BETHLEHEM, N.H. (AP) – A New Hampshire man is using the eBay Web site to auction off what he claims are 1,000 pieces of rock collected near the site where the Old Man of the Mountain granite profile collapsed.

“I’m not trying to rip anyone off,” B. Elwin Sherman of Bethlehem said Sunday. “I make it clear I gathered rocks from near the rockfall. That can be loosely interpreted. I’m not claiming they came from the Old Man’s nose,” he said.

The going rate is $2 for a piece the size of a thumbnail. And it includes a “Certificate of Rockthenticity.”

Sherman selling the bits of stone that he says he gathered from “near the rock fall” over the weekend is not about the money.

“It’s always been a special place for me. It’s been a special place for millions of people,” he said. Sherman said he’s received some calls and e-mails about his Internet auction – some for and some against.

A search of the eBay auction site shows hundreds of “Old Man” items for bid, including shotglasses with the historic granite profile, bottle openers and postcards.