I had the opportunity to visit the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) in Toronto this past March. Adam Teller and Eli Frommer, both Minerals.net enthusiasts from New York, joined me on this trip. The ROM is Canada's premier natural history museum, and it has an extensive mineral and gemstone hall containing many exceptional pieces. Some individual minerals and gemstones in the collection are highly renowned. Anyone in the vicinity of Toronto should definitely pay a visit to this museum.
The mineral hall occupies a large room with high ceilings, and the appearance of the room and displays show that it was recently renovated with modern display units and excellent lighting. A large focus of the museum exhibits is naturally the minerals of Canada. However, there are also plenty of other minerals and exhibits to be seen at this museum. For this new particular news post, I focused primarily on the minerals of Canada, though a few other interesting photos managed to get in as well. The museum has a dazzling collection from several important Canadian localities, including the Jefferey Quarry in Asbestos, Mont Saint Hilaire, the Cobalt District, and the Rapid Creek area.
The museum also hosts a gem hall adjacent to the mineral hall, which contains collections of rough and cut gemstones, as well as other interesting displays such as Gold.
The museum has most of the minerals on display labeled with a number. There are touch screen tablets by each large case which allow one to navigate and read all about each mineral in detail based on its associated number. This new-age concept with a tablet touch screen for detailed information is a great usage of modern technology for a mineral and gemstone exhibit. However, it disturbed me how many of these these touch tablets were disabled and rendered useless. In fact, there were more non-functioning units than functioning ones! Further, the basic locality should also have been shown together with a mineral on display, so that you can see this information without the need to look it up.
I subsequently discussed the above matter with Katherine Dunnell, the Mineralogy & Geology Technician at the museum, who informed me that they are upgrading the entire digital kiosk system this coming month. This will be a great improvement for research, and I am looking forward to seeing this enhancement on my next visit to the museum.
Below are some handpicked photos of some of the fascinating display cases in the ROM. Click the pictures below for a larger version pop-up.
Adam Teller, Hershel Friedman, and Eli Frommer in Front of the Uniquely-Styled ROM Entrance
The ROM Mineral Hall
Eli and Adam Posing by a Huge Michigan
Copper from the Keweenaw Peninsula
Bizarre "Gogotte" Sandstone Formation from Chartes Eure-et-Loir, France
Huge Polished Slab of
Serpentine from Montville, New Jersey
Large Mass of Radiating
Schorl Tourmaline from the Sceptre Claims, Emerald Lake, Yukon Territory
Head-Sized Plate of Gemmy Orange
Grossular Garnet from the Jeffrey Quarry, Asbestos, Quebec
Very Large Plate of
Diopside with Other Smaller Diopside Crystals on the Side from the Jeffrey Quarry, Asbestos, Quebec
Crystal Cluster of
Prehnite in a very Unique Formation of Thick Blocky Crystals from the Jeffrey Quarry, Asbestos, Quebec
Orange-Yellow
Prehnite Crystals in Interesting Aggregates from the Jeffrey Quarry, Asbestos, Quebec
Vesuvianite Crystals from the Jeffrey Quarry, Asbestos, Quebec
Phosphates from the Rapid Creek Area in the Yukon Territory
Giant
Silver Mass from the Cobalt Mining District in Ontario
Safflorite and
Skutterudite from the Cobalt Mining District in Ontario
A Giant Grapefruit-Sized Crystal of
Analcime from Mont Saint Hilaire, Quebec
Beautiful
Serandite Crystals from Mont Saint Hilaire, Quebec
Various Colorful Crystals from Mont Saint Hilaire, Quebec
Beautiful Twinned
Serandite Crystal from Mont Saint Hilaire, Quebec
Diopside Crystal Clustes from Birds Creek, Bancroft, Ontario
Elongated
Corundum Crystal from the Gutz Farm, Renfrew Co., Ontario
Deep Green
Fluorite from Madoc, Hastings Co., Ontario.
This is Probably the Best Fluorite I have ever seen from Canada!
Exceptional
Apatite Crystals Protruding from
Calcite Matrix
From the Liscomb Occurrence, Wilberforce, Ontario
Large
Molybdenite from Moly Hill, Quebec
Star Sapphire from Sri Lanka
Case of Various Gemstones Displaying
Asterism and
Chatoyancy
Tourmaline Cat's Eye; Locality Unknown
Large
Gold from Mine McIntyre, Timmins, Ontario
Canadian
Gold - Left to Right:
Crosus Mine, Matheson, Ontario
Sachigo River Mine, Sachigo River, Ontario
Hoyle Pond Mine, Timmins, Ontario
Gold in Matrix ("Picture Rock") from Mine d'or O'Brien, Cadillac, Quebec
Cut
Cerussite gem, 896 carats, from Tsumeb, Namibia
This is the world's largest cut Cerussite Gemstone, and an Iconic ROM Object
Cerussite is an extremely lustrous gemstone with amazing internal fire, greater than Diamond
Mass of
Biotite Mica with Adam and Eli for Perspective
From the Purdy Mine, Eau Claire Station, Ontario
Minerals.net Delegation at the ROM Museum. Left to Right:
Adam Teller, Hershel Friedman, Eli Frommer
