March Speaker: "A Look at the Remarkable Collection of the mim Museum, Beirut, Lebanon” by Philip M. Persson

by Laura Dwyer, MSDC Member

Our speaker will be Phil Persson, a geologist, mineral dealer, and collector living on the west side of Denver, Colorado. He will provide a look at the mim Museum in Beirut, Lebanon.

The mim name is inspired by the 24th letter of the Arabic alphabet, pronounced “mim,” which is also the first letter of the words “museum,” “mineral,” and “mines” in both Arabic and English. The mim is a public mineral museum located in Beirut, Lebanon and is the brainchild of Salim Eddé, a Lebanese entrepreneur, collector, and scientist.

The museum, which opened in October 2013, is located on the campus of Saint Joseph University in downtown Beirut. It currently contains approximately 2,500 specimens and includes world-class examples of aesthetic minerals, as well as high-quality systematic specimens representing rare and unusual minerals.

The museum attracts nearly 40,000 visitors a year and is currently the top ranked activity in Beirut on the TripAdvisor website. Phil's presentation will introduce the audience to this remarkable museum, certainly one of the most important in the mineral world, and its world-class collection.

Speaker Bio

Phil's passion for geology and mineral collecting began as a child living near the "fluorescent mineral capital of the world," Franklin New Jersey, and eventually led to a BA in geology from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 2012 and an MSc in economic geology with a focus on geochemistry and petrology at the Colorado School of Mines in 2017.

Phil has been a co-author and collaborator on numerous scientific papers and magazine articles on mineralogy and geology, with a focus on rare earth element minerals and pegmatites of Colorado. He enjoys public speaking and has given dozens of talks for mineral clubs and events, as well as helped organize several scientific symposia in Colorado. He has been involved in the mineral dealing and collecting community for close to 20 years and currently works full-time as a mineral dealer in the Denver, Colorado area.