On a visit to Minas Gerais back in June of 2002, I was fortunate enough to visit the Navegadora (Orozimbo) mine shortly after the excavation of a huge pocket containing very large crystals of quartz and microcline. The most amazing was a wonderful microcline accented by balls of cleavelandite and paired with (yes, the two pieces fit together) an equally remarkable crystal of quartz. At the time, I was told that the entire lot had been purchased by someone from Japan. Apparently, that deal fell through because later that year I was contacted by Lawrence Stoller asking whether our museum might be interested in buying some large crystals from Brazil. (Yes, those same crystals!) Needless to say, I jumped at the chance. Unfortunately, acquiring the crystals turned out to be the easy step. Finding a way to get a 6-ton (combined) mineral specimen on display has turned out to be much more complicated. I am happy to report that, 16 years after their discovery, these crystals are now on public display (temporarily) at the Los Angeles County Fair. Hopefully, in the future, we will be able to find a way to put them on permanent display. I am attaching an image of me with the two pieces taken during setup at the Fair (giant crystals.jpg), an image of me with the microcline at the mine in 2002 (microcline.jpg) and an article about the discovery by Jaroslav Hyrsl that appeared in Mineralien-Welt in 2002. Tony ______________________________________________ Anthony R. Kampf, Ph.D. Curator Emeritus, Mineral Sciences Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County 900 Exposition Blvd. , Los Angeles , CA 90007 Phone: 213-763-3328; Fax: 213-749-4107 Email: akampf@nhm.org<mailto:akampf@nhm.org> ______________________________________________

Waw great work On 6 Sep 2018 23:26, "MSA-Pegmatite Interest Group" < msa-pegmatite@minlists.org> wrote: > On a visit to Minas Gerais back in June of 2002, I was fortunate enough to > visit the Navegadora (Orozimbo) mine shortly after the excavation of a huge > pocket containing very large crystals of quartz and microcline. The most > amazing was a wonderful microcline accented by balls of cleavelandite and > paired with (yes, the two pieces fit together) an equally remarkable > crystal of quartz. At the time, I was told that the entire lot had been > purchased by someone from Japan. Apparently, that deal fell through because > later that year I was contacted by Lawrence Stoller asking whether our > museum might be interested in buying some large crystals from Brazil. (Yes, > those same crystals!) Needless to say, I jumped at the chance. > > > > Unfortunately, acquiring the crystals turned out to be the easy step. > Finding a way to get a 6-ton (combined) mineral specimen on display has > turned out to be much more complicated. I am happy to report that, 16 years > after their discovery, these crystals are now on public display > (temporarily) at the Los Angeles County Fair. Hopefully, in the future, we > will be able to find a way to put them on permanent display. > > > > I am attaching an image of me with the two pieces taken during setup at > the Fair (giant crystals.jpg), an image of me with the microcline at the > mine in 2002 (microcline.jpg) and an article about the discovery by > Jaroslav Hyrsl that appeared in Mineralien-Welt in 2002. > > > > Tony > > ______________________________________________ > > Anthony R. Kampf, Ph.D. > > Curator Emeritus, Mineral Sciences > > Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County > > 900 Exposition Blvd. , Los Angeles , CA 90007 > > Phone: 213-763-3328; Fax: 213-749-4107 > > Email: akampf@nhm.org > > ______________________________________________ > > > > _______________________________________________ > MSA-pegmatite mailing list > http://lists.minlists.org/mailman/listinfo/msa-pegmatite > > The MSA-pegmatite Listserv is an announce-only list serve. It was created > by the Pegmatite Interest Group (PIG) to send its members news. >