Maine Tourmaline
Elbaite tourmaline in the Maine Mineral and Gem Museum, Bethel
In 1977, a necklace was donated to the state of Maine. It wasn’t just any necklace. It was a showcase for Maine tourmaline.
Tourmaline is a mineral that forms gemstones ranging in color from black and brown to vibrant hues of green and pink. During the Victorian era, the stones became fashionable, prized for their variety of color, their clarity, and their large size. It is found around the world, but few places in the United States have produced gem-quality deposits as significant as those in western Maine.
The state’s first major tourmaline discovery came in 1820 at Mount Mica near Paris Hill. The story of that find is that two boys exploring the hillside found unusual green crystals. The boys‚Äô discovery eventually led miners to a pegmatite deposit inside Mount Mica, where years of digging uncovered increasingly rich pockets of tourmaline. But the biggest find came decades after tourmaline mining in Maine had declined.
In 1972, miners at the Dunton Quarry in Newry broke into a crystal-lined pocket filled with vivid green and pink tourmalines. The discovery became known as “the Big Find,” yielding more than a ton of tourmaline in two years.
Stones from the Big Find were eventually set into the ceremonial necklace donated to the state in 1977. Made by Ellsworth goldsmith Addison Saunders with gold hand-panned from the Swift River, the necklace features double strings of alternating pink and green stones that drape into a 24.58-carat pink tourmaline drop.
When the necklace was donated to the state nearly 50 years ago, it was intended for the governor’s wife to wear at official functions. But in 2019, for the first time, it was worn by the governor herself.
Author: Stephanie Bouchard
