Celebrate with us! July 5th.

Update on Rocks, Rocks and more Rocks!

Update:
Small specimens selling for $5 each while the larger ones are $7 each. Great value! and they are going fast...

New shipment of 52 boxes of outstanding Rock specimens!

Just arrived at Ironstone Heritage Museum this afternoon. We are having so much fun opening each box to see the stunning assortment of quality specimens.

Everything from Copper, Amethyst, giodes, Crystals, Lepidolite, Wulfenite, Sulfur, Kyanite, Aragonite, Rose Quartz, Blue Calcite, Malachite , Okenite (this one is fuzzy and just too wierd to touch!), Dolomite, Actinolite, Sodalite, Amazonite ....

And we have only opened 5 of the 52 boxes!

Prices are only $5 & $7 each.

Snooze ya loose!  These are great for collectors of all ages. If we come across anything real unusual, we will post a photo!


And most important, these are all labeled!  The first batch we received of smaller and lesser quality rocks a couple of years ago were not labeled. We have been trying over the years to learn more about each specimen and figure out what they all are.  This time, NO PROBLEM!  We know what they are and where they come from.  All specimens include a descriptive tag.  

Start your collection now!

Franklin Classic Car Club

Visiting from throughout the United States, the Franklin Classic Car Club comes to Murphys and Ironstone Vineyards.  Over 60 Classic Car Buffs invade Calaveras County, one in particular having driven all the way from New York State!  And NOT in a trailer, but on the road.  

History of the Franklin Company and Club

The Motor Car and the Company

The Franklin motor car was invented by the engineer John Wilkinson and manufactured by the industrialist H. H. Franklin and marked under his name. The Franklin was one of the most innovative motor cars of its time, featuring an air-cooled engine, scientific light weight and flexible construction at a time when other luxury car manufacturers were making ponderous machines. Although it was a luxury car, its unique features made the Franklin a pleasant and easy car to operate, and consequently most Franklins were owner driven. The company always featured many body styles, both factory and custom-made, which were conducive to being owner driven. The Franklin's design allowed it to set many records in point-to-point races which revealed its superior nimble handling, durability, economy and speed over the rough roads of the day. Throughout its history Franklin was a luxury car and it was in this part of the automotive market that it competed with the other notable makes of the day. As such it fell victim to the Great Depression along with many of these same fine luxury car manufacturers.

  

These remarkable motor cars engendered such a loyal and faithful following that interest in these automobiles never died out. Many individuals continued to operate Franklins as their every day automobiles or preserved them right up to the emergence of the antique and classic hobby, decades after production ceased in 1934. The H. H. Franklin Manufacturing Company was a very large employer in Syracuse, New York area, its home base, and many people across the world had very fond associations with the company and its motor cars either as employees, dealers, service personnel or just loyal customers of that fine make. For others who were younger it may have been an unforgettable recollection of a Franklin in the family or one which was owned by a neighbor. They were very distinctive automobiles and were not easily forgotten.

Information from the Franklin Car Club
http://www.franklincar.org/about/history/company-and-club.html

Lady Antebellum was a sell out show and awesome!

Hope you got to see the show! It was awesome!  
We have been away buried in work and unable to join you here, but, we are back!  And will get updates on line again...

Post Clinic images ...

If you missed the Free Appraisal Clinic by Holabird & Associates
here are a few more items that came in...

This was an antique shadowbox that was animated. Excellent condition and very funny!

Several antique Guns & Rifles came in. This was the more rare

 Interesting figuring fetching around $300

Fake? or Museum Treasure?  Turned out to be a lovely print... not worth as much as the frame!

There were several outstanding collections of original art that came in. These were done by artist D. Schuler

 Yes, there was GOLD as well, some outstanding specimens too!

Prospector Mario brought in his bathroom waist basket and discovered it was a custom art piece from the early 1900's.

This might be a Miwuk paint brush?

Some things required a closer inspection...

 Is this genuine? The blade seems to be, but ...

 More outstanding art..

This was an outstanding collection from an authentic gold rush bad guy!

  Rugs and more rugs..

 Excellent antique rifle ..

Antique clothing well preserved

Great old metal & glass sign

Appraisal Clinic arrivals!

 Here are a few photos of some of the great stuff coming in for appraisals this morning! Already looking to be a fun day to watch & learn!

Free Appraisal Clinic!

Today and Sunday, Holabird & Associates are conducting a free appraisal clinic specializing in Early Americana, books, paintings, coins, gold, documents, letters, etc... bring it in for a free appraisal!

Stay tuned for photos of some of the awesome stuff coming in!!!

Concert Announcement!

Announcing Two Amazing Shows

 for 

Ironstone Amphitheatre!

Richter Entertainment Group Presents

Lady Antebellum

plus Special Guest

Friday, June 13th

presenting station KAT Country Radio

ZZ Top & Jeff Beck

Friday, August 15th

presenting station 104.1 The Hawk

Tickets on Sale Through Ticketmaster.

