Calcite, Chalcopyrite, and Marcasite

Item Description

A showy and complete Calcite cluster from the well-known Brushy Creek Mine, famous for these sparkling combination specimens. The lustrous, grey Calcite scalenohedrons range up to 2.4 cm, and are instantly recognizable with their preferential coating of sparkly Chalcopyrite and/or Marcasite crystals. The sulfides have good luster, and a light iridescence whose colors cover much of the spectrum. Distinctive and choice, this is classic material for the Brushy Creek mine. It was worked briefly in the mid-1900s and also in a more recent specimen-mining venture by Joe Kielbaso and friends in the late 1980s (from which this piece surely came out). At the time (I was 16) they were phenomenally expensive by the standards of an Ohio teenaged mineral collector, and I recall paying $100 or so for one about this good, even back then (a lot of money at the time for a calcite from a producing locale nearby!). Now, you almost never see them come up for sale again