Pyrite (rare locality specimen) (ex Gary Weaver Collection)

Item Description

A full-sized miniature display specimen from the famous Alice Glory Hole (Alice Mine) above Central City (and Idaho Springs), Colorado. The locality is most often associated with Central City, which is in Gilpin County, but it lies just west over the border into Clear Creek County. The entire locale has been reclaimed, and you won't find much left outside of the western wall if you visit there today. This locality sits at over 10,000 feet in elevation, and it's best known to mineral collectors for producing some of the finest Chalcopyrite specimens from Colorado, exhibiting some of the finest twins for the species extant. This piece is actually more difficult to find on the market in my mind, as it's only one of a handful of good crystallized Pyrites I've seen from the Alice Mine. The piece features a fine quality, very sharp, highly lustrous, robust, cubic crystal of bright, golden, metallic Pyrite measuring 2.2 cm surrounded by thin, prismatic, GEM quality, colorless Quartz crystals and minor golden-brown compressed rhombohedra of Siderite on host rock matrix. A smaller secondary Pyrite cube can be seen beneath the main crystal for a nice touch. There is a bit of roughness, so the piece is not 100% damage free, but take my word for it, it's one of the best Pyrites I've ever seen from the locale in terms of quality, aesthetics and the fact that it has that wonderful Quartz association. From the collection of Gary Weaver (1944-2019), an electrical engineer who worked for Hughes Aircraft in California. After retiring to Prescott, Arizona in the early 2000s, Gary rekindled his childhood love of minerals, amassing a collection of roughly 2000 specimens, focusing on localities in which he and his wife had lived or visited (Mexico, Peru and the western / southwestern United States). You can read Gary's obituary here https://www.dcourier.com/news/2019/apr/27/obituary-gary-richard-weaver/