Jasper

Jasper is found throughout the world. This chalcedony is a cryptocrystalline form of silica. Jasper types of gemstones come in colors ranging from green, red, blue, orange, yellow and brown. The colors are because of impurities such as ash, clay or minerals within the stones. Iron typically creates the reddish hues, while manganese oxide is responsible for blues, and inclusions of iron oxide or the mineral goethite create the yellows.

Many times there are types of gemstones with examples of various inclusions, such as with the bloodstone jasper, where chlorite and pyroxene cause the deep green, while iron is responsible for the red speckling. Jasper’s name is based on the French word “jaspre” which came from the Latin “jaspidem” meaning “speckled stone.” This is fitting because when polished, jasper has a speckled pattern seemingly just below the surface.

Kunzite

The best-known variety of spodumene, kunzite is the pink to purple version of this important mineral that is still sometimes mined for lithium production. Kunzite boasts beautiful pink or purplish hues because of the presence of manganese, while chromium creates the greens of another variety, hiddenite.

A fascinating aspect of kunzite is its pleochroic attributes where it displays different colors, such as a combination of pink, purple and transparent, depending on which way you look through the crystal. This is a key consideration when cutting the gem. It also has phosphorescence, which allows the stone to absorb light and then release it in the dark, as with any of our favorite glow-in-the-dark items. The drawback is excessive exposure to sunlight fades its beautiful colors.

With a Mohs rating of 7, eye-catching colors, and the unique characteristics of pleochroism and phosphorescence, it’s even more intriguing to know that large crystals are possible with the best example being an 880-carat heart-shaped kunzite housed at the Smithsonian.

Lapis Lazuli

The beautiful deep blue lapis lazuli is an example of when a gemstone is not a mineral. Instead, lapis lazuli is a rock consisting of multiple minerals, including lazurite, calcite, pyrite, afghanite and several others.

To be considered true lapis lazuli, the rock has to contain at least 25 percent of the mineral lazurite that lends to the distinct blue coloration. Calcite is usually the next most prevalent mineral which often shows up as white layers or mottling. Pyrite provides the shiny gold flecks in some specimens.

Afghanistan is the hotbed of lapis lazuli. There are records of it being mined in the Badakhshan Province of the northeastern part of the country as early as 7000 B.C. The name is derived from the Arabic word “lazaward” meaning “heaven” along with the Persian term for blue, “lazhuward.” In ancient times, Egyptian women also used powdered lapis as an eye shadow. And even in the 1800s, powdered lapis was used to create ultramarine blue paint used in oil canvas paintings, such as Vincent Van Gogh’s “The Starry Night.”

Malachite

A vibrant green gemstone with distinct parallel banding, malachite is a striking specimen and its popularity for thousands of years is no surprise. Derived from the Greek word meaning “mallows,” this correlates to the deep green of malachite with the color of the mallow plant’s leaves.

The gem color is derived from the copper carbonate hydroxide minerals often found in regions near copper deposits. Because malachite is a fairly malleable oxidized copper ore, it’s possible to extract copper from it using sulfuric acid.

The Egyptians also figured out how to remove the copper by placing powdered malachite in a hot fire, which resulted in tiny spheres of copper as a by-product. They used this copper to make cookware, and razors and eventually created stronger bronze by adding arsenic or tin. They also used finely ground gemstones as a distinctive eye paint. Besides adorning the appearance of ancient Egyptians, malachite is one of the oldest known pigments and was identified in the artwork of Egyptian tombs.

Natrolite

Typically found with slender, needle-like crystals protruding from the crystal, natrolite is an eye-catching specimen. It’s difficult to imagine such a fragile-looking stone cut and polished into impressively faceted gems, although high-quality gems are truly rare. Not surprisingly, it’s sometimes called needle stone.

Natrolite leans toward a colorless appearance but can be found in white, light yellow, green, orange, pink, brown or gray. When it’s placed under either longwave or shortwave ultraviolet light, it glows in yellow, orange and sometimes pale green.

