Galena (cuboctahedrons) (ex Chet Lemanski Collection)

Item Description

A showy and three-dimensional group of sharp, well-formed, metallic, steel-grey colored cuboctahedral crystals of Galena measuring up to 1.1 cm associated with white rhombic Dolomite and minor golden metallic Chalcopyrite. The piece is in excellent shape, with very little damage. You don't see octahedral Galena from many world localities, and the material from Missouri is some of the best from the Western Hemisphere. For reference, this piece was only labeled as coming from Iron County, and we don't know specifically from which mine it was found. From the collection of Chester ("Chet") S. Lemanski Jr. of Browns Mills, New Jersey (https://www.mindat.org/user-461.html). Collection #20571CL. Chet was born 1947 in started collecting minerals circa 1957. He worked briefly as a drill runner at the famous Sterling Mine, in Ogdensburg, New Jersey and from 1987 to 1990 he helped convert the mine into a public access mining museum. He has held the role of treasurer, vice president and president of the Franklin-Ogdensburg Mineralogical Society (FOMS), and has been a board member and vice president of the Franklin Mineral Museum. The rare copper arsenate, Lemanskiite was named in his honor in 1999.