The Handbook of Mineralogy series is a Five Volume set authored by John W. Anthony, Richard A. Bideaux, Kenneth W. Bladh, and Monte C. Nichols, and published by Mineral Data Publishing. Each mineral known at the time of publication occupies one page of the handbook.In 2001 the copyright for the Handbook of Mineralogy was given to the Mineralogical Society of America by Kenneth W. Bladh, Richard A. Bideaux, Elizabeth Anthony-Morton and Barbara G. Nichols and the remaining volumes were shipped to the MSA warehouse in Chantilly, VA.Along with the copyright, MSA was given pdf files of each page of the handbook. These are freely distributed to the public on this website.In 2002, the MSA council established an editorial office, headed by Dick Bideaux, for the purpose of updating and maintaining the mineral database of the Handbook of Mineralogy and to continue converting the text files to PDF files for on-line access through the MSA website.After Dick Bideaux's untimely death in 2004 the MSA council organized an editorial committee in 2006 headed by Frank Dudas (MIT) to complete the task. This website is being organized to that end.Ken Bladh (Wittenberg University), one of the original authors of the Handbook, was appointed Editor of the Handbook of Mineralogy database by MSA Council action in June 2010, after Frank Dudas was unable to continue in that role. Professor Bladh’s initial goal is to bring the online Handbook up to date by adding pdf pages for all new minerals approved by the IMA after the publication of each original Handbook volume. Revision of the Handbook to reflect all IMA approved changes in nomenclature and new mineral data will be undertaken after the new minerals project is completed.Cite the online version of the Handbook as:John W. Anthony, Richard A. Bideaux, Kenneth W. Bladh, and Monte C. Nichols, Eds., Handbook of Mineralogy, Mineralogical Society of America, Chantilly, VA 20151-1110, USA. http://www.handbookofmineralogy.org/.This book contains 4022 mineral descriptions collected in one file from this site.