Mount Keira Mining History

Mount Keira was the site of the first coal mine in the Illawarra region of NSW and so holds a significant place in the mining history of the State. Mount Keira is located approximately 10 kilometres west of Wollongong, and the mountain for which it is renowned sits 469 metres above sea level.

Land at Mount Keira was granted to the settler James Stares Spearing in 1825. By the 1830s Spearing had an extensive range of produce at his property Paulsgrove including fields of wheat, maize and barley, as well as an orchard and pig run. With the establishment of the Spearing family, other settlers followed and either purchased or were granted land at Mount Keira. The development of the town necessitated the establishment of a road linking Mount Keira with Wollongong and as a result Mount Keira Road was built in 1835 using convict labour, as were other roads in the vicinity.

Coal was purportedly first discovered at Mount Keira in 1839 by William Branwhite Clarke, a clergyman and geologist who was paramount in the detection of mineral resources in Australia. The first mine at Mount Keira was the Albert Coal Mine which produced coal from the Wongawilli and Bulli seams. Mining operations at Mount Keira commenced in 1848, and in 1849 the first coal was transported from the mountain in horse-drawn carts. The mine was located on the property of James Shoobert who opened two tunnels on the slopes of the mountain to facilitate the transportation of coal. This mine however was abandoned in 1856. [1]

In 1857 a new mine, the Osborne Wallsend Colliery, was opened, and on the 16th of April 1857, 3.5 tonnes of coal was transported by bullock team from the mine to the wharf at Belmore Basin in order to be shipped to Sydney. [2]  The use of bullock teams to transport the coal down the mountain was considered to be inefficient and the mine owner, Henry Osborne, petitioned the Government to build a tramway. In 1861, following the passing of the Mount Keira Tramways Act in Parliament, construction of a tramway began which was to link Mount Keira to the port at Wollongong. In 1878 steam locomotives were introduced, which remained in use until 1954. In 1888 the railway between Sydney and Wollongong was officially opened and became the dominant means of transporting coal, replacing the shipping method. By the 1870s the coal produced at the mine was considered to be of such exceptional quality that it was shipped internationally to India and parts of Asia. 

In the early twentieth century the Mount Keira mine was producing approximately 600 to 700 tonnes of coal per day. [3]  By the 1930s however, the coal production had slumped and workers were only employed intermittently. In 1937 BHP became the owners of the Osborne Wallsend Colliery so as to supply coal to its expanding steelworks at Port Kembla. [4]  The Mount Pleasant Colliery, part of the Osborne Wallsend Colliery, was closed in 1939 and reopened in 1951, only to be closed definitively in 1955 when the coal was exhausted.

The Mount Keira mine was progressively modernised during the twentieth century, in particular with the Samson Coal Cutter being used from 1938, the introduction of the Jeffrey L400 Loaders in 1940, as well as an Atlas battery powered electric loco. [5]  In 1942 the Mount Keira mine was the first in Australia to use the diesel loco underground to transport the workers in and out of the pit. [6]  In 1947 work began on the Kemira tunnel which by 1954 was being used to transport coal. The Osborne Wallsend Colliery became part of Kemira Colliery in 1955, which combined the mines at Mount Keira and neighbouring Mount Kembla. In 1965 Mt Keira became the first mine in NSW to successfully use the longwall technique to extract coal. [7]

Until its closure in 1991, the mine at Mount Keira, dating back to the original mine-site from 1848, was the longest operating coal mine in Australia. The site was rehabilitated by 2005. Mount Keira now hosts a park which extends for 9.4 hectares at the summit of the mountain and is used for recreational activities.

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