Mimetite

specimen number:
2262261

location:
Congreso Leon Mine, San Pedro Corralitos, Chihuahua, Mexico

description:
Gorgeous lustrous almost chatoyant yellow botryoidal crystallized mimetite specimen. This is in really good condition as seen.

The Congreso-Leon mine, situated near San Pedro Corralitos within the Casas Grandes Municipality of Chihuahua, Mexico, is an iconic mineral locality famous for producing world-class specimens of vibrant, golden-yellow botryoidal mimetite. Geologically, this deposit is an oxidized, carbonate-hosted lead-zinc-silver replacement system where hydrothermal fluids intruded Cretaceous limestone beds. Over time, intense supergene weathering oxidized primary galena and arsenopyrite, liberating lead and arsenic to precipitate the lead arsenate chloride mineral mimetite as lustrous, grape-like crystal aggregates on a dark brown limonite matrix. Historically, the mine operated for roughly sixty years as a commercial lead and zinc underground operation before its permanent closure due to economic depletion in the 1950s. The site achieved legendary status in the mineral collecting community in late 1968, when noted mineral dealer Benny Fenn descended nine hundred feet on ropes into the hazardous, abandoned workings. Fenn discovered a massive, pristine pocket measuring forty feet long by thirty feet high, carefully hand-harvesting and wrapping over two tons of magnificent mimetite specimens over a three-month period.

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