May 21–27, 2008, Number 493
A.E. Seamen Mineral Museum
This week I chose to focus more on an interesting part of Michigan Tech's campus: The A.E. Seamen Mineral Museum. Michigan Tech has the second largest private collection owned by a university and to me it is one of the most fascinating parts of campus to see. In this week's article I'm going to talk about what the museum displays and hopefully this will be encouragement for many of you to check it out the next time you're on campus.
To start, the museum is located on the fifth floor of the Electrical Energy Resources Center building. After taking the elevator up, and immediately once you get off, there are cabinets with information talking about the history of the museum. A. E. Seamen started his career in the Upper Peninsula as a timber-man, but through his own studies was able to learn a great deal about the local minerals and rocks. He eventually began to work for the Geological Survey and was taken on to the Michigan Mining School by Dr. Wadsworth, who directed the school and also worked with the Geological Survey. Seamen became the official curator in 1923.
Currently, the museum has over 30,000 specimens with about 5,000 on display. Just recently, they updated the Fluorescent mineral display to make it more informative for those that walk through. To see a complete layout of the displays at the museum, check out the Visitor's Guide website where you can view the floor plan as either an HTML or PDF file. The museum is divided mostly into two sections: one side displays general minerals found in many different locations across the world and the other side displays minerals that are found throughout Michigan.
A basic walk through the museum is definitely a great time and worth the trip. The collections contain lots of descriptive information about what you are seeing and make it easy to understand. One of my favorite specimens to see is the pieces of datolite found in the Upper Peninsula. The main website for the Mineral Museum has many links to more information about what the museum does and the future goals set in place. There is also a gift shop that has many fascinating specimens and gifts that make for great presents any time of the year.
I hope that this brief introduction to the mineral museum has many of you interested in checking it out the next time you come up to campus. If there are any comments or questions feel free to email me at my personal email address. Any suggestions for future articles are greatly appreciated.
Until next week,
- Michigan Technological University
- 1400 Townsend Drive, Houghton, MI 49931-1295
- 906-487-1885