Possible meteorite? Options

[Momof2]

Hello everyone. I have a couple questions about a 'rock' my husband found...

First, the history: For many years my husband's had this blackish rock sitting on a shelf in his office with a bunch of other mementos. The other day I asked him why in the heck he keeps hanging onto the rock and he said, 'I think it's a meteorite'. Now, what he knows about meteorites is about as much as he knows about how to build a spaceship but he said a geologist friend told him that's what it looked like. Probably over a few beers.

12-15 years ago, he doesn't really remember, he was at a garage/ estate sale and the rock was holding down some papers from blowing away. He liked the shape and jokingly asked the seller if he could buy it. She said yes and just gave it to him along with all the other junk, er, highly valuable collectibles he was buying.

I did some research online and hacked away a small fragment of the rock, noting the grayish color inside, blackened crust outside. I realize that doesn't prove anything but maybe it's worth a look.

QUESTION 1: What institution do you recommend, preferably here in Denver, to analyze and see if it even is a meteorite?

QUESTION 2: Are there laws about people owning meteorites? I found your website by following a thread about laws preventing people from keeping things they find, etc. Does that apply to garage sales?? (haha)

Thanks for your help!

[ASTROBLEME]

The population of non-magnetic meteorites is statistically so small that it is unlikely that the specimen is one of those. Even if it is a meteorite, to have any real market value, it must have a location where it was collected and classification to establish what type it is. From what I've seen so far, it looks like a country rock and the market value probably wouldn't cover the testing costs.

If you really want to know if the object is a meteorite, then I'd suggest you hire Actlabs to run a sample through their analysis code 4 Litho-Meteorite.

ASTROBLEME

[Momof2]

The population of non-magnetic meteorites is statistically so small that it is unlikely that the specimen is one of those. Even if it is a meteorite, to have any real market value, it must have a location where it was collected and classification to establish what type it is. From what I've seen so far, it looks like a country rock and the market value probably wouldn't cover the testing costs.

If you really want to know if the object is a meteorite, then I'd suggest you hire Actlabs to run a sample through their analysis code 4 Litho-Meteorite.

ASTROBLEME

Ha, no I believe you guys on here, there is NO WAY I'd let hubby spend a dime on his rock! This was great to hear from all you folks who actually know something about this, I really appreciate all the help