He's a legend in his own mine.

• Position: James King Hill of North American Emerald Mines Inc.

When James King Hill goes to work, he could be crushed by falling rock or shot by a competitor. Or so he says. "This is real-life Indiana Jones stuff out here. I risk my life every day."

Hill, 33, runs North American Emerald Mines Inc., a commercial dig in Hiddenite, 14 miles northwest of Statesville and the center of what there is of a U.S. emerald industry. In 1995, while searching a 14-foot pit he dug, he came across a 5-foot-wide crystal pocket. He found small emeralds at first but struck it big with the last one. He put it in his mouth - as gem hunters do - to suck the mud off. "That's when I knew. The sun shone through it, and it was green fire, sparkling."

The 20.2-carat rough stone produced the 10.4-carat James King Hill Emerald. It's a big, good-quality stone, though not the third-largest fine-quality emerald found in North America, as he claims. He prices it at just over $1 million. Experts concur that it's likely a collector's item but probably only worth double a similar Colombian emerald, which would run around $70,000. Hill has spent $45,000 just promoting it.

"I've never heard of any violence or anybody robbing anybody else," says John Sinkankas, a well-known gem expert and author. Neither has he heard of Hill. In the gem business, he explains, people try to pass themselves and gems off as all kinds of things.

Hiddenite is mostly a tourist attraction. In the 1880s, Thomas Edison sent Professor William E. Hidden...