Sunday History Photo / Qld

Thanks Doug

Alan

Doug,
it is one of the strangest geo areas around. They mined gold copper right beside where they mined coal and the undergrounds go in under a high rock ridge.

Friends father worked there in the late 50's just before it closed. He later lost a leg, arm, eye and half his stomach when a ventilation fan disintegrated.

Great spot with some quality Brumbies running around. A bit of gold can still be detected around there as well. The property homestead/ hospital was still in good nick the last time I was there.

Thanks for the post.

G'day Doug T

Your post has been a very interesting read and a bit of a trip back into a slightly misty part of my working life in far north Queensland.

Way back then I had the pleasure of working along side a young bloke who was born and raised in Mount Molloy ~ a true north Queenslander who had a passion for his region and he had a certain gift when it came to telling a story or spinning a yarn as he would call it, the Mount Mulligan mine disaster and stories of Palmer River, Black Rock Mountain and Mitchell River were just a few young Graham would relive at the time.

There were still people in Mount Molloy back in 1983 that were directly related to some of the miners that were killed in the disaster, my connection to the region back then was also through mining at the Mount Carbine tungsten mine.

Thanks again Doug for the trip back through a moment in my life.

Safe travels : Joe Fury

Thanks for another interesting historical snippett, Doug.
Using "safe" and "underground coal mine" in the one sentence, appears to me to be the greatest oxymoron around.

My Grand-dad was a coal miner in Scotland, just North of Edinburgh. He lost a leg in a cave-in.
He was trapped by the rock fall, and they amputated his leg on the spot without anaesthetic, to save his life!
He was conscious all through the amputation, but lost consciousness when he was brought to the surface - and he was unconscious for three weeks afterwards!

Talk about tough in those days. No penicillin, nothing to stop the spread of gangrene and simple infections that we shrug off with a few pills today.
In those days, simple infections often meant death.
My Grandmother (this Grand-dads wife) died a few years after Grand-dads accident, of septicaemia - simple blood poisoning that is promptly fixed today with antibiotics.

One of their sons, my uncle, became a coal mine manager and was fatally gassed at the age of 44, leaving a wife and three children.
There's little to be said for the promotion of underground coal mining.
I guess it was necessary in the days of no mechanisation - but the toll from underground coal mining over the centuries, worldwide, has been horrendous.

Amazingly, Grand-dad lived a healthy long life after his trauma, he got to 85.
They made him paymaster at the mine after his accident and he never went underground again, ever.
When he died, he was in a retirement home. He had placed a newspaper over his face to have an afternoon nap, and when the staff went to wake him up, they couldn't wake him, he was gone.
That's got to be a good way to go - far better than being gassed, buried, or blown up in an underground mine.

Cheers, Ron

Hi Doug,I lived in Dimbulah for yrs and was a frequent visitor to that area.I worked for a time at Mt Arthur (wolfram mine) for a time.Its the same ore body that runs from Mt Molloy to Chilicoe.There is a small lake on top of the mountain and a water line feeds the old hospitals lawns.They need to leave a sprinkler going all the time,to releave pressure.I hunted pigs in the region.A mate worked as a ringer for the station and used to tell me where a scrubber bull or cow had died and i'd hit that area.Some real tough boars in that place.Have many fond memories of those years and the people.