Utah Fine Mineral & Fossil Museum

We invite you to enjoy our Utah Fine Mineral and Fossil Display both in-store and online.

With over 500 specimens, ours is one of the most extensive, finely curated, Utah collections on display to the public. Meet Rick Dalrymple, our mineral curator, in-store. He has collected minerals personally for 35+ years, has professional museum curating experience, and is recognized by insurance and other industries as an expert mineral appraiser.

Azurite

Azurite is copper carbonate, like limestone is calcium carbonate. This means, like limestone, it will fizz (effervesce) when exposed to hydrochloric acid.

Azurite is also one of the chief ores of copper. It almost always forms with malachite and is often replaced by malachite (pseudomorphed). This is caused by ground water reacting with other copper and the azurite. The combination of the two is very aesthetic.

Fine azurite crystals to 4 inches are known from Tsumeb, South Africa and Morocco. The U.S. has many azurites. Bisbee is famous for the “cave”. In the mid-1870’s, a mineral collector and mining consultant named William Nevin was working in Bisbee. The mine opened a “cave” of azurite and malachite 150 feet long and 50 wide and tall. Nevin described the scene as beyond beautiful. Flows of azurite and malachite that seemed to glow when lit from the back. The azurite and malachite drapery was banded with alternating layers azurite and malachite.

The description can only be imagined as it was not documented except by his description. Being a mineral dealer he removed hundreds of crates weighing tons and shipped them to New York to be sold. The rest, and majority, of the cave was smeltered for the copper! What a crime.

Azurite can form in concretions (rounded balls) known as blue berries. Utah is famous for the azurite blueberries.

Variscite, with its brilliant emerald green, is an American icon amongst mineral collectors, and the most prized specimens in the world are found in Utah.

Variscite is an aluminum phosphate, making it a cousin to turquoise. The difference is that variscite lacks copper. It was once used as a cheap turquoise knock off but now it is priced much higher than turquoise. It forms near the surface by phosphoric water percolating through aluminum bearing rocks. When the water has dissolved some of the aluminum, it will deposit variscite in cracks in the rock below the aluminum deposit.

Gem variscite is found at four locations in Utah and each is distinct in appearance. The four locations are Ametrice Hill in Tooele County; Clay Canyon in Juab County; Lucin in Box Elder County; and Snowville in Box Elder County.

Clay Canyon the most famous location in the world. It produced nodules up to three feet in diameter. The colors from this location vary from a limey opaque green to a rich translucent emerald green as clear as glass.

There are a number of rare minerals associated with variscite. At Clay Canyon the variscite was found with crandallite, millisite & wardite, gordonite, millisite, montgomeryite, and englishite as well as others.

All the locations for variscite in Utah are now closed so specimens and rough are not being produced any longer.

Red beryl is one of America’s great icon gemstones. Gem material is only found in one seam deposit in the west desert of Utah. This striking gemstone is not only beautiful but extremely rare. The mine in no longer in production and there is little chance of it starting up again. The deposit now sits buried under rubble. Red beryl is prized by mineral collectors for its showy crystals as well as jewelers and gemstone collectors for its vivid color as a gemstone.

Beryl is a family of minerals including aquamarine, emeralds, goshenite, heliodor, pezzatolite, and morganite.

Each is different in that they form in different types of environments and have different trace elements that make them different colors, but they share the same basic chemical composition and crystal structure.

Red beryl formed when Rhyolite lava erupted about 300 million years ago. As the lava began to cool, shrinkage cracks formed, creating escape routes for the gases rich in beryllium to escape. Surface water rich in silica, alkali feldspar, iron, and manganese worked its way through the cracks and mixed with the beryllium gas to form the red beryl crystals. The crystals formed on the hot side of the gas mix where the temperature ranged between 300° and 650° Celsius. Trace amounts of manganese trapped within the crystal structure causes the variety of pinks and reds of the beryl.