The Franklin Mineral Museum is teacher friendly. We offer a variety of "fun while learning" themes that will fit a wide range of curriculum. Although our primary focus is mineral science, geology, and local mining history, we also touch on the science of archeology and anthropology. Field collecting and mineral identification are also an important part of our program.

Our tours can be customized to meet the needs of your curriculum. The museum collections are arranged in systematic order making them easy to follow instructional aids. Our local room focuses on Franklin - Ogdensburg mineralogy, nature of the ores, commercial exploitation of the deposits, geology and local history. Our fluorescent mineral display is the most comprehensive Franklin-Sterling fluorescent mineral display in the world! In this room students will learn about mineral fluorescence.

The museum also features a life-size mine replica that depicts the mining method used in the Franklin Mine. The building that houses the mine replica is on the New Jersey State Historic Site Register and was once the engine house for the Taylor Mine that operated from the mid to late 1800's.

The museum tour will then change themes as your group is led into our Indian Room. The Indian Room is a big hit with students and teachers as it brings us back to a culture that depended on nature to survive. It gives our visitors a better understanding of how past cultures used rocks, bones and other naturally occurring materials to fashion crude tools for survival.  Many of our stone tools were collected in New Jersey including Sussex County.

Adjacent to the Indian Room we go further back in time to our fossil room. The museum has one of the best petrified wood collections on public display in the world featuring polished slabs up to nearly 4 feet in diameter! Curiously, one of the most popular exhibits in the fossil room is the dinosaur dung. This exhibit also features fossil shells, fish, bugs, crustaceans, and dinosaur footprints.

After the short break from minerals, the tour then enters the Welsh Room. The Welsh Room houses the world's most comprehensive display of world-wide minerals. There are over 5,000 specimens on display here and a total of 6,317 specimens and artifacts in the Welsh collection. This room is a science teacher's paradise! The collection is arranged systematically with segments of the collection independently depicting basic rock forming minerals, geology, crystallography and mineralogy.

Students having completed the museum tour will have the opportunity to collect on the world famous Buckwheat Mineral Dump. This 15 acre tract of land is what is left of an enormous discard pile of lean ore, pegmatite, volcanic intrusive and more. Hundreds of different mineral species have been found there over the years. The museum can provide mineral check lists as a teaching tool for teachers. We can also provide rock kits for teachers containing examples of 14 identified mineral species from the Buckwheat Dump for the nominal fee of $7.50.

Identification services are available on site (free). Dark rooms are provided for checking for fluorescence. The museum also has a mineral research laboratory for mineral research and identification.

Educators are welcome to preview the museum to help optimize their curriculum. Call 973-827-3481 for further information.

Recommended Books on the area:

For earth science teachers grade 5 to 8: "Magnificent Rocks" - $15.00.            This is a work book of Franklin - Sterling mineralogy, geology, and history.         By Dr. Pete J. Dunn, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution and Mrs. Susan Cooper, retired teacher from Ogdensburg Elementary School, Ogdensburg, NJ.

For teachers and the curious: "Story of Franklin and Sterling Hill"-$15.00.          By Dr. Pete J. Dunn.

More advanced reading:

Franklin and Sterling Hill, "the world's most magnificent mineral deposits"            By Dr. Pete J. Dunn 1995. This is the most comprehensive up-to-date publication about Franklin and Sterling Hill. Available in five parts plus two supplements. Parts I to V $30.00 each, supplements I and II $25.00 each. Complete set is $200.00. Available through the Franklin-Ogdensburg Mineralogical Society P.O. BOX 146, Franklin, NJ 07416, the Franklin Mineral Museum or the Sterling Hill Mining Museum.