Noble, Oklahoma -
Rose Rock Museum and Festival

This is a neat little "museum". Inside you will find quite a few trinkets, cards, rocks, etc, and towards the back you will find a large Rose Rock sample. There's a little history and information on why they form. You can even purchase your own little Rose Rock if you so desire. It will take you about 10-15 min to look around the "museum" area. [Scott Mobley, 03/01/2009]

If you take the main road through Noble, OK, (State Highway 77), past the false front buildings and numerous antique stores and the post office, you will come to a very small building off to the side of the road. That building is there to celebrate the rose rock. Every year, Noble pays tribute to this little rose-shaped piece of sandstone, and they have even gone to the trouble to have a rose rock museum/gift shop! You can't really blame them though; rose rocks can only be found in Oklahoma and some place in Africa. Festival is first Saturday in May. [Mandy, 01/24/1999]

[RA: Photo added 2009. The Timberlake Rose Rock Museum is FREE and contains the world's largest collection of Rose Rocks. According to the museum, there's a "Legend of the Cherokee Rose":

"When gold was found in Georgia, the government drove the Cherokees to Oklahoma. Four thousand of them died on the journey west. But God, looking down from heaven, decided to commemorate the brave Cherokees. As the blood of the braves and the tears of the maidens dropped to the ground, he turned them into stone in the shape of a rose. This is why they are found in Oklahoma, the end of the "Trail of Tears."