![]() We used to run 35 conventional sphere machines using silicon carbide grit. Up until 2010, Rare Earth Trading Company (was run as a side business focused on unique agate specimens, cabochons, spheres and rough rock. ![]() I had moved to Silicon Valley and then Boston building software companies and managing teams in the US, India and Eastern Europe. He worked full-time in the Computer Semiconductor Industry, which led him to Silicon Valley, and then Austin TX, followed by India and China as the industry evolved. Over 20 years ago John started Rare Earth Trading while living in Ohio. As time passed, this became an impetus for Highland Park Lapidary 30 plus years later. While both pieces of equipment worked, we almost give up lapidary because we could not achieve the results we had hoped for. The saw was a Highland Park 10-inch gravity feed saw and the grinder was a Rock Rascal. We got our first slab saw and grinder later that year. We remember the thrill of digging thunder eggs at Priday Ranch (now Richardson’s Ranch) and finding Lake Superior Agates in Muscatine Iowa. At that time you could find nice material along the roadside, as the freeway system was newer then. John was 10 and I was five and we stopped at nearly every road cut to collect stones and soil samples. It all started in 1970 when my brother John and I got bit by the rock bug and started collecting rocks on a family vacation around the United States and Canada. People ask us all the time how we ended up with Rare Earth Trading Co, Highland Park Lapidary and Spheres To You with customers and operations spanning multiple continents. HIGHLAND PARK LAPIDARY COMPANY IS IN NO WAY RELATED TO OR ASSOCIATED WITH HIGHLAND PARK MANUFACTURING OR ROCKS LAPIDARY OR ANY OF THEIR SUCCESSORS.The Rare Earth Trading Co, Spheres To You and Highland Park Lapidary Story We encourage you to compare our products to anyone in the industry and you’ll discover what many others have already found out - our durable, quality equipment will perform for lifetimes of cutting - at a cost far less. Our Highland Park Style Slab Saws and other lapidary tools are manufactured with this same commitment to quality and performance - at prices affordable to the beginner or the seasoned professional. Our first saw (acquired when we were age 10) was made by Highland Park Manufacturing and we greatly admire and respect the pioneering work they did in creating quality lapidary equipment that still can be found in operation today. We started manufacturing the Highland Park Style Slab Saw because we believe this design is the very best. We think a big reason for this is that equipment is simply too expensive and often too poorly built to enable a new enthusiast to be successful. Over the last 20 years we’ve seen the lapidary industry in the US shrink in size as less and less people have come into the hobby. Simple stated, our equipment is Built to Last a Lifetime™. We design all our products in our shop in Texas and manufacture them in our factory in China staffed with our own employees who we personally manage to insure the highest quality every step of the way. You’ll see our 40+ year passion for lapidary when you experience our equipment and visit our other businesses The Rare Earth Trading Company (and Spheres To You (At Highland Park Lapidary we manufacture high performance slab saws, sphere cutting machines, specialized diamond tooling and oil cleaners. We feel it’s important to actually know something about cutting to design and build quality lapidary tools. It’s our passion for cutting that has led us to building equipment that enables many hours of pleasurable and productive cutting.
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