A member of the zeolite group, which are hydrated aluminosilicate minerals, the name comes from the Greek words for soda and stone, “natron” and “lithos.” It was officially named by the German chemist Martin Heinrich Klaproth in the early 1800s. Natrolite is found in regions where there are veins of basaltic rocks, along with granite and the igneous rock, gneiss.

Onyx

While onyx and agate are both types of chalcedonies and share many similarities, one way to tell them apart is to look at their banding. Agate sports curved bands and onyx has straight, parallel banding. When many people envision onyx, they think of a black gem but is often found in red, brown or yellow, which is called sardonyx. Red and white layers are usually what is referred to as carnelian onyx, while Nicolo onyx has light blue layers alternating with black.

Since ancient times, artists have created intricately carved cameos. Black onyx grew in popularity during the Victorian Era when mourning jewelry was an integral part of society. After Queen Victoria’s husband Prince Albert passed away in 1861, she and all of the British Empire descended into mourning. Besides onyx, jet, vulcanite and even black enamel were used in the adornments. Many included personal mementos, such as hair, woven into the locket or watch fob.

Peridot

Peridot is the gem variety of the common mineral olivine and one with a unique origination story. Unlike many other minerals that form on the Earth’s surface, peridots are birthed either deep within the Earth’s upper mantle where they are brought to the surface through volcanic activity, or deposited by meteorites.

Because of this relationship with volcanoes, Hawaiian legend claims that peridot symbolizes the tears of Pele, the goddess of volcanoes and fire. It is so intertwined that there are several beaches on the island of Oahu that are made up of green sand that glitters with these tiny green crystals. Its distinct coloration is because of the percentage of iron in the formation of the crystals, yet can vary to the point where the stone looks more yellow, olive or even greenish-brown.

The ancient Egyptians referred to peridots as the “gem of the sun,” and some experts surmise that Cleopatra’s famed emeralds may have actually been peridot gemstones.

Quartz

Quartz might not only be one of the most abundant minerals found on Earth, but it is also possibly one of the most useful as it is found in everything from glass to electronics, and has been critical in the mining industry. One fascinating aspect of quartz crystals is their vibrational ability.

As a piezoelectric material, quartz creates an electrical charge when it’s squeezed. As a result, it vibrates 32,768 times per second, and for nearly a century, quartz crystals have been used in watches, computers, GPS units and a remarkable number of everyday items. Found in several varieties, types of gemstones include rosy quartz, smoky quartz and amethyst, quartz is as diverse as it is beautiful. The coloration differences are often due to natural radiation reacting with specific minerals within the quartz. For instance, iron is responsible for the purple hue of amethyst while aluminum creates the gray of the smoky quartz.

Ruby

The terms “ruby” and “red” are practically synonymous, or at the very least, ruby is often used as an adjective to describe types of gemstones with a particular shade of color. Its name comes from the Latin word for red, “ruber.” Bringing the highest per-carat price of any of the colored stones in the modern market, rubies shine among the corundums, which also include sapphires. Like sapphires, they score high on the Mohs scale ranking just below a diamond.

Pure corundums are colorless, but chromium causes the striking red coloration of rubies. The deeper the color, the more chromium is present. This element also causes rubies to glow under ultraviolet light. Because of rubies’ chemical composition, the first working laser, called the ruby laser, was created in 1960 by Theodore Maiman. One of its first uses was in range-finding equipment, but the technology is used to this day as a light source for medical procedures or high-speed photography.

As this list demonstrates, types of gemstones go well beyond only beautiful objects. The myriad of important day-to-day applications for gemstones gives us a deeper appreciation of what might be considered common gems.

This story about types of gemstones by letter appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Amy Grisak.

The post Types of Gemstones by Letter (J-R) first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

January

Garnet has been the birthstone for January since the 15th century, at least. With a Mohs hardness of 6.5 to 7.5, it can be faceted into beautiful gemstones that wear well in jewelry. Since the term “garnet” actually refers to a group of nesosilicate gems, those born in this month can choose from a rainbow of colors.

The most common members are red almandine, an iron-aluminum silicate; red pyrope, a magnesium aluminum silicate; orange-yellow spessartine, a manganese aluminum silicate; the yellow or green varieties of andradite, a calcium-iron silicate; predominately green grossular, a calcium-aluminum silicate; and rare, bright-green uvarovite, a calcium chromium silicate.

