Junitoite with Gilalite and Kinoite

Item Description

A rare association specimen from the famous Christmas Mine in Arizona featuring nearly colorless, translucent, semi-platy micro crystals of the rare calcium zinc silicate species, Junitoite associated with attractive rich blue Kinoite along with light green colored Gilalite. The piece is certainly best seen under magnification, and it's a great combination of rare minerals from this unique Arizona locale. The Christmas Mine is the type locality for both Junitoite and Gilalite, and although the best known examples of Kinoite come from the Christmas Mine, most people don't realize that the type locality is actually further south in Pima County. Junitoite was named after Jun Ito a mineralogist from the University of Chicago, Gilalite is named after Gila County, Arizona, and Kinoite is said to get its name from the Italian Jesuit missionary Eusebio Francisco Kino (1645-1711). You can actually see a statue of him along the Kino Parkway in Tucson. From the collection of Chester ("Chet") S. Lemanski Jr. of Browns Mills, New Jersey (https://www.mindat.org/user-461.html). Collection #2338L. 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.