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Geevor
Geevor tin mine headframe.jpg
Victory shaft headgear
Location
Geevor is located in Cornwall
Geevor
Geevor
Location in Cornwall
Location Pendeen
County Cornwall
Country England, United Kingdom
Coordinates 50°09′09″N 005°40′33″W / 50.15250°N 5.67583°W / 50.15250; -5.67583
Production
Products Tin
History
Opened 1911
Closed 1990
Owner
Website http://www.geevor.com/
Type: Cultural
Criteria: ii, iii, iv
Designated: 2006 (30th session)
Reference #: 1512
Region: Europe and North America

Geevor Tin Mine (from Cornish: Whel an Gever, meaning "mine of the goats"), formerly North Levant Mine is a tin mine in the far west of Cornwall, England, between the villages of Pendeen and Trewellard. It was operational between 1911 and 1990 during which time it produced about 50,000 tons of black tin. It is now a museum and heritage centre left as a living history of a working tin mine. The museum is an Anchor Point of ERIH, The European Route of Industrial Heritage. Since 2006, the mine has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape.

History

Tin and copper have been mined from the general area of Geevor since the late 18th century. It was originally a small enterprise known as Wheal an Giver, "a piece of ground occupied by goats". The area was worked under the name of East Levant Mine until 1840 and then as North Levant from 1851 to 1891 when it closed. During the 1880s as many as 176 workers were employed at the mine, but in the ten years after North Levant's closure the site saw only intermittent activity by a few miners.

At the turn of the 20th century a group of St. Just miners who had emigrated to South Africa were forced to return by the outbreak of the Second Boer War. They leased the area and conducted more thorough prospecting, being encouraged enough to set up a company called Levant North (Wheal Geevor) in 1901. This was acquired by the West Australian Gold Field Company Ltd. in 1904 which brought together various mines under the name of Geevor Tin Mines Ltd. in 1911, not long after the price of tin had rapidly risen to £181 a ton in 1906 from a low of £64 in 1896.

The Wethered shaft (named after Oliver Wethered, one of the founders of the mine) was begun in 1909 and initial development occurred around it. By 1919, the works were moving west toward the coastline and the Victory shaft (named to celebrate the end of the First World War) was sunk about 540 metres to the north-west. The mine suspended operations in 1921 and again for 12 months during the tin crisis in 1930 that permanently closed many other Cornish mines. In 1944 working through Wethered shaft was discontinued, but the Victory shaft continued in use.

TomCorser Penwith Aerial Geevor Tinmine
Geevor seen from the air

From the end of World War II until the early 1960s both Geevor and South Crofty found it hard to raise capital and to recruit skilled miners. Both mines took on Polish and Italian miners at this time. New investment, forward-looking management and rising tin prices in the 1960s improved matters and at this time around 270 staff were employed by the mine. During the 1960s there was much underground exploration; this included extending into the undersea workings of the Levant mine that had closed in 1930, work that was complicated by a hole in the seabed that first had to be plugged before the workings could be drained.

By the 1970s Geevor's sett covered an area of about three square miles and included Boscaswell Downs mine, Pendeen Consols and Levant mine. In 1985 the International Tin Council failed and there was a dramatic fall in the price of the metal. The mine struggled on for a few years, but closed in 1990, and the pumps were switched off in May 1991 allowing the workings to flood. The mine is not geologically exhausted of tin, but it is exhausted of tin that is recoverable economically.

During the 20th century Geevor drove over 85 miles (137 km) of tunnels from which it produced around 50,000 tons of black tin and made a profit of over £7 million. On average over a million gallons of water, a quarter of which was sea-water, was pumped from the mine daily.

Geology

The mine's lodes were located in an outer zone of coarse-grained biotite granite of Carboniferous age, intruded into surrounding Devonian age "killas" - a series of metamorphosed sedimentary and volcanic rocks, visible to the north west of the mine around the cliffs. As the influence of the granitic emplacement increases toward the contact zone, the killas becomes spotted with cordierite, then mica-rich phyllites and finally at the contact, banded hornfels and tourmaline schist.

