Carnegie Museum of Natural History
One of the Four Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh
This necklace made of sardonyx, a type of cryptocrystalline quartz, is on display in Wertz Gallery of Gems and Jewelry.
Quartz has unlimited variations in color and form, making it valuable to human culture since ancient times in everything from jewelry, to arrowheads, to metalworking.
(photo by Debra Wilson)
Check out the intricate and beautiful patterns in this moss agate found in India.
It may look like it would make a great case for your iPhone in this picture, but it’s much smaller, only about two inches, in real life! Come see it for yourself at Carnegie Museum of Natural History!
(photo by Debra Wilson)
Various specimens of ocean jasper are displayed in Carnegie Museum of Natural History’s galleries including this necklace and sphere from Madagascar.
The orbs and spheres seen on these two pieces are typical of ocean jasper.
Would you wear an ocean jasper necklace? Display that orb on your shelf?
(photos by Debra Wilson)
You can probably guess where this “grape” agate gets its name. It is now on display at Carnegie Museum of Natural History.
(Photo by Debra Wilson)
After 25 years at Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Curator of Collections for the Section of Minerals, Marc Wilson, retired in August 2017. Marc began managing the museum’s impressive mineral and gem collection in 1992 and greatly improved the collection and exhibition halls during his tenure.
In 2007 Hillman Hall of Minerals and Gems was renovated and expanded with the addition of Wertz Gallery: Gems and Jewelry. He received the Friends of Mineralogy Award of Merit and was recognized as EFMLS Honoree for the 2001 AFMS Scholarship Award. He was inducted into the National Rockhound and Lapidary Hall of Fame in 2001 and served as a consulting editor for Rocks & Minerals since 1998. Collection Assistant Debra Wilson will now serve as Collection Manager for the Section of Minerals at Carnegie Museum.
Congrats to both Marc and Deb!
These poppies are not going to put anyone to sleep.
Poppy jasper is a vibrant, reddish variation of brecciate jasper. This piece is on display in Wertz Gallery of Gems and Jewelry.
When quartz is impure and opaque, it is called jasper.
