Frank and Wendy Melanson are long-time members of the mineral communtiy. They were Canada’s prolific dealers in international minerals, under the dealership name Hawthorneden, for over 40 years – travelling the globe for minerals, and setting up at shows across North America and abroad. From extensive in-country travels, Frank brought back superb specimens that their business placed into museums and collections worldwide.

I’ve added great new specimens to the website in this Mexico Update. The update includes several mineral species for which Mexico is famous, including adamite, austinite, wulfenite, danburite and datolite.

I am excited to tell you that the Pete Richards collection is here! Over his lifetime, Pete has built a remarkable large mineral collection with great diversity and great specimens. This first of many Pete Richards collection updates to come features excellent U.S. specimens.

I’ve posted some beautiful new specimens in this Morocco Update, includingazurite from Kerrochen and Bou Beker, vanadinite from Taouz, pyrite-coated fluorite from El Hammam, purple fluorite from Tounfit, twinned cerussite from Mibladen and quartz on siderite from Gourrama.

Excellent new specimens from Mont Saint-Hilaire. The specimens in this update are from finds 1988-2007. This selection of specimens represents several different unique finds, including beautiful serandites, terminated elpidite crystals, twinned rhodochrosite, sodalite var. hackmanite, narsarsukite, leucophanite, analcime and more.

This China Update – April 2014 features excellent new chalcopyrite/siderite and tennantite specimens from the Kaiwu Mine (the tennantites have been confirmed by analysis). The update also includes amazing highly distinctive new calcites from Chenzhou Prefecture, Hunan Province (including some unique mushroom-shaped ones). I’ve also included a few other excellent quality calcite specimens from Shimen, […]

Each year when “Tucson” nears, I’m like a kid who can’t wait to race downstairs on Christmas morning. Just the chance to experience the sprawling mineral shows all over the city (known collectively in Mineral World simply as “Tucson”)… there is so much to see! This is a brief blog post about a few finds from Tucson 2014.