February

From the 15th century to the present, amethyst has been the preferred birthstone for February. Amethyst belongs to a mineral family that can compete with garnet for diversity of color: quartz.

Pure quartz is colorless, as exemplified by Herkimer diamonds. The causes of amethyst’s shades of pale violet to rich purple are radiation and the inclusion of iron impurities and trace elements.

As a rule, amethyst crystals are short and stubby, and occur in large numbers, often filling a large vug a hollow petrified tree section, or lining the inside of a geode. Fine crystals that are large enough to produce a faceted gem of over 20 carats are rare.

March

The current choice of a birthstone for March is aquamarine. Aquamarine is a variety of beryl (Mohs 7.5-8). Its name was derived from the fact that the beautiful, transparent, blue-green coloration of the gem resembles that of seawater. It can be found in translucent to transparent crystals that form in the hexagonal system. The six-sided crystals are often striated lengthwise.

Aquamarine develops in metamorphic rocks and, more often, in pegmatites.

April

Before 1900, a person with an April birthday had two choices of birthstone: diamond or sapphire. During the 20th century, however, diamonds became the preferred stone.

Diamond, a mineral consisting of pure carbon, heads the list of all gemstones for its beauty and hardness. A 10 on the Mohs Scale of Hardness, it is resistant to scratching and is an ideal gem to set in rings. Its hardness results from the arrangement of its atoms in cubes.

All diamonds have slightly rounded faces, and they’re so smooth they feel greasy to the touch. They can be colorless and water clear to blue, pink, yellow, brown, green or black, and transparent or translucent. They shine with an adamantine luster when held to the light.

May

There were two choices for May birthstones for several hundred years: emerald and agate. The popularity of agate seems to have waned at the turn of the 20th century, so emerald is now the favorite. It’s the green member of the beryl family of gemstones. The color varies from bright green to pale green and, sometimes, darker shades of blue-green.

Fine emeralds have a velvety surface appearance and, in the better stones, an even distribution of color. One bad trait of emeralds is a tendency to have inclusions. It’s rare to find an emerald without some slight imperfection. This in no way deters from the beauty of this gemstone, though. It can also be one way of determining whether an emerald is a simulated gem or the real thing, as manmade stones have no imperfections.

June

The contemporary choices for June are pearl, moonstone and alexandrite. Of course, a pearl is the organic product of marine bivalves and not a mineral.

Moonstone is a variety of feldspar that shows adularescence, or schiller, an optical effect that produces a milky luster with a bluish tinge that appears to move across the stone when it is tilted. The phenomenon is named after the feldspar variety adularia.

Alexandrite is a color-change variety of chrysoberyl (beryllium aluminum oxide). This is a very rare and expensive gemstone. It has a hardness of 8.5, and its crystals are either tabular or prismatic. The distinction between alexandrite and chrysoberyl is simply color. A strange characteristic of alexandrite is that it is red, purple or violet when held under artificial light, but in daylight, it looks green.

July

Ruby is the standard birthstone for the month of July. It is a corundum (aluminum oxide) gem that gets its color from the presence of chromium in its structure. An exceptionally hard mineral, corundum illustrates a hardness of nine on the Mohs scale. “Pigeon-blood” red is the preferred color for rubies, though they also occur in lighter shades, including pink. All other colors of corundum are called sapphires.

Ruby exhibits all the desirable properties of a jewelry stone: beauty, durability, optical properties, and rarity. Some rubies display a star or asterism when fashioned into a cabochon. This effect is caused by the reflection of light from numerous inclusions of minute, needle-like crystals of rutile. Corundum crystallizes in the hexagonal system with a tabular-barrel-shaped habit.

August

Current birthstones for August are peridot, the gem-quality form of olivine and spinel. Olivine makes up a large portion of the earth’s mantle. Rocks containing olivine have been brought to the surface by volcanic action and actually blown out in the form of volcanic bombs. Masses of olivine have been found in meteorites, and the Apollo astronauts brought basaltic rocks back from the moon that contained olivine.

