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Spessartine

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Pale orange lustrous opaque crystal of spessartine 0.8 cm in diameter embedded up on matrix. In good condition. A neat locality example for the species. The specimen comes with a previous label from the collection of Ray DeMark. He collected this in April, 2011.The Harding Mine in Taos County, New Mexico, is a world-famous granitic pegmatite deposit that formed about 1.3 billion years ago through slow fractional crystallization within metamorphic host rocks. Discovered in the early 20th century, the deposit became historically significant for major commercial production of strategic industrial minerals, particularly lithium, tantalum, and beryllium, extracted via surface quarries and underground workings. Today, the site is owned by the University of New Mexico and serves as a celebrated educational geologic laboratory and controlled mineral-collecting locality renowned for its exceptionally large crystal structures and zoning.