Pete J Dunn

Pete J. Dunn
Born November 10, 1942 in Somerville, Massachusetts
Died November 8, 2017 in Alexandria, Virginia

Pete Dunn’s professional career began in 1969, when, as a student pursuing a Master’s degree in geology and mineralogy, he served as curator in the Geology Department at Boston University. Pete joined the Smithsonian Institution as a mineralogist in 1972, a position he would hold for the rest of his career. While at the Smithsonian he continued graduate studies at the University of Delaware and in 1983 was awarded a Ph.D. degree. He retired in January 2008.

Pete Dunn began studying the minerals of Franklin and Sterling Hill in 1973, a concerted effort that led to the publication of 70 papers on the area, and, in 1995, the publication of a 755-page monograph in five volumes. Between 2002 and 2005 he followed this with a seven-volume treatise on the mining history of Franklin and Sterling Hill (1765-1900), a mammoth effort totaling 1,102 pages. Both of these efforts rank as the most thorough and definitive treatments of their kind.

Although the Franklin-Sterling Hill area was the main focus of Dr. Dunn’s professional interests, his publications reveal a wide-ranging interest in mineralogy. He delighted in discovering mineral species new to science and during his career described more than 130 of them, until recently a world record. He also served as editor for several prestigious journals, was active in mineral systematics (procedural and nomenclatural matters), and published more than a dozen guest editorials of interest to the mineral-collector community.

Bibliography prepared by Pete J. Dunn, November 2002. Posted by the Franklin-Ogdensburg Mineralogical Society, Inc., April 2018.
Pete J Dunn Bibliography