FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[J. G. Alcolea]

Hi everyone.

A Zincite labeled with "Franklin Furnace" can mean old or not necessarily?

Juan.

[John Betts]

The town of Franklin Furnace changed name in 1913 to Franklin Borough, or Franklin for short.

[J. G. Alcolea]

Thank Betts. It is more logical to think it may be a piece before that date...

Juan.

[alfredo]

Where places change names, or political boundaries, collectors do not instantly change their label writing habits. It is very common to see collectors' labels using old (ie. "familiar") names 20 or 30 years after an official name change! So you cannot use the name change date as proof of when a label was written.

I could give dozens of examples of this "mental inertia" in mineral labels.

[rweaver]

Of course this also opens up the old point of just what makes a correct label. If a mineral was known to be mined under one named location and then that name changed to something else later in life what label is then correct? The Red Cloud mine is a good example of that, all but one specimen in my collection was mined when the Red Cloud was located in Yuma Co. vs. La Paz Co. So for historical sake I use Yuma Co. for those.

[Peter Lemkin]

Some dealers or sellers will sometimes use an older name to make the specimen seem to be a 'classic' piece rather than a more recent piece, but not everyone is trying to 'age' their specimens. The above reasons already cited apply - or the label could have been from when it was called Franklin Furnace. Franklin was my first collecting spot in my life. I was eight and asked my parents to drive me there [about an hours drive]. They told the story to their dying day of how I almost filled the back of the car with minerals and then proceeded to amaze them when at home so many of them glowed under UV light and I had identified and labeled them all. That was sixty years ago and I used the name Franklin, N.J., but was aware that in some of my mineral books it stated Franklin Furnace.

[J. G. Alcolea]

Ok.

For me the antiquity of the piece is not the most important, but interesting. I like to inquire and date my minerals as best as possible.

The minimum age with data of this specimen is 1975.


Greetings to all.

Juan

[Peter Lemkin]

Franklin Furnace was a mine [willemite, zincite, franklinite, and many many others]. At one time there actually was a furnace used for making iron. The town associated with it was Franklin and there is also a township [area that includes several towns] called Franklin, which includes another famous 'Franklin' mine named Sterling Hill in Ogdensburg [and many specimens from there are also labeled as 'Franklin' for the township and because Franklin town is only a few kilometers away. It has many of the same minerals. So, I believe the town was never called Franklin Furnace, only one of the two famous 'Franklin' mines was. Wikipedia has more if you look under Franklin Furnace - but doesn't give the date the mine closed; however, for decades after it closed people like me when I was eight collected on the dumps.

[J. G. Alcolea]