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Etc => Museums => Topic started by: FdW on December 20, 2014, 08:49:25 PM

Title: USA, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Academy of Natural Sciences
Post by: FdW on December 20, 2014, 08:49:25 PM
The Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University
http://www.ansp.org/

Mineralogy Mania
http://www.ansp.org/explore/online-exhibits/stories/mineralogy-mania/
http://www.ansp.org/explore/online-exhibits/stories/tags/subject/mineralogy/

Benjamin Franklin Parkway 1900, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103, USA

Also see http://www.strahlen.org/forum/index.php/topic,6769.0.html
and their magazine http://www.strahlen.org/forum/index.php/topic,15096.0.html
Title: Re: USA, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Academy of Natural Sciences
Post by: FdW on December 20, 2014, 08:50:08 PM
Philadelphian William Sansom Vaux (1811–1882) learned to love minerals during his boyhood. His substantial inheritance enabled him to collect thousands of gorgeous minerals during his adult years. Acquiring minerals from Philadelphia and throughout the world, Vaux became one of the first major collectors to use aesthetics to guide his purchases.
A dedicated science enthusiast, Vaux was elected to Academy membership in 1834, later serving as an auditor, curator, treasurer, and vice president from 1860 until his death in 1882. Upon his passing, Vaux bequeathed his mineral collection—with the exception of a few specimens which he left to his nephew—to the Academy. The amazing minerals, which include fluorites, pyromorphites, calcites, azurites, stibnites, quartz, and more, were on display for many years in what is now the Academy’s Dinosaur Hall. Today we store them behind the scenes for safety and preservation.
What other important minerals reside at the Academy of Natural Sciences? Read story number 19 of our 200 stories to find out about our first major purchase!
http://www.ansp.org/explore/online-exhibits/stories/mineralogy-mania/

During the 18th and early 19th centuries, Adam Seybert was the only American with extensive knowledge of mineralogy. He had developed an increasing interest in the subject while studying under the famous crystallographer René Haüy in Paris. Seybert acquired a substantial study collection of minerals, which he kept in a specially built mahogany cabinet. He continued to add to his collection upon returning to Philadelphia, where he became the local authority on minerals.
During the year of its founding in 1812, the Academy scraped together funds to acquire the Seybert mineral collection. Seybert sold the collection to the Academy for a staggering $750, but he continued to work on it and went on to prepare a handwritten catalog. The collection of more than 2,000 specimens remains at the Academy and is the oldest intact collection of minerals in the United States, containing more than 90 percent of all known minerals. It includes scientifically significant minerals, vials of ash and sulfur, and the only known minerals collected on the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
The minerals are now housed in a modern cabinet in our Mineralogy Collection, and antique-furniture conservator Alan Andersen has restored the empty cabinet. It is on display in our Ewell Sale Stewart Library & Archives. Come see it today!
http://ansp.org/explore/online-exhibits/stories/the-academys-first-major-purchase/