Limited edition ‘Planet Mars: The Collector’s Cube,’ 2.5˝ x 2.5˝ x 2.5˝, created by Darryl Pitt and launched on QVC in 1997, and later sold at the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral as the first interplanetary collectible. The Lucite cube contains a floating glass vial, 1˝ in length, containing particles of the Zagami Martian meteorite. A sterile vial contains 1/10 carat of pharmaceutically milled particles of the Zagami Martian meteorite suspended in a Lucite cube. The sample from which these Zagami particles are derived was studied by NASA. In fine condition, with some light scuffing. Accompanied by a comprehensive 20-page “Mars Owner’s Manual.”
On October 3, 1962, a farmer in Zagami, Nigeria was nearly struck by a 40-pound meteorite as it plummeted towards Earth. Pointing to a planetary origin, the specimen had an unusually young crystallization age and contained water-bearing minerals. In 1995, the New York Times reported that minute volumes of gas trapped in tiny bubbles within the Zagami matrix were found to match the composition of the Martian atmosphere (as determined by NASA’s Viking lander in 1976). Zagami is one of only five witnessed falls of Martian meteorites, which arrived on Earth as a result of a large asteroid slamming into Mars and ejecting material from the Martian surface into an Earth-crossing orbit.