The tin appears as cassiterite (with around 65-70% tin), within veins associated with quartz, tourmaline, metal sulphides and fluorite. The veins are predominantly in a north west - south east orientation and the cassiterite itself forms around 1% of the vein material.

Tourist attraction

Geevor waterwheel stamps
A 19th century waterwheel and set of Cornish stamps at the museum

Through the commitment of the local community and local bodies, notably Cornwall County Council and Pendeen Community Heritage, the site has remained accessible to the public. Geevor Tin Mine is now a museum and heritage centre, covering an area of 67 acres (270,000 m2) which makes it the largest preserved tin mining site in Great Britain. It is an important part of the Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape and was recognised by UNESCO in 2006. It has been the subject of a £3.8 million improvement programme funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, Objective One, Cornwall County Council and Penwith District Council.

Geevor mill interior panorama
Part of the interior of the ore processing mill, open to visitors

Geevor's new Hard Rock museum is part of the final stage of this improvement programme. The museum tells the story of tin mining in Cornwall and Geevor in particular, showing what happened on the surface and underground and what life was like for those who worked there, including oral history recordings. Visitors can also walk through the mine buildings to see the original machinery and there is a guided underground tour into Wheal Mexico, an 18th-century mine. The site has a souvenir shop and a cafe that overlooks the Atlantic Ocean. There are interactive activities e.g. panning for gold and gemstones.

Mineral Statistics

From Robert Hunt's Mineral Statistics of the United Kingdom.

Tin Production (1892-1988)
Year(s) Black (Tons) Value (£)
1892 17.50 944.00
1893 40.30 1,949.00
1894-1904 no-details ..
1906 14.70 1,203.00
1907-1913 no-details ..
1914 380.60 32,793.00
1914 376.00 34,431.00
1915 348.10 30,589.00
1915 353.00 30,100.00
1916 332.95 36,752.00
1916 444.00 43,350.00
1917 298.60 43,849.00
1917 416.00 56,860.00
1918 374.20 77,985.00
1918 439.00 76,514.00
1919 432.00 62,012.00
1919 432.00 69,064.00
1920 331.00 ..
1921 84.00 ..
1922 191.00 19,436.00
1923 381.00 52,001.00
1924 530.00 74,502.00
1925 438.00 71,257.00
1926 495.00 85,409.00
1927 609.00 96,677.00
1928 740.00 98,375.00
1929 811.00 ..
1930 376.00 ..
1931 91.00 5,486.00
1932 .. 52,526.00
1933 .. 98,387.00
1934 783.00 106,635.00
1935 877.00 111,853.00
1936 921.00 125,828.00
1937-1938 no-details ..
1940 no-details ..
1941 702.00 ..
1942 832.00 ..
1943 no-details ..
1944 577.00 ..
1945 no-details ..
1948 no-details ..
1950 no-details ..
1961-1971 no-details ..
1972 945.00 ..
1973 1,110.00 ..
1974 998.00 ..
1975 794.00 ..
1976 948.00 ..
1977 673.40 ..
1978 671.00 ..
1979 1,090.00 ..
1980 1,142.00 ..
1981 1,344.00 ..
1982 1,342.00 ..
1983 918.00 ..
1984 1,015.00 ..
1985 990.50 ..
1988 680.00
Employment (1905-88)
Year(s) Total Overground Underground
1905 12 8 4
1906-1913 .. .. ..
1918 303 98 205
1919 364 145 219
1922 84 42 42
1923 269 107 162
1924 365 121 244
1925 400 129 271
1926 295 109 186
1927 271 110 161
1928 312 125 187
1929 344 143 201
1930 229 103 126
1931 35 26 9
1932 144 72 72
1933 235 106 129
1934 304 136 168
1935 315 140 175
1936 319 140 179
1937 329 147 182
1938 383 168 215
1940 379 174 205
1941 356 174 182
1942 375 176 199
1943 436 174 262
1944 406 178 228
1945 335 142 193
1948 293 135 158
1950 283 134 149
1976 315 .. ..
1977 325 .. ..
1978 338 .. ..
1979 368 .. ..
1980 376 .. ..
1981 356 .. ..
1982 341 .. ..
1983 354 .. ..
1984 364 .. ..
1985 373 .. ..
1988 120 .. ..

See also

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