AN HISTORIC NININGER RECOVERY OF COMPLETE IRON METEORITE FROM CANYON DIABLO

Canyon Diablo is the most famous and studied iron meteorite in the world. It came to Earth nearly 50,000 years ago in the form of an iron-nickel mass weighing several hundred thousand tons that crashed into the Arizona desert with as much energy as a 20-megaton atomic bomb. While meteorite fragments were flung as far as 11 miles from ground zero, most of the main mass vaporized on impact, creating the most famous and best-preserved meteorite crater in the world—nearly one mile across and 550 feet deep—the renowned “Meteor Crater” near Winslow, Arizona. Canyon Diablo meteorites contain tiny diamonds — the first to ever be discovered in meteorites. The “Father of Meteoritics” Dr. Harvery Nininger had a significant relationship with Meteor Crater. Among his numerous contributions to the science of meteorites, Nininger opened the world's first meteorite museum, which was located just across from the Canyon Diablo crater on Highway 66. Unfortunately, within a couple of years of the museum's opening in 1947, Interstate 40 also opened and there wasn't much reason to travel via the old highway and the museum went out of business. In many ways Nininger was ahead of his time. Today hundreds of thousands of visitors annually visit Meteor Crater. The specimen now offered was recovered by Dr. Nininger himself. This is a historic example of the quintessential American meteorite, prized by museums and private collectors everywhere.

Christie's would like to thank Dr. Alan E. Rubin at the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, University of California, Los Angeles for his assistance in preparing this catalogue note.