“You need a rock. I can tell.” That’s the first thing Ben Crooks will say to you when you walk up to his booth on the Roanoke City Market. You’ll also get a geology lesson if you want one, free of charge. You see, Crooks isn’t just peddling rocks; he’s selling fossils.

The sometimes retired government geologist sells what he has collected from a lifetime of traveling the world. On his tables you’ll find quartz from Saltville and 15 million-year old sharks teeth from North Carolina.

Crooks estimates the trilobites from Highland County are 425 million years old. And the polished fossils from Morocco always catch the eye of passersby.

You could spend a dollar or up to $650 for one of the larger specimens. On occasion, Crooks will bring a large amethyst worth $2,000.

“It’s a gemstone after all,” Crooks said.

His collection started long before his career, when he was a child in Smyth County. Crooks was eight or nine when his Uncle Roger would take him to the mines in far Southwest Virginia and West Virginia.

“We would take veggies and moonshine and sell or trade them for coal. I picked up arrowheads, axes, anything that looked weird. That’s what hillbilly kids do,” Crooks said.

Crooks’ family then moved later to Maryland where he finished high school. He went on to what he called an “undistinguished career” at VMI where he graduated in 1964. He then spent six years in the Army including two tours of Vietnam, the second of which ended early.

“I was shot and blown up.” Luckily, Crooks said, he experienced no lasting effects from his war injuries.

Crooks’ wanderlust continued after his military service ended. He got a mining engineer degree from the University of Maryland and was hired by BP Oil to look at core samples in the Middle East.

“I went on oil expeditions, pipeline surveying. It was cool. I loved it,” Crooks said.

Most of his time with B.P, he was based in Limerick, Ireland. It’s a time he looks back on fondly, but he moved on.

“I wanted to do other things. I got homesick and tired of eating cod,” he said with a laugh.

Once back in the states, Crooks hit the books again and in 1978, graduated from MIT with a Ph.D. in mining engineering.

His next job opportunity came about while he and a buddy were hiking the Appalachian Trail and struck up a conversation with a man from the Department of Agriculture.

“He asked us if we knew anything about geology. We said ‘a little,’” Crooks said.

So it was on the road again. As a geologist for the federal government he traveled to Africa, the Middle East and Antarctica.

Looking back on his career, Crooks says he’s hard pressed to name a favorite time or a most fascinating story.

He says he’s survived helicopter and plane crashes. A boat he was on sunk in the North Sea. And then there have been mining accidents.

“It’s been a blast. Sometimes literally,” said Crooks. “I’ve been shot at by Mexican bandits, African bandits and a few perturbed husbands. It’s not Indiana Jones, just difficult times.”

Now at 60 years old, Crooks still finds thrill in the discovery of a fossil.

“There’s always the adventure of the discovery. I can’t drive down the road without looking at rocks.” Crooks said. He shares that curiosity with anyone who asks.

“What’s this?” one customer said while picking up a colorful rock.

“Peacock ore,” Crooks answered. “It’s from an iron mine in Utah.”

“Why is it this color?”

“Oxidation. When they get warm, water starts a chemical reaction.”

Crooks still hunts for fossils. His life partner, Patricia, has become an amateur geologist by going with him on these adventures. Recently they scaled a rock wall somewhere in West Virginia (Crooks won’t divulge the location). He said they found dinosaur tracks and dinosaur eggs that Crooks estimates are 195 million years old.

“I like to go see what’s popping up and what’s been uncovered,” Crooks said when asked why he still hunts for fossils. “You never know what you’re going to see.