A popular jewelry stone, peridot has a hardness of 6.5-7 and can be transparent or translucent, with a vitreous luster. Its color shades from deep green to apple green, yellow-green or olive. It’s most often found in granular nodules, forming short, prismatic crystals in the orthorhombic system.

Spinel is the gem-quality member of the larger spinel group. Its hardness (Mohs 7.5-8.0) makes it ideal for jewelry use. Its spectrum of colors includes red, pink, purple, blue and lavender. In times past, red spinel was often mistaken for ruby. A notable example is the Black Prince’s Ruby, set in the royal crown of England.

September

The birthstone for September is sapphire. This term refers to any corundum (aluminum oxide) gem that has any color other than red (ruby). Sapphires may be colorless, blue, green, yellow, orange, brown, pink, purple, gray, black, or multicolor. At Mohs 9, its hardness is second only to that of a diamond.

Heat treatment is sometimes used to give natural blue sapphires a deeper, more pleasing color. Natural star sapphires, which display the optical phenomenon of asterism, are very rare.

October

Two options for October are opal and tourmaline. Opal is a magnificent gemstone with a play of color or “fire” in all colors of the spectrum. Spaces between the tiny spherules of silica that make up the gem diffract light into its spectral colors. Red, yellow, green and blue, in strong to pastel shades, flash from the stone when it is tilted.

Opal occurs in common and precious types. Common opal does not display any reflective fire. It may have a honey-yellow, brown, gray or colorless body color that is milky and opaque. Opal (Mohs 5-6) is not a very hard gemstone.

Tourmaline, a silicate of boron, has a complicated chemical composition, in which a number of elements, including calcium, iron, sodium and aluminum, may combine. It has a Mohs hardness of 7-7.5.

It belongs to the trigonal crystal system and its habit is hemimorphic (a crystal having two ends of an axes unlike in its planes).

Because of the coloration of the individual stones, tourmaline has several names, including schorl (black), rubellite (red), indicolite (blue), and dravite (brown). Tricolor crystals are common. The popular watermelon variety has an outer layer of green around a red core.

November

The current birthstones for November are topaz and citrine. People tend to think of topaz, a silicate mineral with aluminum and fluorine, as a yellow stone, but heat-treating and color-enhancing adaptations have made blue the predominant color on the market. It is an allochromatic mineral, which means its color is caused by internal defects in the crystal and has a Mohs hardness of eight.

Citrine is the golden member of the quartz family (silicon dioxide). Though quartz in its many forms is one of the most abundant minerals on earth, fine, gem-grade crystals are not that common. Citrine is affordable and, when faceted, rivals more expensive gemstones in beauty.

December

There are three birthstones for December: turquoise, blue zircon and tanzanite. Turquoise (hydrated copper aluminum phosphate) is an opaque, blue-to-green, massive gem material. It has a relatively low hardness of Mohs 5-6, so care must be taken with turquoise jewelry.

The rarest and most valuable variety is robin’s-egg blue with black “spiderweb” veins of limonite. Fake turquoise, consisting of dyed howlite or magnesite, is common. Buyer beware.

Zircon (zirconium silicate) can be blue, black, red, brown, green, yellow, smoky, or water-clear. It has an adamantine luster much like that of a diamond, and it is often misidentified as such.

Tanzanite, the blue/purple variety of zoisite (basic calcium aluminum silicate), is a recently introduced alternative for December. Tanzanite crystals in shades of yellow to brown, green, pink, gray or blue are often heat-treated to produce a gemstone that is a beautiful and permanent blue.

This story about what are birthstones by month previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe! Story by Kenneth H. Rohn.

The post What are the Birthstones by Month? first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

It is hard to believe zoisite is a massive mineral that makes lovely Christmas gems, appears in a cartoon, and is also one of the world’s more valuable gems.

I first encountered zoisite in the 1950s when I was already actively attending club meetings and visiting mineral shops. Later, for over two decades, I drove across the country each summer to work on my dad’s farm. Since I was able to stop at countless rock shops during these travels, I became well aware of a remarkable green and red lapidary rock in significant quantities. In those early days, it was described as a recent find from Africa and was immediately popular with lapidary artists and collectors, alike.

