Dravite Tourmaline

Item Description

This specimen is marked as coming from Preiļi, Latvia in Chet Lemanski's collection catalogue, with a note that says, "A former Joseph Wilcox (?) specimen (1850-1890) from the Delaware County (PA) Institute of Science collection". With that said, I can't find a reference to Dravite from any locality in Latvia, and it's quite possible that based on the age of the piece, it could have been mistakenly mislabeled. If anyone out there has some insight as to the correct locality for this piece, please feel free to let us know.
This piece is a sharp, well-formed, doubly-terminated, trigonal prism of rich golden-brown Dravite Tourmaline with moderate internal translucency when backlit. A cool antique Tourmaline specimen that dates back to the 1800s.
As mentioned, this piece is from the collection of Chester ("Chet") S. Lemanski Jr. of Browns Mills, New Jersey (https://www.mindat.org/user-461.html). Collection #9078CL. Chet was born 1947 in started collecting minerals circa 1957. He worked briefly as a drill runner at the famous Sterling Mine, in Ogdensburg, New Jersey and from 1987 to 1990 he helped convert the mine into a public access mining museum. He has held the role of treasurer, vice president and president of the Franklin-Ogdensburg Mineralogical Society (FOMS), and has been a board member and vice president of the Franklin Mineral Museum. The rare copper arsenate, Lemanskiite was named in his honor in 1999.