Minerals.net

Our final post covering the 2019 East Coast Gem, Mineral & Fossil Show at Springfield features some exceptional minerals that we encountered at the dealer booths. There was an impressive variety from many of the fine dealers, with a good selection of new and interesting material since the Tucson show earlier this year. We hope you enjoy our selection of minerals that made it for this report.

The Mineral City Show is a new show in Tucson at 516 W Lester Street, a bit further uptown than the major shows. Mineral City is organized by Graham Sutton, and took place in a newly construction cinderblock L-shaped building.

The concept of this show is to provide dealers with permanent storage of their minerals in Tucson, and allow them to showcase as well during the show season. The concept is novel and it seemed to have really kicked off this year. There were 16 well-known dealers at Mineral City, offering excellent specimens of all price ranges available.

From their website, it looks like Mineral City will be expanding with additional dealers for 2020. Many of the dealers here had maintained rooms in the Hotel Tucson (AKA InnSuites) in prior years; some of them still maintained rooms in both shows, while others exited the other show and only exhibited here.

The Arizona Mineral & Fossil Show at the Hotel Tucson City Center (or more commonly known as the InnSuites) is a sprawling hotel complex with many rooms filled with dealers. There is a large variety of dealers at this show, with many setting up here in late January and then transferring to the main show at the Convention Center during the second full week in February.

This show has a very enjoyable and relaxed atmosphere, and is one of my favorite events in Tucson. There are always interesting minerals and new finds to be discovered in almost all the rooms, as well as interesting people to chat with throughout the grounds. This post contains photos of some of remarkable minerals and new finds that I encountered at the Hotel Tucson City Center.

There are literally dozens of mineral and gem shows throughout Tucson during late January and early February. The main cluster of shows takes place at the motels and parking lots along the Interstate 10 Freeway service road west and southwest of downtown. Thousands of dealers set up shop here in the motel rooms and tents throughout this area, creating a true spectacle to behold.

I started my walk at Interstate 10 Freeway and 22nd Street, walking north and visiting the Quality Inn, Howard Johnson, and Travelodge. These motels have their rooms filled with dealers and tents in every surface area. I then continued north along the service road, walking along a quieter area until getting to the Riverpark Inn, where the Pueblo show takes place. This is a very busy show, with many gem, jewelry, and rock dealers, as well as quality mineral dealers with fine minerals for sale. I was considering continuing north to the Rapa River show directly north of the Riverpark Inn but ran out of time.

Continuing with our reports of the 2019 Tucson shows, our next post is the 22nd Street show. This gem and mineral show takes place on the eastern side of the I-10 Freeway near downtown Tucson. It features a gigantic tent (the largest tent I have ever seen) containing most of the dealers, and also has an additional smaller satellite tent called the "Showcase."

The main tent has all types of mineral, gemstones, and jewelry dealers, and the Showcase tent caters to high end dealers. Like the previous year, which introduced the Showcase tent, the signature dealer was the Arkenstone, boasting impressive displays of exceptionally fine and highly photogenic minerals.