Discovering Zoisite

The massive green mineral was crystalline zoisite, which was slightly sugary looking. Locked in the green stone were hexagonal deep red crystals of ruby, which contrasted with the green host rock. The ruby crystals varied in size and were opaque to translucent in perfect hexagonal form.

The ruby crystal terminations were as much as four inches across. In some of the larger pieces, the exposed termination end of the ruby was slightly translucent, so when domed and polished, the stone showed a lovely chatoyant shimmer. There were no free-standing ruby crystals, but the lovely combination of red ruby and green zoisite in a single rock was attractive to lapidary artists, who soon recognized the red-green combination as an ideal Christmas theme.

A third mineral in the red-green rock was small black spots and crystalline rods, scattered throughout the green zoisite in stark contrast to the red and green colors. In the early days, the black mineral was initially labeled hornblende. Though I did not do lapidary work, I was curious enough to learn about the zoisite-ruby combination.

The discovery of zoisite-ruby rock happened in 1949 when an English prospector named Tom Blevins worked in Tanzania. While prospecting, he came across a deposit of large opaque ruby crystals. He immediately staked claims — in hopes he could make a fortune if some of the rubies proved to be gemmy and could be cut. However, luck was not on his side.

The zoisite deposit was part of a substantial regional metamorphic area composed mainly of schists and marble formations. Mining commenced on the deposit in hopes deeper mining would reveal gem crystals. That did not happen.

Fruitful Mining

However, mining of the deposit did prove fruitful — with the discovery of the red-green gemstone combination in 1954. Soon after the discovery, the material was marketed as excellent cutting rough. Before Blevins’ discovery, the local Maasai tribe was aware of the deposit and called it anyoli, which means “green stone.” Even now, you may come across that name on an older specimen of zoisite-ruby rock. Today, some 70 years after its discovery, the Tanganyika’s ruby-zoisite deposit is still the only major source for this lovely carving material. Kenya has produced some but in limited amounts.

As time has passed, not only has the name of the country where the zoisite-ruby combination was found changed, so too has the name of the black mineral often found in tandem with the green-red beauty.

Tanganyika, like so many African countries, was under colonial rule in the early 19th century. When Europeans took over the governing of Africa, the zoisite region of Tanganyika came under the control of the Germans as part of German East Africa. This rule lasted until Germany’s defeat during World War I — when the British took control and managed the area — until World War II came to an end. After that war, control of the region brought another name change when placed in the United Nations’ hands as a trust. Then, in 1964, the area that had been Tanganyika was merged with Zanzibar and became the United Republic of Tanganyika and Zanzibar. Later, the Zanzibar name was dropped. Today the primary zoisite-ruby source is the United Republic of Tanganyika.

Unique Presentation

While doing research for this article, I came across some surprising and, what I thought, quite fascinating non-mineral information involving mineral names used in odd ways. To rockhounds and scientists, zoisite is a mineral. In a popular Japanese cartoon adventure, which launched in the early 1990s, zoisite is also the name of a cartoon character. On the program, zoisite is joined by several other characters with mineral names. Broadcast worldwide, the Japanese anime series is called “Sailor Moon,” which is also the zoisite heroine’s name.

The storyline of the series is the usual battle between good and evil throughout the

universe. In their fight for good, the leading characters (a group called Shitennov) begin as the Heavenly Zoisite, Jadeite, Kunzite, and Nephrite. Their main charge or responsibility, to guard Prince Endymion. However, in the process, the group members themselves transform into evil characters at times due to charges of negative energy from the Dark Side — and they end up becoming servants of Queen Beryl.

Other mineral names like hematite and silver crystal also crop up as characters. The anime television series was popular on a global level, earning millions of dollars. You can catch an episode in multiple places online — type in the name Sailor Moon. It is all quite fanciful and has absolutely nothing to do with minerals, but it is fun to see mineral names used in this creative way.

Be that as it may, beyond Japanese anime, zoisite occurs in many localities and has been found in various forms. When found crystallized, it can exhibit multiple colors. Zoisite is much more well-known for its lapidary uses in various massive carved material forms. It can be colorless, yellow, green, green, green-brown, pink, blue, and purple in both massive and crystallized form. The pink color is best known in massive form and is called thulite, and I’ll discuss more later in this article. Lapidary artists are more familiar with African green and pink material.

