[Rockhounds] "D'ever Wonder?" - Wondering about mountain leather ... and looking for pictures.

[charles creekmur]

The mineral, palygorskite, is known as mountain leather. The piece in my
collection looks like a old Readers Digest that has laid out in the rain and
weather for years.   It is soft, pliable and does not look or feel like a
mineral at all. Search on Mindat.org for description and pictures.
Charles

On Wed, Jan 14, 2009 at 9:09 PM, <smkell45 at aol.com> wrote:

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> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kris Rowe <lapidary.specialties at gmail.com>
> To: rockhounds at lists.drizzle.com <rockhounds at lists.drizzle.com>
> Sent: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 10:02 pm
> Subject: [Rockhounds] "D'ever Wonder?" - Wondering about mountain leather
> ... and looking for pictures.
>
> Hi.Check www.mindat.org for mountain leather. smkell
>
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> Howdy, y'all!
>                    I was sitting (shivering) on the back porch last
> evening, reading a Lapidary Journal (from 1968, if I remember correctly)
> with a great article on 'Amethyst of Korea.' Amongst the many materials
> written of was something that was unfamiliar to me, called
> "mountain leather."
> So, lacking any underground (at least deeper than 8 feet) mining
> experience,
> I googled it and found "TEM observations of a 30 million
> year old mountain leather nanofiber mineral composite" on ScienceDirect.
> However, they want my money before letting me read the
> paper, and my Queen of Reciepts says "$31.50 for a research paper? for
> FUN?", at which point I slunk back to my Laz-e-Boy and
> decided to ask y'all ... what the heck IS mountain leather, what does it
> look like, and have any of you found any?
>
> The Intro to the research paper makes mountain leather sound like something
> Dupont wishes it would have made, and brought a smile
> to my face with the amazed comment that it was 30 million years old, the
> same wry smile I get when someone marvels at how amazing
> it is that Nature could create something so complex!  *lol*
> Warning to you search wizards (like me) there's almost nothing readily
> available online about this material, other than the mentioned paper.
> So, dear miners with letters behind your names, help me if you can. I don't
> want to wake up at 4 am wondering about this question. My
> sanity is in your hands (sorry it's so sticky, the kids were plaaying with
> it.)
>
> Be Well!
>             Kris Rowe
>             Lapidary Specialties
>
>
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