Baryte (large doubly-terminated crystal)

Item Description

A remarkable, large impressive Baryte specimen from the Linwood Mine in Iowa, where some of the finest quality contemporary Barytes have been found. This locality is an underground limestone mine, and to the best of my knowledge, the largest individual crystals of Baryte from any locality in the United States have been found there. This piece dates back to 2016, and shows truly beautiful form for the species and the locality. It's an astounding large cabinet sized example featuring a big superb doubly-terminated crystal measuring a whopping 16.6 cm, with a soft golden hue, accompanied by a few additional Barytes aesthetically sitting on matrix. Minor sparkling metallic golden Marcasite can be seen as well for a nice touch. The quality is excellent for the material as the Baryte crystals are sharp, well-formed, gemmy and have a mixture of lustrous and "frosted" faces for a pleasing effect. I love the textbook "chisel"-shaped terminations on the crystals. The eye-catching color is singular, and truly does not resemble any Barytes we've seen from any other locality. The specimen is in remarkably fine condition with no major damage I can see. Valued $5,000. For reference, the label accompanying the piece states that it is from a "type 2 pocket", which is detailed in Rocks and Minerals.
Ex George Loud Collection No. 28.3.1.1 IA.1; 9916 George (born August 16, 1942) is a well-known mineral collector from Washington, DC and South Carolina respectively, and was a patent lawyer by trade for over 50 years. He assembled one of the great mineral collections in the U.S., comprising worldwide specimens, and in later years he sold the worldwide specimens to focus on minerals of the United States, specifically locality suites with an emphasis on amazing representation of species while still maintaining fine quality. The specimens remarkably range from micros to all the way up to large cabinets in size. We recently acquired most of his impressive 9000+ piece collection, and the VAST majority of these pieces will be offered here in the auctions, as we feel that everyone deserves and equal opportunity at acquiring these important, well-documented and fine quality specimens for their collections.
See: https://mineralogicalrecord.com/biographies_labels/george-loud for more information