Almost sixty years ago my grandfather worked at the piston ring foundry in a town nearby. From time to time he brought home slag - stones - from the furnace which he put in his driveway.Today I live in the house my grandparents lived in (and had built in the 1920's) and this past weekend when my grandsons were here for a sleepover, they started digging in my driveway for rocks . . . and found what we all thought was obsidian! We were amazed they might find even one piece of obsidian in our driveway (we live in Michigan - not really close to any sources of obsidian), but they found zippy bags full of obsidian. It was a puzzle.
Until my mom saw my photo of the boys and the caption about finding obsidian in the driveway. She told me about my grandpa bringing home the slag and yes, slag basically creates a type of obsidian - not the obsidian you might find from volcanoes, but similar.
Well, the boys' discovery isn't quite as exciting as we thought, but it was still great fun for them to go out and dig in my driveway to find their "treasure"! So far our summer has been full of discoveries - fireflies, tadpoles, stars, Jupiter, Saturn, the Moon and now, not-quite-obsidian!
It was a fun weekend for sure!
That's really cool that your grandsons were able to discover a small piece of their family's history! I love little stories from the past like that. It's all of those little things that add up to such a rich family tapestry. :-)
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