Epidote with Humboldtine (rare CA combo) Bob Reynolds Coll.

Item Description

A RARE, rich and showy combination from this well-known California skarn deposit. Lustrous, striated dark green-black epidote prisms, to 4.1 cm, are attractively clustered jackstraw-style on the large blocky matrix. The large crystals in the interior are terminated, a nice plus. The specimen is liberally coated with yellow Humboldtine, "a rare authigenic organic mineral occurring on fracture surfaces in coal deposits and rarely in granitic pegmatites and hydrothermal mineral deposits" (MINDAT). The color contrast of the two species adds character. Garnet Hill is well-known for fine California epidote and andradite garnet specimens and the locality became inaccessible in about 2002. The piece comes with a Seibel Minerals label, indicating that John Seibel collected the specimen in the mid- to late 1980s. Ex Bob Reynolds Collection, a well-known fossil and mineral expert and Curator of the San Bernardino County Museum. He passed away in 2020. A very fine, rich and rare example of the combination species from the locale.