Quincy 400: Kevin Czaja presents Quincy Rocks!--And Minerals

Name: Quincy 400: Kevin Czaja presents Quincy Rocks!--And Minerals
Start: 2025-12-02T18:30:00-05:00
End: 2025-12-02T20:00:00-05:00
Location: 40 Washington St, Quincy, MA, United States, Massachusetts 02169

Schedule

Tue Dec 02 2025 at 06:30 pm to 08:00 pm

UTC-05:00

Location

40 Washington St, Quincy, MA, United States, Massachusetts 02169 | Quincy, MA

Richardson Building, 40 Washington Street, Quincy, MA, 02169
Celebrate the last of #Quincy400 with us at the Thomas Crane Public Library with geologist Kevin Czaja as we get up close and personal with the Library's very own Charles A. Claflin Geological and Mineral Specimen Collection & the F. Wesley Fuller Geological Specimens Collection! We'll learn all about the rocks and minerals, their origins, and their donors.
The Claflin Collection was collected by Charles A. Claflin over many years, and sold by Emily Bauer, Executrix of the Charles A. Claflin Estate to William A. Bradford of Quincy. The purchase stipulated that the collection "would go on permanent display as a gift to some public institution," and that is why Bradford donated it to TCPL. Bradford wrote, "I sincerely hope that in the years to come, this exhibit will still continue to attract attention, and to prove helpful to those interested in geological and mineral studies." (Letter to Trustees, 12/22/1944). Donated by William A. Bradford, 1944. It consists of 20 mineral samples from various parts of the US.
The Fuller Collection was donated by a citizens committee under the direction of William A. Bradford to the Library on March 23, 1954. Fuller made granite samples to be used by salesman on their routes across the United States. His personal hobby was collecting stones found all over native New England and other parts of the country. Pieces of his handiwork may be found in the museums in Boston, New York and Washington, D.C.

Kevin Czaja is the Assistant Curator at the Mineralogical & Geological Museum at Harvard University where he has worked for over 28 years. He has been passionately interested in minerals ever since he was about 7 years old and discovered shiny green prehnite in the “trap-rock” (basalt) road-fill he found not far from where he grew up in Rockfall, Middlesex County, Connecticut. His particular strengths include mineral species identification, northeastern U.S. regional mineralogy and pegmatite phosphate mineralogy. A longtime director and past president of the Boston Mineral Club, Kevin has M.A.’s from Harvard University and the University at Albany, and a B.A. from the University of Connecticut. His most recent work has focused on a somewhat obscure New England occurrence of Manganese dominant phosphate mineralization in southeastern New Hampshire. This effort has now culminated in the following article being recently published in Rocks and Minerals magazine: “Minerals of the Turner Mine, A Little-Known Phosphate Rich Granite Pegmatite in Marlow, Cheshire County, New Hampshire.”
https://thomascranelibrary.assabetinteractive.com/calendar/kevin-czaja-presents-quincy-rocks-and-minerals/