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The Man Behind the Rocks

In this world, flooded with technology that advances more and more every day, it is not hard to forget what is important. Certain hobbies such as photography, writing, and scrapbooking are all focused on capturing important moments so that they will be never forgotten.

Recently, I had the pleasure of sitting down with a man who has his own unique way of recalling such memories.

Red flannel, black slacks, and graying hair fill my vision as William Chellberg greets me at the door of his two-story home in the suburbs of Wheaton. His wife, Doris, momentarily pauses her cross stitching in their cozy sun room so that she can wave and call out a greeting.

As I follow William down the stairs to his office space in the basement, I notice that the walls are covered top to bottom in amateur drawings and childish scribblings.

William laughs when he sees me observing them and says, "They're all from my grandchildren. We had ten little artists, but they've all grown up now."

Distracted by the thought of his grandchildren, he seems to daze out while staring at the art; I think he got lost in his memories for a moment. When we finally make it to the bottom of the staircase I am greeted by a stunning sight.

Glimmering in the light is what I can only assume to be hundreds of little pieces from the Garden of Eden. Row after row of breath-taking stones line an old wooden display case. Every rock sits on a bed of red velvet which William says keeps them from getting scuffed. The light of the display shines on the stones and gives them a magical glimmer. I take a picture of part of it, but I know it will not do them justice. Beauty like this cannot be captured by the lens of a camera.

William has a thoughtful look on his face as he turns to me and states, "I think I have just under eight hundred in my collection now. But that's just the ones that I have a written record of; I have numerous boxes of uncounted stones in my garage. Ones that I just haven't gotten around to working on yet." Still feeling hypnotized by the sparkle of his display case, I manage to ask him when he started collecting.

As a loving husband, and hardworking father of three, William informs me that he began collecting rocks when his eldest son, Kevin, had just turned six. Since he mentioned that Kevin was born in 1957, that means he has been in the business of rock collecting for about fifty-four years! What can keep him so invested in this time-consuming hobby I ask. "To me they are not just rocks," he states, "they are memories, and stories." It takes him a minute to get his thoughts in order before he shares with me some of the special times that the rocks bring back to mind.

Cinnabar, in particular, he tells me, has some fond memories behind it. Not long after he started collecting he began sending letters to a miner down in California. As they got to talking, their friendship grew, and the miner began to send along gifts for William's three children, every time he sent a shipment of rocks. Most of the toys now are long since forgotten except for a small rubber clown, which William keeps on his rock collecting bookshelf next to the letters from his friend.

It seems that there is more sentimental value to the stones than actual monetary value. "Seven hundred and fifty dollars, I think, is my most valuable stone," he says proudly, "but I don't think my wife would be too happy to know how much money I've spent on rocks over the years, so let's just keep that between the two of us." I can tell by the twinkle in his eyes that he does not regret spending a single cent. Even though it is not the most expensive, or holds the most memories, he tells me that his favorite stone is his rhodachrosite that was mined from the Sweet Home Mine in Arizona. I can tell why.

No picture can compare to seeing these stones in the flesh. They are so red it looks as though the earth bled them out, and their natural cut makes them the envy of every other stone. To my touch it is smoother than silk and I am dumbfounded by its natural beauty. Up until I saw this rock, I had always assumed that the diamond was the King of the stones, but to use a cliché, the diamond cannot hold a candle to the rhodachrosite. Its natural beauty is unrivaled; the voice of this stone is one of royalty. A rock like this must have been worth the risk it took to find it.

"I was always took special care not to take risks," says William, "anytime I went digging for stones where there was a risk of overhead rocks falling, I would wear a hard hat." However, the joking tone of our conversation shifts as he tells me about the time when wearing a hard hat saved his friend's life. "My friend Kenny and his son John have always been risk-takers when it comes to self-collecting," he says. Usually William is the only one of the group to wear a hard hat, but one particular day Kenny and John decided to put on their protective gear; what made them decide to do it that day he does not know, but he is thankful that they did.

They had been out in the hot sun for hours, looking for geodes in Kenny's hometown in Indiana; with almost nothing to show for all their labor, they were ready to give up. "Kenny had been chipping away at part of the canyon wall for a good while before it opened up into a vug. A vug," he explains, "is when the rock wall opens into a pocket. Ranging in size, a vug can be as small as a few inches, to being large enough to crawl into. This particular one was large enough to crawl into." But crawling inside can be dangerous. One wrong move and you can bring the canyon down on you; you can become trapped inside earth's wall and suffocate. However, after not finding anything for hours, Kenny seemed to think it was a risk worth taking and crawled inside.

The stones around the wall looked strong, but neither William nor John wanted to know for certain how strong they really were, because they did not want to think about the danger their friend, or father, was getting himself into. "I distracted myself by taking some pictures of the quarry," says William, "I even took one of Kenny part-way in the vug." After a few stressful minutes Kenny crawled back out the vug victorious. It was a short-lived victory however, because only seconds after he emerged, there was a rumbling sound.

A stone, about the size and shape of a man's fist fell from the canyon wall above Kenny and hit his hard hat with so much force that half of the hat became dented. William says when he saw the rock hit his friend, all he could think about was what would have happened if he was not wearing the hat. "If that rock would have hit him without the protection of his hat he wouldn't still be alive, and I would have been alone in a canyon with his 12-year-old son," he says. If he had lost his friend that day, he confesses that he would probably have stopped collecting rocks.

Now that he is 81, William has not had the time, or energy to go out self-collecting as often as he would like. Occasionally, he will visit rock shows with one of his children or grandchildren, but ever since his friend, Kenny, got sick a few years ago they have put self-collecting trips on hold. "I still keep my rock pick and my hard hat tucked away in my car, just in case I feel like scratching that familiar itch," says William, but he admits that it has been over five years since the last time he went.

William has shelf after shelf of books on rock collecting, and he even tells me he has posted a video on YouTube about how to record your collection.

"There is so much I would say to people that want to get into rock collecting, that I don't know what to say!" he laughs. Wearing long pants, comfy shoes, and gloves are a few of Williams must-have tips for self-collecting. "Hard hats are only necessary when there is a risk of overhead rocks," but he says that a bucket to carry all the finds, and a rock pick to work with, is something that should never be left behind.

Rock collecting is one of the few hobbies that allows a person to really discover the beauty of the creation; it is a hobby for the down-to-earth people who want to find the hidden treasures that are buried beneath the earth's crust. This is the type of hobby that takes one away from the electronic age, and gives someone a chance to capture memories while getting in touch with nature in a way that is almost unheard of.

Throughout my conversation with William, I was struck by his reason to collect rocks. It was not to sell them for money; it was to have something that reminded him of all the important people, and memories in his life. In actuality, it was not really the stones that he collected, but the memories. Cinnabar, to him, was the story of the kindness of his friend the miner; geodes, to him, were the story of the value of his friendship with Kenny; every stone represents something to him. He may be old now, and his memory may fail him at times, but the stones will always be there to remind him of what is important.

The man behind the rocks gave me something far more valuable than the precious stones he has dug up; he gave me a reminder to consider what is important in this life. His memories are written in the stones; he has captured them in such a way that he can never forget them.

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