Compared to gems that have been known and appreciated for hundreds or thousands of years, morganite is a newcomer. Commercial quantities of pink beryl (the name by which morganite was known at that time) with a rich color were first discovered in Madagascar in 1910. George Kunz, Tiffany and Company’s chief gemologist, obtained specimens of the material for mineralogical and gemological testing and found them to be exceptional.

Kunz decided that the gem should be named for John Pierport Morgan, an American financier and banker. With help from Kunz, Morgan had built two of the world’s most important gem collections and allowed them to be exhibited widely, including exhibits at two World’s Fairs. His collections were donated to the American Museum of Natural History, where many of his gems are still on public view today.

Madagascar became the first source of gem morganite, and the material produced there was of a rich pink color. Other commercial deposits were later found in Afghanistan, Brazil, Mozambique, Namibia, and the United States (California and Maine). Today, most of the world’s supply of morganite is being mined in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil.