Charlie Key: Recollections of Tsumeb.

In the late 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s he focused extensively (though by no means exclusively) on Tsumeb (fig. 2), during which time he and his business partner, Frederick "Rick" Ludlow Smith, were responsible for bringing vast quantities of Tsumeb specimens to collectors in the United States and beyond. At the Tucson Gem and Mineral Society (TGMS) Show in 2014, and again in 2015, I had the enormous privilege of sitting down with Charlie to discuss some of his memories of visits to Tsumeb and his role in bringing so many Tsumeb specimens from southern Africa to the United States. B M. S.: I read somewhere that you have estimated that the value of dioptase from Tsumeb exceeded the value of all other Tsumeb collector minerals combined? Charlie was much more than a successful mineral dealer; his knowledge of specimen mineralogy was quite extraordinary, and he had a willingness to share that knowledge in a friendly, modest, and relaxed manner. [Extracted from the article]