Manganese Dendrite (ex Willard Wulff Collection)

Item Description

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 comes with a typed label from Wulff on one of his famous 3x5 index cards that states it was purchased from Carol Amshoff in Tucson, Arizona. A well-preserved example of beautiful manganese dendrites in Solnhofen Limestone (Jurassic) rock. This is actually what's referred to as a pseudo-fossil, as it's inorganic, and not a true fossil. The mineral that forms these dendrites is typically Hollandite, Coronadite or Cryptomelane. It not possible to determine the species based upon the shape of the dendrites alone.