Schorl Tourmaline (excellent thumbnail) (ex Bill Larson Collection)

Item Description

The Columbia Mine dates back to 1872, and is the oldest gem tourmaline mine in California. It produced beautiful Tourmalines in a wide array of colors, and also produced some excellent black Schorls as well. This piece is a fantastic full sized thumbnail specimen of Schorl with fine, sharp, well-formed, lustrous faces and that classic jet black color. The prism shows wonderful striations, and the termination is beautiful with predominant trigonal pyramidal faces and small accent second order modifying faces. Excellent condition all around. A wonderful piece for any fan of historic localities, worldwide Tourmalines, minerals of Southern California or just really nice thumbnails. From the collection of Bill Larson of Fallbrook, California. Bill is a well-known gem and mineral dealer as well as a miner and collector. Bill is synonymous with minerals of San Diego County, and owned and operated famous mines such as the Stewart Lithia, the Tourmaline Queen, the Pala Chief and the Himalaya, producing some of the most iconic mineral specimens to come out of the area during the 1970s-1980s. Bill is also known as "Burma Bill" and traveled the world for decades in search of fine gems and minerals, and was directly involved in the in-person acquisition and importation of superb specimens and stones from Myanmar (Burma). You can read his biography at https://mineralogicalrecord.com/biographies_labels/larsonwilliam-f/