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The Glorieta meteorite was first discovered by Mr Charles Sponsler. He was a prospector and and in 1884 found three large masses lying on a bare rock. He must have thought they were some sort of valuable silver ore or something of that nature. The three pieces he found totaled 317 pounds, the first piece weighed 148.5 pounds. The second weighed 115 pounds and the third weighed 53.5 pounds. It was thought that the three pieces were just separated from each other and they seemed to fit together back into one mass.
The local people found more pieces of this pallasite over the years. Because of the steep terrain, the pieces were exposed on the surface over time. Nininger did some work in the area and recovered pieces from locals.
In more modern times Steve Schoner had this strewn field to himself for many years and found many specimens of this beautiful meteorite. He also has the largest Glorieta pallasite found to date. Others have hunted for this elusive meteorite, in fact meteorite hunters have come from all over the world to look for their own Glorieta pallasite. In most cases the Glorieta has given up very little to these meteorite hunters. If they found anything it was usually small and hard earned, in fact some meteorite hunters have hunted for more than 20 days without finding a single Glorieta meteorite. Hunting is difficult because of steep terrain, brush and trees.
The Glorieta is a pallasite, but many of the pieces found are all iron. We use the word siderite to describe an all iron specimen. The small meteorites (under 50 grams) were mostly pallasite's, they showed at least a little olivine. The bigger pieces over a kilo, seem to be split about half and half between pallasite's and siderites.
The Glorieta is from Santa Fe County New Mexico it is a stony iron pallasite. It is a medium octahedrite band width 0.85