Tourmaline (multi-color crystal)

Item Description

The historic Himalaya Mine in San Diego County, California is one of the most famous Tourmaline localities in the United States and honestly in North America. This important specimen-producing mine has given collectors some of the most iconic, eye-catching and colorful Tourmaline specimens in the world. This specimen is a beautiful, sharp, lustrous, gemmy, attractive multi-color crystal featuring a combination of pastel pink, greenish and "tea" colors which are best seen when backlit, and rotated in the light. Other than the base of the crystal where it detached from the pocket wall, there is no real damage I can see. A classic miniature-sized representative gem crystal from this historic locality with atypical coloring for the locality. Specimen weight is 66.7 grams.
This piece comes from the personal collection of Colorado mining legend, Dave Bergman, the maternal grandfather of Brian Kosnar. Dave is now retired from mining, but he worked for decades in various mines underground in Colorado, as a miner, mechanic, engineer, shift boss and foreman. His biggest claim to fame is that he was the foreman and the primary person in charge of mining and specimen recovery at the Sweet Home Mine in Colorado in the 1970s alongside his son-in-law, Rich Kosnar. This project what was the FIRST ever operation for specimen recovery at this historic locality. A full-page photograph of Dave can be seen mining underground at the Sweet Home in on page 58 of Peter Bancroft's book "Gem and Crystal Treasures".