
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, September 3, 1993                   TAG: 9309030009
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-16   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: PERTH, AUSTRALIA                                LENGTH: Short

KIDS STRIKE A DEAL, GIVE UP OLD EGG

Government officials struck a deal Thursday with three children who found a foot-long fossilized egg, which they hid after being barred from selling it to a foreign collector for $102,000.

Jamie Andrich, 9, and two cousins gave officials the egg after Western Australia state government promised to set up a fund to raise up to $109,000 for the children's education.

The money is to be raised from donations solicited at the Western Australia state museum, where the 2,000-year-old egg will be displayed.

Jamie and his cousins - Kelly, 8, and Michelle Rew, 6 - found the egg in a sand dune while on vacation in January at Cervantes, about 155 miles north of Perth.

But state government officials barred any sale, saying the egg was public property.

The egg is believed to be from the extinct elephant bird, a flightless creature that lived in Madagascar until about 400 years ago.

by CNB