The crystal variety thus most valuable and exciting is seldom thought of as zoisite. It has striking colors for a type of zoisite, presenting as blue to violet in color. The mineral is known as tanzanite, a name for the country where tanzanite is found.

Tanzanite occurs in a metamorphic deposit in the Merelani Hills, near Arusha, which is in sight of Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest mountain — where tanzanite was found in 1967. Once found, it was brought to the U.S. by geologist Campbell R. Bridges, who later discovered the superb green garnet tsavorite.

History of Appeal

The new gem tanzanite, named by Tiffany & Co., took the gem world by storm. Crystals were found just over 50 years ago by a local prospector, and Bridges brought some of the first crystals to Tiffany’s in New York. The company immediately introduced the gem as something new and exceptional. Since that time, tanzanite has become one of the top gems in the marketplace for quality, beauty, and value. It rivals most rubies and sapphires and other gems. Only diamonds, which are far more common than tanzanite, can cost more due to a controlled market. Diamonds are nowhere near as beautiful as tanzanite, in my humble opinion. Only the rare and unusual blue sapphires and deep blood red rubies command higher prices than tanzanite.

The initial tanzanite crystals showed the lovely blue to the violet color we all recognize. As mining continued at depth, fewer blue crystals were found and the crystals being mined had to be heat treated to remove an unwanted brownish hue. The treatment is permanent and brings out the classic blue color.

What I find most interesting is tanzanite’s natural trichroism, three different colors in the same natural crystal. Look at a natural crystal through its main prism face and you’ll see one color. Turn it 90 degrees and you’ll see the second color. Look down the crystal’s vertical axis to see the third color: violet, blue and red, respectively. Note each of the three colors I referred to is permanent in a natural crystal. Just about all tanzanite mined today has to be heat-treated, but the result is the gorgeous blue-violet desired color. This treatment disturbs the trichroism, but the result is a permanent blue to violet hue. Look back at the October 2019 issue of Rock & Gem to enjoy a more detailed article, which I wrote, about tanzanite.

Gem collectors seldom realize their lovely blue tanzanite gem or crystal is related to the red-green ruby zoisite rock. There is also another massive variety of zoisite we seldom hear much about today, which is thulite. Thulite is sometimes called rosaline for its pink color. Its site locality is an island off Norway.

Thulite has also been found in Austria, in small crystals. But the initial find was a material sought after by lapidary artists, a translucent pink solid rock suitable for carving and cabochons. It was found in Sauland, off Norway, in 1820 and named after Thule, the Island of Lore and Stories. Pink thulite is a popular material for cabochons, although it does need to be protected when mounted, as it has a hardness between two and three on the Moh’s scale. It is compact, slightly granular, and is usually spotted white by included calcite, and the shades of pink are undoubtedly due to manganese substituting for calcium.

As I remarked at the beginning of this article, ruby-zoisite material provides carvers and lapidary artists with opportunities to create spectacular Christmastime art. The only problem with ruby-zoisite is the random occurring of spots and needles of the black mineral hornblende, and slight undercutting has to be compensated.

Call the red and green rock what you wish — the lovely contrasting red and green colors in the material given to us by nature is very well suited for the holiday season and creating stunning and memorable gifts.

The post Zoisite: A Massive Mineral Marked by Holiday Color and Appeal first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Story by Warren L. Hollar

Passion is an important part of maintaining a productive life at any age. How can one reach the age of 90: good genes, good eating habits, good activity, and good social engagement?

Richard V. Sipe, at age 90, enjoys many of those things, but says his passion for carving corundum is a major force in giving a sense of meaning and purpose to his life.

Richard’s passion is not just gemstone carving. He has chosen to work with one of the most difficult gem media—corundum—and he only wants to sculpt the largest ones. His life’s work has been punctuated by three large pieces of corundum.