Tickets on Sale Friday April 11th

Stay Tuned for Ironstone Pre-Sale Information!

Sponsored by Black Oak Casino!

Richter Entertainment is coming back to Ironstone with a pair of stellar shows!!  First in June, we are proud to bring to Murphys, for the first time, Lady Antebellum. Since its 2006 inception, Lady A has risen quickly to become Country Music's most influential current group. Lady A won the Vocal Group of the Year honor from both the Country Music Association and from the Academy of Country Music three times in a row. Eight of the band's singles went gold, with four - "American Honey," "Need You Now," "Just A Kiss" and "I Run To You" - surpassing the platinum mark. "Need You Now" went on to sell over seven million downloads, according to the RIAA. Additionally, "Need You Now" claimed five of the trio's seven career Grammy wins in 2011, including the all-genre Record and Song of the Year.

All of that was achieved through a fragile balance of several key pieces, each of which helps define Lady Antebellum's sound: ingratiating melodies, the interplay between Kelley's soulful male resonance and Scott's scintillating female texture, the threesome's bittersweet harmonic blend, and production elements that invariably emphasize the stylistic inclusiveness of modern country.

That sound catapulted Lady A to an enviable level of popularity. The band picked up an audience beyond the typical Country core listener, it hit the road playing arenas and stadiums, and the group performed on all the major television shows, including Saturday Night Live, Oprah, the Grammys, The Voice, and most every other daytime and late night program on network television.

Art is a moving target. Those who do it most successfully find shades of emotion within themselves that change the texture of their work and how they feel about themselves. As a result, a real artist is ever-changing.

So it is for Lady Antebellum, whose album Golden was figuratively - and literally - borne on the move. The harmony-based trio - Charles Kelley, Hillary Scott and Dave Haywood - and its sizeable fan base bonded heavily during the band's Own The Night World Tour, its first arena run as a headlining act, in 2012. The shows themselves were inspirational. But so was the time offstage. Lady A made a point of experimenting and creating with its road band as the one-nighters and the miles of travel piled up. That behind-the-scenes interaction inspired much of the music on Golden, an instantly infectious project in which Lady A discovered new edges for its already-successful foundation.

Their new record,"Golden, depicts a kind of a special time for us in our career," Haywood says. "I personally feel so humbled that we can still be making records that people are excited to hear. We're in a really valuable, golden time."

Then, in August we honored to present long time music legends and mutual admirers, ZZ Top and Jeff Beck on tour together for the first time.  Last time ZZ Top played at ironstone it was near sell out and an amazing show!  To have Jeff Beck joining ZZ Top is a show of rare magnitude!

Formatted with musical synergy in mind, stops along the touring route will offer fans a full Jeff Beck set, followed by a full ZZ Top set, with a finale that joins the English fret master with the Texas rockers for a collaboration each night of the tour.

ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons, speaking on behalf of band mates Dusty Hill and Frank Beard, noted that Beck has long been a source of musical inspiration from the time when Beck played in the Yardbirds, the seminal hard blues-based Britrock band. Gibbons commented, “Ever since experiencing ‘Jeff’s Boogie,’ the prospect of performance with Jeff Beck on the deck brings us into focus with the curator of crunch.”

Likewise, Beck has been an enduring fan of ZZ Top, from even before their ascendance in popularity in the 70s and 80s. He remarked, “Ever since Eliminator I thought it would be great to play with ZZ Top,” and went on to declare Billy Gibbons, “The Professor of Grunge.” 

This tour is not the first live collaboration between the two camps. Gibbons joined Jeff Beck and his band on stage at the 25^th anniversary celebration of the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame in 2009 at New York’s Madison Square Garden, where they performed The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s “Foxy Lady” and ZZ Top’s hit “Rough Boy” together. The following year Jeff Beck joined ZZ Top in Lucca, Italy for an extended rendition of the band’s signature piece “La Grange.” This, however, marks the first time Jeff Beck and ZZ Top will have done any sort of extensive touring together. 

ZZ Top, formed in the Houston area of Texas in 1969, became a huge national touring act in the 70s and darlings of MTV in the 80s, going on to sell tens of millions of records. Their unique hybrid of dirty blues, hard rock, incorporating new sounds and technology, earned them induction into the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame in 2004 with Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones doing the honors. 

Jeff Beck, a native of London and two-time Rock And Roll Hall of Famer (with The Yardbirds in 1992, and on his own in 2009), helped set the template in the 60s for the solo-heavy, feedback-laden, rock guitar hero archetype. He formed the Jeff Beck Group by the end of that decade with then-unknown vocalist Rod Stewart, eventually going solo, with forays into fusion and beyond in the mid-70s. Beck, like ZZ Top, has continually incorporated new sounds and technologies into his work throughout his half-century long career.  Lately, Beck has been working on a new studio album, his first since the 2010 release of the critically acclaimed Emotion & Commotion, which earned him two Grammy Awards and the highest charting debut in his career.