The oil that keeps your bicycle from squeaking and the gasoline that keeps your parents' car running both come from deep in the earth's crust. Both began as a thick black liquid found in big pools...
Buried sunshine
Nearly all rocks are made of minerals---things that are not alive and never have been. But there is one kind of rock that is not made of minerals. It is coal, a black shiny rock made of---green...
A slippery mineral
What is inside the pencil you use to write? It's often called "lead"---but it's not really lead at all. It's a mixture of clay and a soft, black mineral called graphite (GRAF yt). Some graphite is...
The money minerals
Gold is a bright-yellow metal that looks like sunlight turned to stone. Silver is a pale-gray metal that looks like frozen moonlight. These two minerals are so beautiful and hard to find that people...
Precious stones
They shine, they sparkle, they flash and shimmer. The crowns of kings and emperors were covered with them, and wealthy people have always worn necklaces, rings, and other jewelry made of them. They...
The stone that burns
"I smell brimstone! The Devil must be near!" Long ago, that's what someone might have said if they smelled sulfur burning. Sulfur was called brimstone, which means "the stone that burns." Because it...
The dry liquid
> mercury ore (cinnabar) and mercury Imagine a dry liquid---a liquid you can stick your finger into without getting it wet. There is such a liquid. It's a melted metal that stays melted even when...
The Atomic Age mineral
The prospector moved slowly across a rocky, desert hillside. He was searching for a very valuable mineral. But he had no pick or shovel. As he walked along, he held a metal tube over the rocks. A...
The Iron Age mineral
Safety pins and skyscrapers, scissors and steamships, automobiles and airplanes---none of these things could be made without the mineral called iron. Iron is a metal, like copper and tin and bronze....
The Bronze Age minerals
> ancient copper head from Iran > > This copper head was made thousands of years ago. It is no longer > bright because, in time, copper is covered with a greenish coating > called patina. > >...