Overview
Santa Fe College's Museum of Earth Science is home to over 1,700 mineral, fossil and rock samples around the world. The museum also has martian and lunar meteorites and other "rocks from space."
Approximately 70 percent (about 1,200) of the specimens in the museum are from the John Withey Collection. John Withey was a retired high school teacher and avid mineral and fossil collector. The collection was originally part of the Earth Wonders museum in Bunnell, Florida. Withey passed away in January 2010, but his legacy and dreams remain in SF's Museum of Earth Science.
The other 30 percent of the specimens have been donated by faculty, or from private collections, or were purchased by the Santa Fe College Foundation.
Also, in the museum there are two large murals painted by a local artist depicting the Geologic Time Scale and the Evolution of Life through Geologic Time.
The museum is located in and around the lobby area of Building X, adjacent to the Kika Silva Pla Planetarium and near the Lawrence W. Tyree Library on SF's Northwest Campus in Gainesville, Florida.
The other geologic exhibit on campus is the Jean Klein Rock Cycle Garden, located outside in front of the Lawrence W. Tyree Library.