Resize Text: Arizona contains a wealth of metal and mineral resources and experienced a geologic history that produced many natural environments that concentrated metals and other chemical compounds into aesthetically pleasing shapes and colors—or stated more simply, the mineral specimens featured in this article. Connoisseurs of beautiful or scientifically interesting minerals owe much to the mining industry that extracted these resources for commercial uses. Many of the specimens we admire in museums and private collections were collected in underground mines (fig. 1) or open-pit surface mines (fig. 2), either during or after their economic lives. I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge also the important role of those individuals with a keen eye for the unusual, the beautiful, and the marketable who collected and preserved these natural treasures.
Dr. Ken Bladh, a professor of geology at Wittenberg University, Springfield, Ohio, is coauthor of the five-volume Handbook of Mineralogy and currently serves as primary editor of the Mineralogical Society of America online Handbook of Mineralogy. Professor Bladh holds two advanced degrees in geology from the University of Arizona and collected personally at many of the classic localities described in this and his previous article (Rocks & Minerals 1981) on Arizona minerals.
Become a Subscriber
