Tourmaline (rare locality specimen - rare purple color)

Item Description

A hard to find specimen of Tourmaline from the lesser-known Blue Lady Mine in San Diego County, California. At first, this lustrous, trigonal crystal might appear black, but with strong backlighting, you can see unusual and rare silvery-purple hues along the edges, capped off by a lovely blue termination. The crystal does pass light, but it's pretty dark, so keep that in mind when bidding. Still, it's a rare hue from a rare locality, so if you collect pegmatite minerals, San Diego County minerals or Tourmaline. don't miss out on this one, as you probably won't see much from this mine for sale, as it is currently located on property managed by San Diego State University, and collecting is not allowed. For reference, the label accompanying this specimen says it was collected in 1983. Specimen weight is 5.63 grams
From the collection of Robert (Bob) Reynolds who passed in August of 2020. Bob was a well-known fossil and mineral expert and former Curator of Earth Sciences at the San Bernardino County Museum in California. The rare phyllomanganate-chromate species Reynoldsite was named in his honor in 2011.