FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[colin robinson]

Tobi, I've been down Florence mine quite a few times and know the Lonely Hearts area. It is not far from either the Florence shaft or the Ullcoats workings so the idea of it being long and lonely work makes no sense at all when you consider that all hard rock mining is long and lonely work for the small gang of men pushing forward a heading. A more likely explanation is that it's a little joke among the miners. Cumbrians are good at that sort of thing!

The drift driven from surface is what we up here call a dib or dip shaft and is either an incline or decline..depending.

Beckermet didn't produce much of note apart from the Banana Slide calcites but I have found small blue fluorites on the dump from no. 1 shaft.

The pumps, headframe and winding gear at Florence are still fully functional and the mine could easily be re-opened if we could find someone to pay the pumping costs. Any takers out there?

[Tobi]

[Philip Mostmans]

Hi Colin,

Good to hear from you again, it's been a while.

Thank you for the background information.

As much as I would like to help out reopening the Florence mine, I'm afraid my current account balance the pumps would not last more than several days. Perhaps if we all tried our luck in the lottery? :-)

[Tobi]

Two more classics from Cumbrian mines:

[James Catmur]

Thank you Tobi - nice specimens for the region. Let's have some more folks!

[Jesse Fisher]

Okay, if you insist!

Fluorite on Baryte from the Dow Scar Level, Hilton Mine, Scordale, Cumbria (formerly Westmorland). The specimen was recovered in 1970 by Mick Sutcliffe and Lindsay Greenbank. The Hilton Mine is one fo the few locations in the North Pennines where fluorite and Baryte occur in the same orebody.

[Tobi]

[Jesse Fisher]

A nice hematite-stained calcite twin from the West Cumbrian Iron Ore Field.

[colin robinson]

Jesse, there are many locations along the boundary between the barium and fluorite zones that have both minerals together although they don't produce much in the way of specimen material which is probably why they are not that well known. Once you get down into the Askrigg block the association is very common. A couple of weeks ago I was collecting some very nice cockscomb Baryte clusters on fluorite with a secondary growth of small fluorites on the Baryte blades. I'm sure you're as aware as I am that a lot of rare/uncommon material is only so because nobody has bothered to publish a paper on it. Some of us just like digging holes and hitting rocks with a big hammer!

[Jesse Fisher]

I've seen plenty of fluorite-Baryte combos from North Yorkshire - Coldstones Quarry, Wetgrooves, etc. Weardale region's another story.

[colin robinson]

Kidney ore hematite from Kelton Fell mine, Kirkland, Cumbria. This mine was worked in the Ordovician rocks of the Lake District and not the carboniferous where most of Cumbria's hematite came from.

[colin robinson]

Another kidney ore, this time from New Parkside mine, Frizington. This is from the shaft dump of pit no. 7.

[colin robinson]

A thumbnail Hilton fluorite showing the 'Hilton blue' line just below the surface. This one is from the flats on Dowscar High Level.

[colin robinson]

Interesting edge-modification on this fluorite crystal from Birkett Common. It is approx. 6mm and associated with all sorts of other stuff !

[colin robinson]

[colin robinson]

Jackstraw cerussite crystals to 1cm from Barrow mina, Braithwaite, Cumbria.

[colin robinson]

Double-terminated baryte crystals to 2cm with calcite from Frizington Parks mine.

[colin robinson]

Prismatic baryte crystals to 12mm from Kinniside mine.

[colin robinson]

Calcite crystals with hematite inclusions from Lonsdale Mine, Frizington.

[Jordi Fabre]