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It wasn't necessarily that we chose the specimens.
I mean, a lot of these have been in the collection
for many decades.
And they were almost certainly donated.
So we probably received collections
from the mine owners or just from collectors
who had a lot of material, and we took everything.
Now we would have to be very picky.
We would-- obviously, these drawers are full,
so we may actually say no if somebody wanted
to give us more tourmaline comparable to this.
I don't know, we-- I don't know that we would or not,
it would depend.
But again, we just don't necessarily
need any more of this particular mineral
from this particular locality.
We're always on the lookout for localities
that we don't have in the collection.
We'll take anything from a locality
if we don't already have anything
from there, and rare minerals, of course.
So again, we don't necessarily need twenty crystals of quartz
from this mine, for example.
Something like this.
Single crystal with no association.
It's just a little bit less interesting to geologists.
But, very, very interesting to collectors.
This collection is essentially like a library.
That's what I tell kids who visit,
is it's a library of rocks.
And we actually do loan them out.
The users are mostly geologists with particular research
projects.
Those are usually focused on certain areas.
So they'll want to know, what do you have from this locality?
We also get some requests from material science and engineers.
People that work in ceramics and metallurgy,
those types of fields, who sometimes
want very unusual rare minerals that maybe they're
working with synthetics, analogs,
and they want to see the natural specimen.
So we get some requests for really rare material
from engineers.
And also, of course, mineralogists,
who are describing new minerals, sometimes
will realize that a specimen may have
been misdescribed many years ago.
So they'll start scouring museum collections looking
for examples of that.
And again, that type of thing we usually find in
our micromount and thumbnail collection,
just 'cause that's where we have the most
of the rare material, small pieces.
We don't send material to individuals.
That's a museum policy.
So if you're at a research institution,
you can just make a request, and as long
as we have enough of the material, then
we will chop off a piece and send it to you,
or-- that's actually more common than loaning an entire rock.
Usually people want a certain amount-- 10 grams of this.
And all I need to do is break off a piece,
and then they can just have it.
So we don't charge, we just mail it to you.
Often something like this, yes, it would be.
But off of something like this, no.
I just need a hammer.
So it depends.
And again, if they only want a single crystal of something
very rare, then it's just a matter of tiny tweezers,
break a little bit off.
This again, like examples with interesting
very sharp zoning, different termination.
Every time a specimen is added to the collection,
it obviously gets a catalog number,
which is glued onto the mineral.
And then it's also kept in box with a label.
So in theory, if there's an earthquake and all of this
goes flying, we would easily be able to replace the specimen
with the correct label.
It has measurements, usually weight for gems, but not
for all mineral specimens.
So, yeah, if I were to chop off--
I wouldn't-- but if I make a piece smaller,
then I can just update the measurements in the database
just to indicate.
And again, that was in case if somehow the label came off,
the little number came off, everything gets messed up,
we also have measurements.
And eventually we will have photographs of every specimen.
We keep as much information as we
have on the specimen in our database.
So we have size, history of ownership, obviously,
the donor-- the transaction history--
whether it was a purchase or a donation.
We'll even record the color in a mineral
where color is significant.
We would record any type of features of the minerals,
such as habit.
We would record if it was a twin.
We just try to describe it as accurately as possible.
We also keep track of history of the locality,
and whether the specimen has been published,
either in a research paper or in a popular article
as best we can.