Spessartine on Muscovite (rare old locale) (ex Chet Lemanski Collection)

Item Description

This is the first and only specimen of this very hard to find material that we've had to offer in the auctions. This small cabinet specimen features many sharp, lustrous, translucent, deep orange-red colored crystals of Spessartine featuring both trapezohedral and dodecahedral habits measuring up to 6 mm sitting atop a crystal group of silvery-bronze colored, semi-metallic Muscovite. The Muscovite group has an odd sphenoidal shape, with a thick blocky base, that tapers into a steep pyramid at the top. It's essentially a group of crystals are intergrown to create the unusual shape, but you don't see it very often in Muscovite. The specimen sits beautifully on its own without the aid of a base or clay. I've never seen one of these before, and it's really unusual from the standpoint of the style and habit of the Muscovite. If you collect worldwide Garnets, do not miss out on this attractive specimen from a locality that you never see offered on the market. The hand-written label attacehd to the underside of the specimen states that it was collected in 1967. It's almost impossible to put a value on a piece like this, because we've never had one before, and it's hard to compare other Garnet / Muscovite specimens from worldwide localities, because this one is so much more unusual and unique. From the collection of Chester ("Chet") S. Lemanski Jr. of Browns Mills, New Jersey (https://www.mindat.org/user-461.html). Collection #22645CL. 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.