Purposeful Living

The properties of corundum provide a clearer understanding of the difficulty of undertaking his passion: It is an exceptionally hard and tough material. On the 10-point Mohs Scale of Hardness, is an index mineral for No. 9, one place below diamond. It is not only is it difficult to shape these stones, but extremely time-consuming and expensive.

Richard was born in 1927. He served in World War II, then began his career as a stonemason in 1950, after studying under an Italian stonemason in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. While working on construction sites in North Carolina, he found many interesting rock specimens, which motivated him to become a self-taught rockhound. He soon began his own construction company, which allowed him additional access to gem and mineral specimens.

During his early days of sculpting, his works included a 7-foot-tall sculpture carved out of a composite of nephrite jade that was displayed at his church. He named the sculpture “Wisdom”.

After that came “200 Years on the Road”, a 9-foot-tall nephrite jade sculpture representative of a circular road leading from the past to the future that stands in front of a 30-inch-high by 75-foot-long stone wall etched with nine scenes that reflect how U.S. historical events, such as slavery and the Civil War, impacted North Carolina history. Other scenes, such as the Tree of Life, were inspired by the Book of Revelation, in the Bible.

This sculpture took Richard 12 years to complete. It is displayed at his home in Conover, North Carolina, and was featured in the Jerry Bledsoe book North Carolina Curiosities. “200 Years on the Road” was, Richard says, the first sculpture that made him feel like an artist in stone.

Language of Stones

In an interview, Richard spoke to me about the life force he felt in each unique stone and how the stone could speak to him. Interestingly, his approach to sculpting used the stone itself as inspiration. As did Renaissance sculptors, he believed his work freed the form trapped inside the stone. Richard often grew a beard before he began work on a sculpture, and let the stone dictate the outcome as it became a work of art. His time frame for working with a single piece was not measured in days or weeks, but in years. Richard is also known for the special sculptures he has made for the Waldensians in Valdese, North Carolina, and as volunteer projects for local organizations such as the Fireman’s Museum and Sipe’s Orchard Home.

The discovery of 20 large corundum specimens at the construction site of a bowling alley in Newton, North Carolina, about 50 years ago whetted his love for sapphires and rubies.

Many smaller corundum crystals in gray, blue and yellow were also dug out of the construction site. His first exceptional sapphire, weighing 38 pounds (80,669 carats), came from the bowling alley construction. Richard sculpted it, and named the work “The Link”.

For many months, he studied the shape, veining stratification, and structural weaknesses of the sapphire. He knew that grinding with power tools and the use of diamond grit were not only expensive, but would change the shape of the piece forever. Almost two years passed before he made his first attempt at bringing the stone to life. The expense of the diamond wheels was a financial deterrent throughout the process. After the initial grinding to get out the pits and bad places, polishing the stone required 13 different steps to complete.

Carving Leads to Guinness Connection

As his work progressed, Richard needed to go beyond the

8500 diamond disk that was available at the time. Fortunately, he found a 200,000 grit film from a supplier in Georgia that allowed him to proceed with polishing the stone. After he completed polishing and sculpting the sapphire to a weight of 22 pounds, and he had it authenticated by chemical analysis and submitted an application to have it included in the Guinness Book of World Records.

The application was approved, and “The Link” was included in the 1999 edition as the largest carved sapphire. This piece is currently on display in the Catawba County Historical Museum, in Newton. The stone remained in Guinness until it was surpasses by the 27-pound, football-size “Millennium sapphire” from Madagascar, a gem carved with the likenesses of historical figures by Italian artist Alessio Boschi. The carving, considered one of the wonders of the world, is available for sale if the right buyer can come up with $180 million.

The quest for large sapphires led Richard to his second stone of note. At a gem and mineral show in Spruce Pine, North Carolina, he heard a rumor about a giant sapphire, as large as a football, located somewhere in the southeastern United States. After much searching, he found the rumored corundum in Spruce Pine, lying on a hearth next to an old woodstove.

He traded a hand-made stone table for the 63-pound sapphire, which was of Brazilian origin, and began his journey to bring out the spirit of the stone.

