WHAT A GEM! 💎| A gemstone, billed as one of the largest gem-quality opals ever found, has been sold for $125,000 at auction in Alaska on Sunday.
This photo provided by Alaska Premier Auctions and Appraisals shows an opal specimen, Dec. 20, 2021. One of the largest opals in the world was sold for $125,000 at auction in Alaska on Sunday, Feb. 20, 2022. The opal, dubbed the Americus Australis, weighs more than 11,800 carats and is one of the largest gem-quality opals in existence, according to the auction house Alaska Premier Auctions & Appraisals.
The opal is larger than a brick and is broken into two pieces, which von Brandt said was a practice used decades ago to prove gem quality. The family, with roots in California, exhibited the stone at gem shows for years, until the early 1980s, he said. His father then branched out into furniture and displayed it at his shop. Guy von Brandt eventually moved to Oregon and kept the stone “kind of tucked away” for many years, von Brandt said.
Altmann said when Cline emailed her, she was skeptical; the name of the stone, in particular, threw her. But she said she started digging and discovered “something with my grandfather’s handwriting with the picture of the opal with the word ‘Americus Australis.’”
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