r/MineralPorn

I promised to post my museum pieces of Azurite. This is one of William Roeblings early acquisitions with a number of R78 and likely acquired in the 1880's. I find this specifically fascinating as I have family history of mining not far from Bisbee in Tombstone, AZ during the same time period. This is from the Washington Roebling, Smithsonian, and Jack Halpern collections. When Roebling passed in the 1920's his collection was donated to the Smithsonian. It's so fragile and old I didn't want to remove it from the packaging until I am ready to display it.

Fluorite

Strzegom, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, Poland

CaF2, Isometric

max. 26mm

An example of scarce and prized material from Grabina quarries located in pegmatites of Strzegom-Sobótka massif. This particular specimen is relatively sizeable and shows the range of violets one may expect from the material from this locality. It is an octahedral floater with minor damages, exhibiting typical, fine crystallisation with visible growth figures.

New addition to my collection :) Tourmaline is my favorite! Can you guess where this is from?

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Awesome Dioptase with fuzzy malachite from Mindouli, Pool Department, Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Dioptase has great color and clarity

Anatase My favorite of the titanium dioxide trimorph series. It is a fairly uncommon mineral compared to its sister rutile. This specimen comes from Ras Koh mountains, Kharan district, Balochistan, Pakistan

Here’s a beautiful calcite with some dolomite/dolostone from the legendary Elmwood mine, Carthage, Smith county, Tennessee, USA.

Here’s a nice lustrous elongated almandine garnet with quartz inside cavities of a rhyolite matrix from Garnet hill, Ely, White Pine County, Nevada, USA. A classic American garnet locality. On a side note specimens from this local are often mislabeled as spessartine garnet. Further chemical analysis has shown that they are far closer to almandine (Iron-Aluminum silicate) than they are to spessartine (Manganese-Aluminum silicate). Anyway let me know what you guys think of my specimen :)