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Open Ground · Open ground

The Herkimer Diamond Mines

Fee dig · est. ground for 500M-year crystals, Middleville, Herkimer County, NY
ACCESSIBLE
Evidence status: Historical tradition. no documented source (historical tradition); legal status unknown (manual verification recommended). This account is presented as historical tradition, not verified fact. Manual verification recommended. Repository evidence: 0 sources · 0 timeline events · 0 media items · legal unknown · view on the Map Evidence on file: historical tradition

The Herkimer Diamond Mines: still unexplained.

Doubly-terminated quartz crystals, born faceted, half a billion years old

The law of this ground: Private fee mines along NY-28, keep everything you free from the rock.
The subject
developing the photograph…
The manifest
Doubly-terminated quartz crystals, born faceted, half a billion years old
The account

The dolomite here holds pockets, and in the pockets sit crystals that come out of the rock already cut, eighteen facets, two points, water-clear. You break them free with a sledge and a chisel, and what cracks out of the stone is yours. Five hundred million years in the dark, ended by a Tuesday morning's stubbornness.

Leads, where the trail points now
  • What you can keep: Doubly-terminated quartz crystals, born faceted, half a billion years old. Confirm the site's current rules and any day fee before you go.
  • Where: Middleville, Herkimer County, NY. Private fee mines along NY-28, keep everything you free from the rock.
  • Best practice: record anything notable, leave the ground as you found it, and check the latest access notices before you travel.
What the record holds

What remains open

  • No period map of the site has surfaced.
  • No contemporary press coverage has been found.
What we know, and what we don't
Established

No documentary claim is yet established. The account rests on tradition.

Still open
  • No period map of the site has surfaced.
  • No contemporary press coverage has been found.
The evidence room

No documentary or visual exhibits have been located yet. The trail below and the open leads are where this dossier grows next — every exhibit that enters here carries a source.

Where the trail points now
  • What you can keep: Doubly-terminated quartz crystals, born faceted, half a billion years old. Confirm the site's current rules and any day fee before you go.
  • Where: Middleville, Herkimer County, NY. Private fee mines along NY-28, keep everything you free from the rock.
  • Best practice: record anything notable, leave the ground as you found it, and check the latest access notices before you travel.
  • Search Library of Congress + DPLA (IIIF) for period cartography of the site.
  • Run Chronicling America for dated newspaper mentions.
  • Query NARA for archival records tied to the site.

Have a source, a map, or a clipping? Add a lead and it enters the record with its citation.

Start the hunt here
The first leads, so no one walks in cold.
Sources and the record
Related case files

The full hunt kit

Starting brief, what's known and disputed, evidence timeline, source list, map card, coordinate-confidence and legal-access summaries, and a field checklist, free with a Fellowship account.

Latest Word From the Newswire

Context, not proof. The dossier's own sources remain the evidence record.

Checking the wire…

Chart position 43.030°, -74.990° (approx.) View on the Map