Sphalerite on Fluorite (rare locality specimen)

Item Description

Sphalerite specimens from the Annabel Lee Mine are quite rare, and it's even harder to find them on purple Fluorite like this specimen. This beautiful cabinet sized piece hosts a coverage of sharp, well-formed, rather lustrous, deep reddish-brown "ruby jack" Sphalerite crystals measuring up to about 6 mm across, which are sitting on cubic Fluorite crystals that range from a pleasing violet-purple hue on the edges to nearly colorless toward the interiors. The largest Fluorite measures 6.7 cm on edge. The Fluorites have a distinctive and eye-catching "stepped" formation to the cubes, so they have a rigid three-dimensional appeal which highlights the Sphalerites even more. When backlit, you can see the fluorites are not only quite gemmy, but the little Sphalerite crystals show deep warm colored highlights internally in areas. Some tiny Chalcopyrites are visible upon close inspection as well. No major damage, and a wonderful association specimen from Southern Illinois is the rarely seen on the market now since all the major specimen producing mines have closed.
Ex George Loud Collection No. 2621 IL.4; 2084 George (born August 16, 1942) is a well-known mineral collector from Washington, DC and South Carolina respectively, and was a patent lawyer by trade for over 50 years. He assembled one of the great mineral collections in the U.S., comprising worldwide specimens, and in later years he sold the worldwide specimens to focus on minerals of the United States, specifically locality suites with an emphasis on amazing representation of species while still maintaining fine quality. The specimens remarkably range from micros to all the way up to large cabinets in size. We recently acquired most of his impressive 9000+ piece collection, and the VAST majority of these pieces will be offered here in the auctions, as we feel that everyone deserves and equal opportunity at acquiring these important, well-documented and fine quality specimens for their collections.
See: https://mineralogicalrecord.com/biographies_labels/george-loud for more information