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. > >...
A crystal garden
When small crystals of a mineral join together, they "grow" into larger crystals. You can see how crystals grow by growing some crystals yourself. Here's what you will need: 6 tablespoons of water ...
Flat sides and sharp corners
A chunk of mineral may seem to be just a jagged, lumpy, or twisty piece of hard stuff with no special shape. But each kind of mineral is actually made up of tiny shapes called crystals---shapes that...
Solid stuff
It takes a lot of things to make cookies---flour, milk, eggs, butter, sugar. But when the cookies are baked, you can't see that there are a lot of things in them. Everything is all mixed together. A...