BRENHAM PALLASITE Meteorite Palladium Silver Coin 5$ Cook Islands 2007

In February 1886 Mrs. Eliza Kimberly found a strange black chunk of stone in the „Brenham Fields" in Kiowa, Kansas. She identified it as a meteorite straight away but could only let it be specified more precisely by a scientist several years later. It was a very rare meteorite – a pallasite. A pallasite is a stony-iron meteorite type. It was named after the German academic Peter Simon Pallas who first described this rare group of meteorites in the years 1772–1777. They are considered to be very beautiful and consist of about 50 percent iron-nickel and another 50 percent olivine. A small component of this famous Brenham Meteorite, which originated billions of years ago, has been set in this coin. To emphasise the particularity of this issue furthermore, the surface of this coin has selectively been treated with palladium. The untreated surfaces on the moon and the meteorites tail are a strong contrast to the remaining coin and give it a very special visual effect. The coin reverse depicts the Raphael Maklouf effigy of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.