THE GREAT BARTLESVILLE EGG HUNT

Morning, good morning, good morning. Welcome, welcome, welcome. It's time now for our community connection right here. Okay, one, no one, you trust. We have Eric Minton in here, and uh we've got the great Bartlesville Egg.

Hot Yep, it's back again this year.

I am.

When are we gonna do this?

We're gonna do it April nineteenth this year.

All right, Dan, well what time we need to be around?

You want to be at ten o'clock and we're gonna do this one at Unity Square.

No, this is gonna be a lot of fun. I remember the last time you were in here. Uh, folks were They had so many questions because they said, this is just wait, sounds way too fun. Is this where we're going to get the instructions and everything else?

Yeah, so you'll meet there at ten am. All kind of give you the instructions of everything. And there's some twists this year. I don't I kind of leave those to the end, but there's some big ones this year.

Oh, the Man of Mystery here. Now this is year number four for this. Yes, this is starting to become quite the tradition.

Yeah, I've realized it was year four and was like, man, next year's five I'm gonna have to do something.

How does this work?

So basically and pass you show up, I give you some instructions of kind of how it's gonna work, and then we release some clues on Facebook. So there's an event page on Facebook the Great Bartlesville Egg Hunt. So we kind of break it down for everybody and then say, okay.

Here it is.

And it could be all over Bartlesville, it could be downtown.

You never know.

And so until we release those clues and then basically you go out and you do your best to find an egg.

Now, these are kind of unusual eggs. These are ones you make.

Yeah, each one's unique handmade.

Wow glass yep.

Glass comes out of a furnace at twenty one degrees.

That's tough. And these eggs are a little bit more valuable than the ones at the grocery store.

Yeah, they might be a little bit more expensive. You know, prices on eggs have come down now.

So a little bit.

But yeah, they're all glass eggs. Each have their own unique designs. Some have multiple colors, some of them glow in the dark. Some of them have what we call dichroic glass, which is a real shimmery.

Product.

You can put in The egg was actually used on the heat shield for space re entry, and they found you can put it in glass.

So now these things are collectors items.

I mean if people want to collect them, for sure.

But I have had people reach out, you know and say, hey, we've gotten one every year. We can't go this year, you know, and I'm like, it's limited stock.

Very limited too. So how long does this last? Is this like a week long hunt?

No, it's really just that day.

But you know, each year I've had to make it a little more difficult because the citizens of Bortlesville and people who come out, you know, every year we make it a little harder and they are finding it quick. So I think last year we had about two hundred people and I think we had twenty four eggs and they found them probably within i'd say forty minutes.

Oh my goodness sake. So they're on it. They're all about this, Yes, man, how many are up for grabs this year?

So this year we're gonna do twenty four as well. But the clues are gonna be a lot harder this year.

All right, So you got to go to the Facebook page kind of get.

Your Yeah, you get some information there.

I post some stuff out there, but really the day of the event will get you everything and it should be a good time.

So you need to show up ten and you have a unity square to get the final detail. You got it, maybe you can put it all together here. Now, when we talk about we talked about these eggs just being cool and so unique. How do you go about doing this? I mean, I mean, how are they made? I mean, I know they're made of glass, but I don't know anything about making glass.

So there's multiple processes to the glass and how you want to approach that.

But with mine, it's blown glass.

So basically I go into my furnace which has got molten glass at twenty one hundred degrees. When I go in and get glass out, that's called to gather, and at that point I can I have different colors. It's kind of like my palt painted palette. I have what they call fritz little pieces of broken up colored glass that I buy from my suppliers, and then I pick whichever colors I want to go into. Why that glass is hot, I can roll into it, it sticks to it.

All becomes one.

And then I have the option to you to add more colors, designs twists. When I go in and get another gather, I could come out and add more color.

I could just leave it cased.

So some of the eggs have color inside them, some of them the colors right on the outside. So it just depends if I've decided to put dichro in, if I make it glow in the dark, if I hit a mold and put a pattern in it, So they're all can be very different.

Wow, how long does it take to make your average egg?

So the average egg, I would say, I do get a little involved in it, and one of them all to look good, so you know, I mean, I could probably spend ten minutes on an egg, but then it's got a cool and it takes twelve hours to cool. Then once it's cooled, as long as it's made it through that whole process, I then have to grind off the rough edges and polish them, and then that can take a while too, depending on how much polishing and grinding I've.

Got to do.

So overall, I would say, you know, if you want to say I want an egg, I won't be able to produce that egg ready to hand it to you until probably a day and a half later. By the time it's come out of the furnace, it's cooled, it's been cold worked, and it's ready to go.

And that's the minimum.

Yeah, that's the minimum.

So yeah, it's you know, making it not so much, but the way glass has to cool and then some of the afterwork can take some time sometimes.

My goodness sakes, this is going to be great. It's the Great Bartlesville Egg Hunt. Watch the Facebook page same name, then show up at Unity Square on April nineteenth at ten am. And remember they're twenty four eggs, tons of clues and really a lot of fun.

Yeah, everybody seems to enjoy it, have a good time, all ages, family friendly. A lot of people will say, oh, it's more like the adult hunt. You know, it's a little little harder, but everybody's welcome to come out and enjoy it.

And folks, what are they say? Well, what's in it for Eric Minton?

Just the joy of watching everybody come out, the community getting together. I do have some eggs that usually after the hunt, those who may not have found any I do have some for sale, but again it's it's limited. It's really not a big moneymaker or anything. It is just something that kind of started small, evolved and I'm happy to do it.

Oh my, well, Eric, I want to thank you for being with us today and we're going to send folks out there.

Awesome, that's great.

Alrighty folks, the hunt is on. You've been listening to our community connection