Rutile (rare Italian locality)

Item Description

This is to the best of my knowledge, the first specimen of Rutile we've ever had to offer from Biella which lies in the Italian Piedmont. This piece features a very impressive crystal with prismatic tetragonal form and a beautiful pyramidal termination measuring 2.0 cm long, sitting on grainy Smoky Quartz matrix. The Rutile has a deep silvery-grey metallic quality on the surface, but if you flip it over, you can see some dark red tones on the underside of the crystal where it detached from the pocket wall. You don't expect such robust and frankly large crystals from any Alpine locality, and this piece is certainly better than most I could find online for comparison. A really cool and interesting locality piece that you're not likely to find anywhere else for sale.
From the collection of Chester ("Chet") S. Lemanski Jr. of Browns Mills, New Jersey (https://www.mindat.org/user-461.html). Collection #9380CL, and the catalogue entry for the piece states that it was exported from China and imported into the United States by The Rocksmiths, and was purchased by Chet on February 8, 2001 (TGMS Show). 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.