On invitation, Dr. Emanuel Mazor (1936-2020) of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel visited the University of Rochester (NY) as a visiting professor during 1997-98. During his academic career, Dr. Mazor studied geology at Hebrew University in Jerusalem beginning in 1951, receiving his PhD in 1960. He held research positions at various institutions in the US, Australia, and South Africa and became a Professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel, in 1973, retiring from that position in 1997 and becoming Professor Emeritus.
He started collecting meteorite samples in the early 1960s because of his interest in radioactivity and cosmochemistry. As Chair of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Rochester, New York, Asish Basu coordinated Professor Mazor’s visit. During Mazor’s time in Rochester, they became good friends and colleagues. Both Asish and his wife Susan got to know Mazor and his wife Ruth, a delightful, friendly, and warm couple!
On his return to Rehovot next year, Professor Mazor decided to send Prof. Basu his personal collection of meteorites, knowing Prof. Basu’s interest and passion in mineralogy, petrology, and geochemistry. These meteorites were sent as a token of friendship and knowing that Prof. Basu would take good care of these meteorites. Prof. Basu brought them to Texas when he moved to UT Arlington to become Head of the Dept. of Earth and Environmental Sciences in 2013 (https://www.uta.edu/ees/faculty/basu/).
On retiring from his academic career after 42 years, Prof. Basu wanted to find a permanent home for these meteorites. Knowing Professor Robert Stern of the Geosciences Department of the University of Texas at Dallas for more than 45 years and also knowing of his love for teaching the future generation about Solar System materials, Prof. Basu decided to leave this meteorite collection to UTD Geosciences Dept., under Prof. Stern’s supervision. The Mazor-Basu collection still comprises most specimens in UTD MERL.