FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[James Catmur]

Tobi, I think they have been called 'heart twins'?

[colin robinson]

[colin robinson]

Newlandside fluorites are renowned for the amazing colour zoning to be seen in some crystals. This battered old thing has seen better days but it does show the zoning quite well. Interestingly a vein worked in the western quarry produced pink crystals - a very rare colour for Weardale. Sadly the vein was quarried away many years ago.

[colin robinson]

A little anecdote to add here. Messers Greenbank and Sutcliffe, founders of the Rogerley Mine, attempted to work the Quarry Hills vein in Newlandside until the then owner, Tommy Wilson caught them and told them to 'bugger off'. Tommy was an old man when I first met him and he told me that he and his sister used to get fluorite specimens in exchange for cigarettes from the prisoners of war who were billeted nearby and put to work in the quarries during the 1914-18 war.

[James Catmur]

[Jesse Fisher]

I've also seen the occasional "double twin" from the Rogerley Mine. I've never heard these referred to as "heart twins." That is usually applied to calcite twins of the appropriate morphology from West Cumbria.

[James Catmur]

If you look at them from one angle it looks a little like a heart. I am not saying it is a good description but it is used. I.e., from a commercail web site, I quote "An aesthetic English fluorite featuring a large double twinned crystal, 'heart' shaped and measuring 2cm in width."

[Jesse Fisher]

Personally, I think calling them "heart twins" requires more than a little imagination, but then, the history of commerce is full of imaginative descriptions. I recall selling a wholesale lot of fluorite to an enthusiastic Japanese customer a few years back. She had a website, and though mostly in a language I don't know, it was obvious that it was selling to the new-age and metaphysical market. One of the few English bits, however, claimed that Rogerley fluorite was "the stone of genius!" Considering just how much money I lost on that venture, I am dubious of the claim.

But getting back to the theme of this thread, here is a fluorite from another little-known Weardale location. The Carricks Mine is located near the village of Ireshopeburn and was worked for iron ore coming from flats of oxidized iron carbonates. Most of the workings were 19th century, but the mine was reopened for a short period during the early 1940s.

[colin robinson]

Nice one, Jesse. The Grove Heads opencut worked one of the veins cut by Carricks level and produced similar material, though not quite as 'fresh' as the ankerite/siderite was oxidized to goethite pseudomorphs. I have to agree that calling double-twinned fluorites 'hearts' is rather misleading, certainly on a site like this.

[colin robinson]

Apologies for the picture quality but this is a scan of photo of a double penetration twin of fluorite (not heart-shaped) recovered from Heights West Cross Vein in the early 1990s. It is 3cm on the long side.

[colin robinson]

And talking of scans of old photos, this unusually coloured fluorite is from Pike Law, Teesdale. It is almost 6cm on the long edge and was one of a number recovered after a landslip exposed a clay-filled cavity containing much broken fluorite. All the fluorite crystals were detached from the matrix and mostly pristine. Sadly a few weeks later the ground moved again bringing down limestone blocks the size of cars so no more fluorite.

[colin robinson]

Pike Law has always been close to my heart as it was where my collecting really started. I'd collected before that but in 1966 my mate Fuzz passed his driving test and the world was our oyster. I saw 'old mines' marked on the Ordnance Survey map and off we went. Fifty years later I found this fluorite plate not 2m from the road where a drainage ditch had cut through one of the old dumps.

[Tobi]

Another Blackdene galena:

[Jesse Fisher]

Another galena and fluorite from the Blackdene Mine. This one is from a large cavity found in 1973. The specimens are characterized by sharp, lustrous, twinned purple fluorite crystals, usually less than 1 cm in size, often associated with cube-octahedral galena crystals on a quartz-rich matrix.

I was told an interesting story about this find by one of the miners who was there at the time. Evidently, the cavity was quite large, and yielded a lot of specimens. A group of the miners who were interested in collecting specimens would use old explosives boxes to pack specimens and would load them onto a locomotive to drive out at the end of each shift. So as not to be too obvious about what they were doing, there was a general agreement that everyone would limit themselves to one box per shift. One miner, a fellow by the name of Bobby Reid was evidently interested in getting all he could, and acquired a fair amount of material from the pocket. He also was, evidently, a somewhat difficult person to come to a deal with, and one perspective buyer decided to try and go around him and make a deal with the mine management for specimens. This just served to alert the management to what was going on with collecting in the mine, and they made the miners blow the remaining cavity. This find is sometimes referred to as "Bobby Reid's pocket."

[Jordi Fabre]

A monster! ;-)

[Tobi]

[Jesse Fisher]

The Burtree Pasture Mine was one of the largest lead-producing mines in Weardale during the 19th century. Despite that, few documented specimens seem to have survived from that time. An attempt to reopen the mine for fluorspar was made in the late 1970s, but was not a financial success. A few pieces such as this one came out at that time.

[Jesse Fisher]

Fluorite twins from the Frazer's Hush Mine, Rookhopeburn, Weardale.

[Tobi]

[Jesse Fisher]

The Killhope Mine, located in the upper (western) part of Weardale was an active lead mine during the 19th century. The main adit (or horse level) is known as the Park Level. In recent years the site has been rebuilt and is now operated as a mining history museum. Prominent on the site is one of the only surviving waterwheels, which were once a commonly used source of power at mines about the Dale. Specimens identified from the mine are relatively rare. This one was formerly in the Arthur Scoble and David Green collections. I have seen others in the collection of the Natural History Museum, London.