This cache is part of the Linn Creek Trail: Marshalltown History series. Follow the bike trail to a series of caches highlighting prominent figures in Marshalltown history. Each cache will require you to leave the trail and search for a hidden cache. The caches in this series vary in difficulty and terrain.
Morris Gervich (1880 – 1968)
Morris Gervich was born in Nikolayev, Ukraine in 1880. After emigrating and moving to Marshalltown, Morris started the M. Gervich & Sons business in 1904. Morris’s brother, Max, worked in the company, but was tragically killed in 1910 when one of the horse-drawn wagons flipped and ran over his chest. Morris, his wife Jennie, and Max are all buried in the Jewish Glendale Cemetery in Des Moines.
In 1942, Morris’s son, Sam Gervich joined the company and was active in the business until 2005. Morris’s grandson, Doug Gervich, currently heads M. Gervich & Sons. Today the company specializes in handling industrial, manufacturing, and demolition scrap as well as dealing in new steel and aluminum.
The Challenge
Cache is not at the posted coordinates.
The periodic table is a tabular arrangement of the chemical elements, ordered by their atomic number. The rows of the table are called periods; the columns are called groups. A chemical symbol is a shorthand method of representing an element. Early chemical symbols stem from classical Latin and Greek vocabulary.
To find the actual coordinates of the cache, solve the following problems based on metals in the periodic table.
AtNo = Atomic Number
Per = Period
Gr = Group
N 42° AB.CDE’
W 92° FG.HIJ’
A = AuGr – AgGr
B = NiAtNo / SnGr
C = ZnAtNo – CrAtNo
D = CrAtNo / CrGr
E = AuPer – AgPer
F = AlGr – FeGr
G = ZnGr / CrPer
H = AlPer + FePer
I = AgGr – AgPer
J = SnGr – FeGr