason bauxite was not mined prior to the late 1800s is because no one had discovered a process for extracting Al from it, and there was no demand for Al--it being more of a rare curiosity until ca. 1900. Even then it was priced like silver. The minable bauxite deposits are not disseminated, but extensive masses of rock-bauxite is actually a rock not a mineral--it is composed of several iron and Al bearing minerals. There is no bauxite around Washington and no reason to haul it there from Benton.

MORE ON BRASS-BACKED BOWIES--SEE SEPARATE POST, as this one has gotten off track. Mussos tests are suspect and inconclusive, but the real problem is that his knife is identical to other fakes and probably dates from the 1950s.