"His lack of education is more than compensated for by his keenly developed moral bankruptcy.”- Woody Allen

DESKTALK: Sometimes at the museum I receive more from visitors than they receive from me. This week was no exception. Vermilionite Dan Dean stopped in for a few minutes. And as is obvious from the video he contributed the artifact therein. I’m not entirely sure I understand (correctly) its port history. But “if” it is what I think, I am slightly surprised. Because I never thought of Vermilion as a place that would’ve employed longshoremen.

While it’s possible. I just (really) don’t know enough about the history of the port to make any real conclusive statement about it. I can just speculate.

I do know that during the latter years of the 19^th century stone was being shipped from port Vermilion. That may have required longshore workers. I also know that following the Great Fire in Chicago a good deal of stone was shipped from Vermilion to help rebuild the city. So I extrapolate from that, that the port would’ve used workmen to accomplish the heavy work of loading the cargo.

I wish I could positively conclude that that was the case, and that this notary stamp was from that period of time. But I cannot. At least I can’t “yet”.

But it’s an interesting idea.

And why and how Dan ended up with this stamp is at present – unknown as well.

So until I have some more conclusive information I’ll let my “speculat’n” on the subject suffice.