By Alice Smith

Georgie Gleim, certified gemologist and president of Gleim Jewelers, addressed the Los Altos Morning Forum audience Nov. 20 on a topic she is preeminently familiar with – the role gems play in our society.

Gleim’s grandfather, Frederick, one of eight children, was apprenticed to a watchmaker, jeweler and engraver until the Depression left him unemployed and broke. He borrowed $500 to purchase a bankrupt jeweler’s inventory in Palo Alto in 1931 and founded Gleim Jewelers. Last year, now with branches in Los Altos, Palo Alto and Stanford, the company marked its 75th anniversary.

Gleim followed her grandfather’s lead in receiving the Robert M. Shipley Award, the highest honor in the industry, and serving as president of the American Gem Society. She also served as president of the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce and as an active member of the Jewelers’ Vigilance Council.

Gleim’s opening slides for the group featured a diamond art deco brooch and a remarkable Tiffany pendant with a large, yellow emerald surrounded by green garnets and other rare stones.

She said the pendant she was wearing illustrated that jewels are more than just personal adornment: They can establish status, provide family history, mark personal achievements and recall major events in one’s life.

Diamonds come in many sizes and shapes and are valuated by color, clarity and size, she said. Gleim displayed the largest known gem in the world, a 545-carat diamond. The British crown jewels contain a 530-carat diamond.

Diamonds are mined in Africa, south of the Sahara (particularly in the Ivory Coast, Namibia, South Africa and Botswana), in India, above the Arctic Circle in Russia and Canada, in Australia and even in Arkansas, where visitors to a state park can diamond-hunt.

Conflict diamonds, also known as blood diamonds, are those mined in war zones and sold to finance insurgency or warlords’ activities.

They originate predominantly in the alluvial diamond mines of Namibia and Angola, according to Gleim. Such diamonds are found in streams and water sources, making them easier to acquire than those underground. Thus they have become the money source for grabbing power, funding conflicts and purchasing arms. Unscrupulous bids for power have resulted in atrocities so dramatically portrayed in the movie “Blood Diamond.”

A question posed by Global Witness, a nongovernmental organization, “What is the diamond industry going to do about these atrocities and injustices?” was the catalyst for organizing the World Diamond Council comprising diamond traders, cutters and large jewelers such as Tiffany & Co.

Gleim believes that as a result, more than 99 percent of the diamonds on the market today are not conflict diamonds because of the merchants’ boycott.

The prevention of child labor and the reduction of environmental impact remain as challenges for the worldwide diamond merchants, Gleim said.

Morning Forum is a members-only lecture series held at Los Altos United Methodist Church. For more information, visit www.morningforum.com.