List of Collections
Many of the excellent specimens the museum owns are organized by donator or specimen. Specimens from these collections are available on display or archived. You can browse descriptions of our collections below or contact the museum manager for further information.
The Wayne D. Martin sedimentary rock collection
Dr. Wayne D. Martin, emeritus Sedimentary Petrologist, assembled and curates this collection of sedimentary rocks and structures. Presently, 1,648 specimens have been computer cataloged.Queries concerning this collection can be addressed to Dr. Wayne D. Martin, Department of Geology, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio 45056, Phone (513) 529-1361. Alternatively, you may contact Dr. Martin through the geology museum manager, Dr. Kendall Hauer.
The igneous, metamorphic, and other sedimentary rock collection
The museum currently holds approximately 2,500 specimens of igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks in its collection. The collecting data for these samples (if recorded) are maintained in index card files in the museum. We have begun to computer catalog these specimens in preparation for a single, standardized catalog.The mineral collection
The mineral collection contains approximately 2,500 specimens, featuring several hundred that may be regarded as "museum quality." The data recorded for the mineral collections are generally minimal, but the interest of this collection is the historical value imparted by early dealer labels such as "Foote of Philadelphia."The economic rock/mineral suites
The economic suites are index-card cataloged. Many of the mines where these rocks and minerals were found are now inaccessible, so this collection will be a valuable resource for the future. These specimens represent many of the most notable U.S. (and some foreign) mining districts.The meteorite-tektite collection
Our collection contains samples of meteorites that have fallen in many different parts of the world as well as several examples of tektites, which are typically centimeter-sized globules of natural glass that were formed as a result of melting earth materials by meteorite impacts. Most notably, the museum has on display three samples of the famous Canyon Diablo Octahedrite, a meteorite that fell in Arizona, USA around 25,000 years ago, one of which weighs 11.4 kilograms (25 lbs.).
