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 Post subject: Theall and McCollum Magentic mine / Croton Magnetic
PostPosted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 10:16 pm 
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
We made a trip up north this past weekend. While we were out, we stopped at the site of the former Theall and McCollum or Croton Magnetic mine. We were in the area and decided to check out what remains from the former mine site. Its definitely a very sad sight. The mine is certainly reclaimed. The former mining building\ which sat just outside of the mine opening was gone. No evidence other than a cleared out area in front of the mine. No steam engine, none of the old untouched remains are still on the site. The only structure that was left untouched was the old building with the steel door that was opposite the mine, on the other side of the clearing that was made. While I am not sure exactly what that was used for, it had cinderblock walls and looked to be more modern. It could have been used for when they grew mushrooms in the mine.

The new dirt pile was pretty high, much higher than the old pile. While there was a little settling of the pile, the mine is still closed. I will post some pictures that I took when we were there. This was certainly a big loss for us and it only appears the area was reclaimed to close the mine. It doesn't appear that they are building houses or anything else on the site.

Miner Greg


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 10:25 pm 
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
Here are some photos of the reclaimed mine site. For everyone who remembers this mine in it's former glory, here is how the mine looks now.

http://www.ironminers.com/mineforum/vie ... 691#105691


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PostPosted: Sat Aug 23, 2008 2:17 pm 
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Location: Winnemucca, NV
Its a shame that if they just wanted to close the mine, all they had to do was install a bat gat in front of the adit, and a gate on or around the shaft. That doesn't require any tearing down of historical buildings, destroying artifacts and would have saved the 1000's of bats that are now entombed and dead.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 3:42 pm 
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Location: Western PA
are there any pictures of the site prior to reclamation?

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed Aug 27, 2008 7:06 pm 
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Fortunately yes! We took a number of photographs of the ore storage bins, ore crusher, boilers, shed, and concentrating buildings before they were all destroyed. While the main adit has been backfilled for a while, it was still accessible by sliding down from a hole at the top. We took a number of photos underground.

It was actually quite a difficult process because the first 800 feet or so was entirely flooded. I had to prop the camera up on tripod, set it on timer, then quickly paddle a distance away but remain visible in the shot for perspective. This had to be done over and over again to even guarantee a half-way decent shot. Unfortunately we did have the opportunity to photograph as thoroughly as we would have liked to but I promise to place a slideshow up here for Croton Magnetic at some point.

Today, the mound of backfill is much higher and entry would have to be made with a backhoe, which unfortunately is unavailable for us at the site.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri Aug 29, 2008 3:25 pm 
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
We were very lucky to have somewhat documented this site, so I guess that is the only good news about this. There have been so many sites that were remediated before we got to visit them, so it is good that there was documentation done on it. This was an important wild life site for bats, and it is also very sad that their habitat was destroyed and that many bats were probably trapped inside of the mine.

Miner Greg


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PostPosted: Thu Sep 04, 2008 1:05 am 
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well, i'm looking forward to seeing what the place looked like. maybe yous could post a few pictures on the forum? do the slideshow some other time.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Thu Sep 04, 2008 7:26 am 
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Location: Monroe, CT
hey John- heres some pictures we took back in 2004

http://hometown.aol.com/oldclock50/Crot ... cMine.html

this was the most intact site i had ever seen for an 1800s mine


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri Sep 05, 2008 12:04 am 
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Location: Western PA
nice mike. thanks!

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PostPosted: Fri Sep 05, 2008 12:05 am 
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nice CT style, too.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri Sep 05, 2008 11:57 am 
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Here you go John, and everyone else. Here are pictures of Croton-Magnetic before the reclamation:

http://www.ironminers.com/mineforum/viewtopic.php?t=888

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Sep 09, 2008 1:36 am 
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thanks for the link. i remember seeing those pictures a while back.

now i know what you're talking about!

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 10:59 pm 
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Joined: Mon Jun 20, 2005 11:33 pm
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
If anyone else has any additional pictures of this site, please let us know or shoot us an email if you don't want to post on the forum.

You can use the link http://www.ironminers.com/contact/ to send us any anonymous messages (or non anonymous private messages) to tell us about anything you would like to in confidence.

Miner Greg


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:29 pm 
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Location: Monroe, CT
there was some pretty good info on this mine at the putnam county historical society, but really no pictures, that means that we may have done the most complete photo documentation of this mine ever, and only a matter of months before it was destroyed


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 11:20 pm 
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
Mike,

I think we were very lucky to document what we were able to as I am sure that this site was at risk for a long time. It is always possible people may have taken additional photos even outside the mine too. Anything anyone else would be willing to share would be helpful so that we can put together a nice collection of photos of this mine. Even if someone had photos that they didn't want posted to the IronMiners site, we would respect those wishes, but we'd love to have the opportunity to at least see them.

Miner Greg


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