A rather good shot of Liverton Mine, waiting for someone out there to tell me where it was taken from.
(photo courtesy of Mike Holliday)
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This mine was worked from 1863 until 1923.
A lot to see here, Liverton Mine in the background, the viaduct cutting through the photo and the railway on it’s way to Carlin How and to Loftus Mine (via the ’Z’). The calcining kilns at Liverton Mines produced so much ”muck” that the whole area was in perpetual smog. It is said that the clothes of the workers on the kilns used to rot in the acid air.
As the caption on the photo says – Liverton Mines chimney stack felled on Tuesday 24th August 1926
Liverton works, with the spray bars in the right-foreground
A picture looking down the valley towards Skinningrove, with the works on the skyline at the left. Taken from the shale heaps, with the pylon base clearly visible.
(image courtesy of Raymond Brown)
The inevitable onset of “urban decay” sets in after the closure of the mine and we can see the beginning of its destruction. Taken again from the vantage point of the shale heaps.
(image courtesy of Raymond Brown)
This is a snow scene that rivals the Matterhorn views so beloved of ski holiday advertisements except that these are the shale tips of Liverton Mines! The strange structure in front of them is the massive foundations for a pylon of the aerial ropeway that caused the huge cone in the background. I seem to remember a fatality here involving a cycle or a motor cycle which instigated the removal of this well-known landmark?
This is believed to be a view of the Calcining Kilns at Liverton Mines – which were well-known as being associated with the Ironstone Mine. These Kilns obviously dominated the landscape. Railway wagons at this time were generally wooden bodies but couldn’t be used for carrying hot calcined ore which is why the N.E.R. built a fleet of steel wagons specifically for this traffic; a few can be seen to the left. In front are more steel wagons, built about 1906 to hold a greater tonnage. Russ Pigott asked ”Were the larger steel wagons in the picture fitted with vacuum brakes? There seems to be a vac cylinder mounted above the solebar on the end of the wagon. This would seema bit strange as not many locos used on these trains were fitted for vacuum at the time. ” Answered for us by Simon Chapman. ” Well spotted, Russ! Apparently they were actually fitted with air brakes and run as block trains from Liverton to Cargo Fleet works. This was such an unusual working that I can remember the late Ken Hoole trying to find out more information over 30 years ago. Russ said ”I thought the drum shape was the operating wheel for the hopper doors. What locos were used on these trains, I think most J21s were westinghouse fitted but the J26s and 27s had no train brakes. That poor remaining J21 sits a mere couple of miles from me looking ever more like a Barry engine!”
New London being the local nickname for Liverton Mines. The long sweep of the viaduct is easily visible in this image, as are the calcining kilns at Liverton Mine – the fumes from which used to rot the clothes of the labourers working on them. Norman Patton says ”Our family moved from “Brickyard” to Liverton mines in 1952. The promise of a fitted bathroom and hot ‘n cold running water and our garden front and back was too much to resist! Wages at Kilton pit were good at the time and the Journey on push-bike much easier for our Father. We even had a television before the Coronation and the Stanley Matthews Cup Final(12″ Black and White, Console model)! The new estate of council houses inspired the name ” New London” for the village and the council estate was the “Holy City”!” (Brickyard being the local name for the Hartington Street, High Row and St Hilda’s Terrace area of Loftus – rodders) |
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