The Lime Crest and Franklin (or "Farber") quarries of Sussex County were host to a surprisingly large number of mineral species.
Those tiny black specks near the center of the photo are collectors.
This area later became flooded with water; more recently it may have been drained.
The
minerals of Lime Crest are mostly underwater now. The "official
line" has it that the quarry was bought out deliberately by a
multinational with the goal of shutting it down (to eliminate
competition, I guess). I find that a bit hard to believe, because
it can't be cheaper to import bulk stone than it is to quarry it
locally. Fuel costs may be lower, but that's never
reliable. There is a whole back-story involving a couple of
people
who wanted to get the quarry shut down because of the dust, noise,
etc. This certainly played a role in the quarry's demise.
Here's an enouraging update: According to Mindat, the quarry was apparently drained in 2013 and is operating again. As for the collecting status, I do not know.
Finally, there are still other windows into the Franklin marble; if we include the Amity-Warwick area of New York, there are even more sites yet. All of them have similar mineralization, though certain minerals (e.g., warwickite) appear to be more localized. Also-- just my informal observation here-- Lime Crest seemed to have mineralization that didn't appear so much in the ones farther away from the Franklin-Sterling Hill complex.
What follows is a
listing of some minerals that occur in these quarries. I'veI
divided the list in two, just because I didn't want pages that seemed
to scroll on forever.
Click on a link below:
