Are people surprised to learn that Canada is now a major diamond producer?
Well, when people think of diamonds, they usually think of South Africa. But people have been looking for diamonds in North America for a long, long time. In fact, one of Canada’s earliest explorers, Jacques Cartier, thought he had found some near Quebec in the mid-1500s. He sent them back to the French king, but they turned out to be perfect, clear quartz crystals. Within a few hundreds years, however, people had found real diamonds. There was even a working diamond mine in Murfreesboro, Arkansas in the early 1900s. You can still go there as a tourist and look for diamonds. Loose diamonds have also been found in Georgia, Wisconsin, Colorado, California, Texas, and about two dozen other states and Canadian provinces. Often the discoverers have been kids, who are the ideal diamond prospectors; they’re built close to the ground, they like to pick things up, and sometimes they get lucky. Why did prospectors start focusing on Canada? Researchers began to recognize that diamonds occur in th
