Titanite with Pyroxene, Fluorapatite and Pyrolusite (ex Chet Lemanski Collection)

Item Description

A cool association specimen from the Smart Mine in Ontario Canada featuring sharp, well-formed, good sized, dark brown "wedge"-shaped crystals of Titanite measuring up to 2.7 cm across, sitting on dark greenish-brown colored Pyroxene crystal matrix, associated with massive brick red colored Fluorapatite and minor mammillary black Pyrolusite. Minor roughness can be seen in some areas, but it's still a showy and three-dimensional example of these well-known specimens from Renfrew County. Keep in mind that it's not common to find the Titanite crystals on matrix from this locality, so this piece is certainly an uncommon example for what it is. From the collection of Chester ("Chet") S. Lemanski Jr. of Browns Mills, New Jersey (https://www.mindat.org/user-461.html). Collection #3637CL. 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.