Wulfenite (classic material)

Item Description

The famous Red Cloud Mine is unquestionably one of the premier localities for Wulfenite in the world. The finest crystals from this locality have an intense red-orange hue, and sometimes formed in larger-than-average crystals for the species. Throw in the fact that they can feature excellent gemminess, and you have something rare and special. Superb specimens date back close to a century ago, which were mined by the legendary Ed Over, who was one of the great US field collectors in the first half of the 20th Century. Ed made what is the most significant discovery of Wulfenite at the Red Cloud in 1938, producing some of the largest, and most vividly colored Wulfenite crystals from the locality (see https://www.mindat.org/photo-855887.html). This piece is a great example of these amazing crystals featuring a group of sharp, lustrous, strong orange colored, tabular blades measuring 1.6 cm, sitting aesthetically on matrix. With a good amount of lighting, you can see that the crystals are actually GEMMY in areas(!). There are some broken crystals, the piece is not completely pristine, but it's incredibly rare to find specimens with zero damage from this mine due to the nature of the material. Still a fine quality and highly displayable small cabinet sized piece of these renowned Wulfenites.
Formerly in the collection of Robert C. Lambert.
Valued $3,000-$3,500.
Ex George Loud Collection No. 48.1.4.1 AZ.27; 8628. 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