Thanks for the kind words fellas. Wishfull asked "tell us a bit more about yourself, do you have a detector ?"
No, I don't do any gold detecting, too old for it now anyway, but I did try it back in the 1970's when it was first becoming a popular means of prospecting. I have always had really bad Tinnitus and back then I found the beeping noise of the gold detector in my ears all day was really annoying. More annoying than the fact that I only found old horseshoes, nails, and bottle-tops, with the new-fangled device so I gave it up as a bad joke.
I've always been interested geology, mineralogy and crystallography but left school too early to get any education in those fields so I'd buy books on those subjects in an effort to learn what I could. I also had a great passion for Australian gold mining history and spent many happy hours with a couple of mates of mine fossicking for gold, collecting rocks and minerals, and camping out in the scrub. Both of those old mates have gone to the great gold rush in the sky now but I remember well the good times we had together. I found out that my Scottish ancestors were all miners so it's in the genes I guess
mudgee hunter says- "Don't be shy... write a story for us to read!".
Well, it's funny you should say that mh because it so happens that some months ago I did decide to do just that, write the story of my life at the A1 Mine. I'm fairly slow at typing mind you, but so far I've written 20 pages containing nearly 13,000 words and there's still an awful lot to add. I won't post the whole thing here because somebody's bound to plagiarise it and I'm hoping, if it's good enough when finished, it might make a small contribution to the vast amount of literature of Australian mining history.
In my opening post I said I worked at the A1 mine in the early '80's when in fact I meant the late '80's, from 1986 to the end of 1989. I saw the mine progress from a smallish, one owner operation with a 10 head battery and fifteen men on the payroll , to a huge Melbourne based company with four board directors, and over a hundred employees. By then it boasted a seven ton per hour ball mill, and a purpose built cyanide treatment plant.
Here is a small extract of my memoirs for you to chew over. It tells of the time when I first went to the A1 Mine Settlement for a pre-arranged job interview with the underground manager. I've edited out full names some personal details of course -
".....and so it was that in May 1986 my wife and I drove over the Victorian highlands (which form the southern part of Australia's Great Dividing Range) in our Toyota Land Cruiser on our way to the A1 mine. Our route from xxxxx via Licola, took us over Mt. Selma and down into the headwaters of the Goulburn River. Steep, rugged, mountainous country, in which the A1 Mine Settlement is located. This journey took about eight hours to complete and our intention was to spend a few days at the company owned house of my mate "D" and his wife. During those few days at the settlement an interview was arranged with the mines underground manager "C". The job interview was very friendly and laid back and took place in the kitchen of C's small house beside Raspberry Creek., Unbeknownst to me, my mate D had told them that I was a good worker and had been in a few mines! So I was kinda caught off guard when C said, I hear youve been in a few mines, so youd know how to use a Bogger and a Scraper then? I had no idea what the hell he was talking about but decided that honesty was probably the best policy here, so I answered, Well, its true I have been in some mines, but I never actually worked in them, so I really havent a clue what you mean. C just grinned a big smile as if he was pleased with himself for catching me out, but he must have been satisfied with my answer because towards the end of the interview he suggested I go down underground tomorrow morning to spend a day with the crew working on No.16 Level, ......to see if you can handle it, he said. Working deep underground is not suited to everyones taste so this was really a test to see if I could cope with the conditions. I was to spend the day working with D and three other men who made up the No.16 Level crew.
Bright and early next morning I did go underground into the A1 Mine. I experienced for the first time the uneasy feeling of squeezing into the confined space of the small four-man cage and descending rapidly down the dark, damp, narrow shaft to No.16 Level plat, deep down in the bowels of the earth. Here, some distance along the south drive on 16 Level, I spent the entire shift helping the crew build a new ore chute using large heavy hardwood timbers. It turned out to be an experience I thoroughly enjoyed. The world down there around 1600 feet below the surface was so different to anything Id known. Wearing a miners helmet and cap-lamp with heavy battery strapped to your waist was unusual in itself but everything down there looked so surreal in the light of that lamp. On the surface, even on the darkest night with no moon you will begin to see shapes and shadows and find your way around, as your eyes get used to the lack of light. But underground, the darkness is absolute. Turn off your cap lamp and you are immediately enveloped in a complete and seemingly impenetrable blackness that no eyes can adjust to. A fatal fall down an unseen ore-pass would be the inevitible result of wandering blindly around in that awful darkness. The cap-lamp and battery were vital to the life of a miner, as was the wax candle, oil lamp, and carbide gas lamp of earlier times. Light allowed him to work in safety and kept him alive. The air underground at this mine was a constant warm 28C to 30C degrees and the humidity very high. Everything was damp to the touch and water always dripped from the walls and roof of the tunnels. The mine was thick with the smell of mud, mould, newly cut timber, and machine oil, all blended in together in the steamy air. Later on, with experience I got used to the smells and even learned the difference in the smell of the various rock types we worked with and the various types of fungus that grew on the damp timbers.
Having survived my trial day underground, and having enjoyed it immensely without fear or any claustrophobic reactions, I came to the surface at the end of the shift and was struck immediately by the glare of late afternoon daylight and the smell of fresh air, heavy with the scent of eucalyptus from the Mountain Ash forests which covered the surrounding mountains. As I walked to the changing shed to return my borrowed cap-lamp and helmet I met up with the underground manager again who asked how I went. I told him I enjoyed the day very much and would he mind if I went underground again tomorrow?. Not at all was his reply and laughingly added that management would be pleased to have another day of my free labour. I asked if hed come to a decision about a fulltime position for me and he replied Oh yes, youve got the job, didnt I tell you yesterday?........continued.
That's just a piece of the story I'm writing to give you an example. As it turned out I had a few weeks to wait until accommodation at that small settlement became available before I could officially start the job. But on the very first day I was taken down to No. 17 Level South drive, introduced to a bloke who was to be my offsider and then shown what my duties would be. The South drive had been first worked in 1948. It was approximately 1700 feet underground, was 500 feet in length and had been driven through the hard, greenish coloured, grano-diorite **** to gain access to a couple of good sized quartz reefs, in particular the No.17 Reef which was well known and very rich. Over the years this drive fell into disuse and when I arrived on the scene it was completely blocked. Rotting timbers, old rusting mine machinery, rocks the size of family sedans and all kinds of dirt and rubble choked the drive for it's entire length. My job from that very first day was to clear it all out and re-timber the drive as we progressed. The object was to re-open the drive to allow safe access for mining operations to continue on from where it had left off all those years ago. In other words I was employed as a mine rehabilitator and I'm proud to say I saw it through from the very first day to the very last. The goal was finally reached after 18 months of hard graft, most of it done with a banjo and pelican pick, scraper, and bogger. Every rock that made it's way to the surface could be not much larger than a football or they'd get jammed in the ore shutes so, for the first few months, rocks as big as your mum's kitchen table we broke down to rubble manually with a spoiler (a kind of sledge hammer) until I obtained my shotfirer's black ticket and was allowed to use explosives to "turn 'em to talc" (as one miner use to say). It is interesting to note that all the dirt and rubble we removed from the floor of that one drive went through the ore treatment plant on the surface and it alone was paying the weekly wages for the whole mine workforce for the duration.
Well, that's enough for now. As you can see it's a topic close to my heart and I think I could write a book about it. Whether or not any reader will find it interesting is another thing. I would be interested in your comments.
Cheers.
