Coal / Lignite ("Jet") (ex Willard Wulff Collection - collected by Wulff)

Item Description

I can honestly say that I've never seen another piece of this material before. A rarity for the area for sure. This specimen comes from the collection of Willard W. Wulff (1904-1998) of Colorado Springs, Colorado, a prominent figure and collector of Colorado minerals. Wulff was one of the founding members of the Colorado Springs Mineralogical Society in 1936. You can read Willard's bio on the Mineralogical Record website here ( http://www.minrec.org/labels.asp?colid=1528 ). The piece came with a hand-written piece of card stock that simply says "Jet, Fountain Valley" noting that it was personally collected by Wulff himself. This specimen features a black semi-cubic-shaped piece of Jet with typical grained texture. Jet is actually Lignite (a low form of coal) and begins as an accumulation of partially decayed plant material, or peat. Lignite deposits are typically younger than higher-ranked coals, with the majority of them having formed during the Tertiary period.