Tourmaline (classic multi-color crystals) (156.20 grams) (ex Ed Ruggeiro and Michael Garced Collections)

Item Description

A true classic and highly desirable specimen from the world famous Tourmaline Queen Mine in San Diego County. This beautiful full miniature sized specimen features a pair of stout, thick, lustrous, gemmy prisms of Tourmaline which show a range of colors starting with a colorless "Achroite" hue in the lightly frosted basal terminations, that transitions into a soft greenish-blue color and gives way to a rich vivid reddish-pink "Rubellite" shade throughout the rest of the crystals. The piece is complete all the way around, though it has a bit of interrupted growth on the back. It's in superb condition as I can only a couple TINY imperfections on the termination, and the only real "damage" is on the base where it was removed from the pocket wall. The piece glows with color when backlit, and displays beautifully. It's what you could call a "semi"-blue cap specimen, as the blue color is light, but it's there. It's still a blue cap Tourmaline from the Queen Mine, and highly desirable on the market today. For anybody who collects worldwide Tourmalines, San Diego County specimens or pieces specifically from the Queen Mine. From the worldwide mineral collection of Michael Garced with a 3x5 index card label from the Ed Ruggiero Collection stating that the piece was self-collected by Ed on New Year's Eve 1975 while visiting Bill Larson. These sepcimens are highly valued in today's market, and I could see this one in the $5,000 range. Specimen weight is 156.20 grams. The piece comes with a free custom lucite display base as well.