Description

From the historic Phoenixville District, this specimen features crystallized sphalerite with quartz crystals perched on it. The sphalerite crystals are partial, with parallel stepped faces – these are sharp and lustrous. The Phoenixville District mines were worked in the 1850s and 1860s (partly driven in the 1860s by demand for lead for the Civil War), and again from 1917 to 1920. Crystallized sphalerite from these old mines is not often seen – this is a rare locality piece from the John S. White Pennsylvania Collection.