A young girl visiting Arkansas’ Crater of Diamonds State Park on her birthday recently found a 2.95-carat golden brown diamond, the second-largest gemstone unearthed at the park this year.

Aspen Brown, 7, of Paragould, Arkansas, happened on the gemstone while looking for a place to sit and rest along a fenceline during a visit on Sept. 1.

“She got hot and wanted to sit down for a minute, so she walked over to some big rocks by the fence line. Next thing I know, she was running to me, saying ‘Dad! Dad! I found one,!’” the girl’s father Luther Brown said in the Arkansas State Parks release.

The gem is also the first large diamond found at the Murfreesboro, Arkansas, park since an excavation project was finished in August, park officials said in a release. 

A contracted construction company dug a 150-yard trench, and that process could have turned up the 2.95-carat diamond.

The diamond took Ms. Brown’s moniker as its own, which Mr. Brown says befits her fortuitous find.

“There was no skill required for her to find it. She was just in the right place at the right time,” Mr. Brown said.

The surface of the extinct volcano was first plowed by farmer John Huddleston, who first found diamonds there in 1906, according to the Encyclopedia of Arkansas.

In 1924, the largest diamond ever found in the U.S. was discovered at the park, ASP officials said. Commercial diamond finders were able to scour the area until it became Crater of Diamonds State Park in 1972.

ASP officials indicated that over 75,000 diamonds have been found at the site in its over 100-year history. Park visitors, they said, find one to two diamonds daily.

• Brad Matthews can be reached at bmatthews@washingtontimes.com.