This is one of our personal favorites in the collection, and certainly among the best sphalerite specimens known from the district for its overall form and character. This competition-level miniature features a superbly crystallized, doubly-terminated, very lustrous black sphalerite crystal measuring 3.7 cm in length. It serves as the matrix for a cluster of glassy and gemmy amber colored crystals of calcite to 2.5 cm in length and is speckled with minute flecks of iridescent chalcopyrite which reflect the light and make little sparkles against the black-brown sphalerite surface. Mined in June 1987 and long in the Lillie collection, this piece was put on hold for a pending deal with the Chicago Field Museum (it retains the labelling for that deal in the form of a sticker on the back of Lillie's own label noting a value of $10,000). Pristine except a teeny tiny ding on the calcite tip. Illustrated in the MR Illinois-Kentucky Fluorite Issue, Vol.28, page 42, fig.80. In person, this miniature is just amazing. RCL824