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A fantastic calcite specimen from Minnesota's Lake Superior region. Weathered out of the cliffs, beaten by waves that throw 6-12 inch stones around each winter, somehow these gemmy hexagonal prism crystals survived intact! Flat terminations are opaque and white.

Specimen size (cm): 24 X 28 X 13
Largest crystal size (cm): 5.5 X 4.5 X 2.7

ex- Roland Quinn Collection

Picher district, Oklahoma. A classic specimen from mines closed 30 years ago, I was fortunate enough to acquire this through the kindness of Roland Quinn.

Specimen size: 29 X 31 cm

Calcite crystals are 5 - 10 cm, all over the front. Just peeking over from the back are Galena crystals of 3 - 4 cm.

ex- "Rocky" Quinn Collection, collected circa 1935

The last two pictures of of a group of scalenohedral crystals from the same era and district,  7 - 9 cm long.

For a look at the unfortunate results of the mining in the Picher District, click here. The beauty of specimens like this is bittersweet. The metals that were recovered have no 
doubt been used in many of our lives. The environmental damage, the elevated lead
in the blood of the people who live there....

Areas of the Picher district are described as "resembling a moonscape" by the
USGS
 
 

Dolomite Products Quarry
Walworth, New York
Ex-Paul Dudley Collection
 

The calcite is 3.5 cm end to end

You've heard of Walworth fluorite? Now here's part of the rest of the suite from the Dolomite Products Quarry, Walworth calcite and dolomite. This wonder miniature specimen was collected by Paul Dudley.

6 X 6 cm

Houdaille Quarry
Summit, New Jersey

Long since closed to collecting, this quarry produced some beautiful calcite, along with prehnite, stilbite and various zeolites. It's a lesser known classic Norther Jersey traprock locale.

A very fine, completely undamaged calcite rhomb, very clear and colorless in a vug lined with bright prehnite from the Millington, New Jersey quarry. The crystal is 1.7 cm on its long edge. This is very unusual material for New Jersey in its clarity and colorlessness.

3.7 X 2.7 X 3.0 cm

Glassy clear twinned calcite with native copper in it and extruding from the surface.
 

Phoenix Mine
Keweenaw County, Michigan

Ex-Slack Collection, Dept. Geology, Marietta College