Evolution in Skill and Opportunity

Richard had the stone authenticated by sending samples of it to the Gemological Institute of America (GIA). Lab tests confirmed that it was a semitranslucent to opaque, variegated piece of natural corundum. He then had the rough stone photographed, made an aluminum cast of it, and had an artist paint the cast to reflect the original specimen. He then began his quest to bring the artistic features out of the “Sipe sapphire”. It took him nearly two years to get to a point at which he was satisfied. In his words, “You’re never finished with a sapphire. You are never to the point where you can’t get a better polish.”

Richard took great care when shaping the stone not to create any cracks in it. When his modifications were complete, the sculpted stone weighed 38 pounds, which exceeded the weight of the world-renowned “Millennium sapphire”. The Guinness Book of World Records confirmed the “Sipe sapphire” as the largest polished sapphire in existence in 2005.

Richard believes the giant sapphire could star if polished correctly, and that it would serve as a worthy addition to the Catawba County Historical Museum.

What could be the next quest for a man approaching 90 years of age? Always looking for the next challenge, in 2013, Richard purchased a 130-pound corundum (over 250,000 carats) from a dealer in Philadelphia. The corundum originated in Southwest India. He began the journey to creating a unique piece of art by sending a sample of the corundum to the GIA for identification. The test results showed the specimen to be a natural ruby with fuchsite. As with his other projects, he studied the ruby for months to let the rock speak to his creative talents. He also enlisted the aid of juried stone-carving artisan Earl Gray, of Glenwood, West Virginia, whose work is displayed at the prestigious arts and crafts shop Tamarack: The Best of West Virginia, in Beckley, for his most ambitious project.

Searching Beyond the Surface

As Richard began to bring out the essence of the stone, he began to note the appearance of two faces. At first, he thought about naming the piece “Ruby Two Face”, but the name just did not seem to fit. As he proceeded with sculpting and polishing the stone, he saw a face that looked like a fossil head to him. Another face appeared, which seemed to have a big nose. He enlisted his 8-year-old great-grandson to provide an opinion.

Since his great-grandpa said the stone talked to him, the boy listened carefully, but heard no talking. He told Richard that he didn’t hear anything, but he agreed that it looked somewhat like an Indian chief. Working carefully with a diamond-padded angle grinder, Richard began to see the flow of long hair. Now he knew the piece had to be called “The Chief”. From that point on, the flow of his sculpting led him to define two faces for “The Chief”. The fuchsite gave the appearance of “war paint” across the cheeks of the sculpture.

He put the carving aside for several months and then decided his sculpture was near completion. In his words, “corundum can always shine brighter”. After almost four years of work, he was ready to display his third large corundum sculpture in 2016.

After his 90th birthday in March 2017, Richard made plans for the ongoing display of his three large corundum projects. His plans include donating the works to the Catawba County Historical Museum in his hometown. He worked with the museum to develop a Web page, and to display the pieces at several selected sites. The three pieces were displayed at the March 2017 Catawba Valley Gem and Mineral Show in Hickory, North Carolina. Both vendors and attendees were fascinated and charmed by the size and luster of his handiwork. After the show, “The Chief” was transported to New York City to begin the application process for the Guinness record as the largest polished ruby.

Appreciating All Life Has to Offer

Asked if he was ready to slow down, Richard said, “It’s full speed ahead. I’m ready for the next project.” Asked what that might be, he jokingly said that he “might find a bigger corundum in the mines in Southwest India”, where he’d heard there were specimens weighing 200 pounds. Interestingly, he has been in contact with a Philadelphia dealer who negotiates with the mines in India. He continued teasing, “I might even need someone to do a side trip to the diamond mines in South Africa to get enough diamond dust for my grinders.”

Richard says, “I’m truly just an old country boy who loves rocks. I don’t want to accumulate wealth.” The value estimates for his three corundum sculptures, however, approach the seven-figure range. He thoughtfully stated, “I just wish to help others appreciate what God gave us to treasure from the earth.” One can only hope to develop a passion for life like this 90-year-old man, who believes his stones speak to him!

About the Author: Dr. Warren Hollar is a member of the Catawba Valley Gem & Mineral Club, a retired school administrator, and a retired clinician of the University of North Carolina, Charlotte.

The post Stones That Speak: Corundum Calls to Record-Holding Gem Carver first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.