Doc's Rocks Gem Mine

Appalachian Fossil Museum

Construction of the museum started in November of 2010 and the first specimens were moved in mid January 2011. The concept of adding a museum was never really discussed as an option until mid summer 2010. The space was originally used as a classroom for teaching regional geology. At the end of the school year the space was not used for about 4 months even though rent was still being paid on the space. In short we were losing money in an already rocky economy. So after tossing around a few different ideas of what to use it for we decided that Doc had enough rocks in his collection to fill most of the space so people could view and appreciate them. The Idea then turned to trying to see what else we could find regionally to add to the collection. After a few weeks of networking, we realized that the museum route would be an obtainable goal and a great addition to the gem mine. After talking to Jerry Jacene (a paleontologist in TN and a good friend of Docs), we figured out what fossil exhibits would be available to us and design started immediately. The grand opening for the museum was on May 7th 2011 and the rest is history.