LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Jack Pearadin readily concedes that his diamond-hunting pastime has yet to make him rich, even after more than 12 years of searching through Arkansas soil.
That changed at least in possibility earlier this year, when Pearadin and a friend uncovered a six-carat diamond in a field where he has already found more than 300 gems. Pearadin says collectors have suggested the unusual stone could fetch more than $1 million.
An experienced appraiser who spoke with The Associated Press offered a more conservative estimate, saying a diamond of that size and quality might be worth about $250,000. Even so, it remains a remarkable discovery.
“Oh my God! Oh my God!” Pearadin shouted while livestreaming the moment on TikTok. “Holy crap, we got a big one!” The excitement erupted after he rinsed gravel from a bucket and overturned it onto a table, revealing the glittering facets of a 6.03-carat diamond.
About the size of a fingernail, the stone is the largest diamond discovered this year at Crater of Diamonds State Park. Since the former open-pit mine became a state park in 1972, visitors have found more than 37,000 diamonds there.
The park’s biggest diamond, the “Uncle Sam,” weighed 40 carats.
For $15, visitors can search a five-gallon bucket of park gravel and keep any gemstones they uncover. Most finds are tiny and may be worth only a few hundred dollars. The largest diamond ever found in the United States, the 40.23-carat Uncle Sam, was discovered at the park in 1924.
Pearadin, who grew up in Missouri, began visiting the park in 2013. He eventually moved to nearby Murfreesboro to spend more time pursuing his passion. “I love it that much,” he told The Associated Press. He has sold most of his discoveries online.
Park interpreter Sarah Bivens said between 400 and 800 diamonds are found there each year, with most weighing roughly a quarter of a carat. Still, larger discoveries occasionally turn up. Park assistant superintendent Waymon Cox noted that an Arkansas bank manager found a nine-carat diamond in 2020, while a French visitor unearthed a seven-carat stone in 2024.
Diamonds are found in few places in the US.
Diamonds form deep within Earth under extreme heat and pressure. Volcanic activity can force them toward the surface, where water and wind later scatter the stones. Natural diamonds from such deposits are often cloudy and irregular. They also lose about 25% of their weight during cutting and polishing, according to Nathan Renfro, senior manager at the Gemological Institute of America.
Renfro said the United States has just two known primary diamond deposits—locations where columns of once-molten volcanic rock reached the surface. One is Crater of Diamonds; the other is Colorado’s Kelsey Lake, whose land was reclaimed after a commercial mining operation closed years ago.
That makes the Arkansas park one of the few places in the world where the public can search for diamonds and take home whatever they find.
“It’s a pretty remarkable operation that that’s available to the public,” Renfro said. “Most diamond mines are super high security.”
The question now is whether Pearadin’s biggest find can finally deliver a major payday.
A typical 0.17-carat diamond from the park can sell for about $700, said Laura Stanley, a certified gem appraiser in Little Rock. A high-quality six-carat yellow diamond from the site, however, could command approximately $250,000, she said—partly because of its rare Arkansas origin.
“They are their own entity,” Stanley said. “It’s the only place in America where you can go find your own diamond and you can’t compare that to a diamond from anywhere else.”
The Uncle Sam crystal was eventually cut and polished into a 12.42-carat diamond. It was donated to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, where it is displayed in the “Great American Diamonds” exhibit.
Pearadin has given his latest—and largest—discovery a fitting name: the “American Dream.”
“It’s just this massive, gorgeous yellow diamond,” Pearadin said. He plans to share any proceeds with fellow gem hunter Michael Schumacher of Wisconsin, who helped excavate the gravel that yielded the stone. Pearadin also hopes the find will help him open a crystal mine of his own.
___
Turbay is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.