One of the last deep tin mines in Cornwall, this mine closed in the 1980s and has now been converted into a museum and tourist attraction. Victory shaft and the mine buildings are situated on the site of the former North Levant Mine, which was incorporated with the Geevor sett in 1920. The original Geevor Mine sett lay about 250m further southeast (closer to Pendeen village).
An extensive history of the mine is recorded in "GEEVOR", by Cyril Noall.
Tin and copper have been mined from the general area of Geevor since at least the late 1700s. It was originally a small enterprise known as Wheal an Giver, "a piece of ground occupied by goats". The area was worked under the name of North Levant Mine until 1891 when it closed. During the 1880s there had been up to 176 workers at the mine, but in the ten years after North Levant's closure the site saw only intermittent activity by a few miners.
The Wethered shaft (named for Oliver Wethered, one of the founders of the mine) was begun in 1909 and initial development occurred around it. By 1919, the works were moving west toward the coastline and the Victory shaft (named to celebrate the end of the First World War) was sunk about 540 metres to the north-west.
By the 1970s Geevor's sett covered an area of about three square miles and included Boscaswell Downs mine, Pendeen Consols and Levant mine. In 1985 the International Tin Council failed and there was a dramatic fall in the price of the metal. The mine struggled on for a few years, but closed in 1990, and the pumps were switched off in May 1991 allowing the workings to flood. The mine is not geologically exhausted of tin, it is exhausted of tin that is recoverable economically.
Notes on the mineral list:
- Botallackite has not been reported from the Geevor lodes. All specimens reputedly found at Geevor mine came from the Levant workings (mostly from South lode) with which Geevor is connected underground.
References
- Rocks & Min.: 22:1030;
- Bureau of Mines Mineral Trade Notes (June 20, 1947).
- Elton, N.J. and Hooper, J.J. (1993). "Sodium-zippeite from Geevor mine, St Just, Cornwall." Mineralogical Magazine, 57, 352-354.
- Elton, N.J. and Hooper, J.J. (1992). "Andersonite and Schröckingerite from Geevor mine, Cornwall: two species new to Britain." Mineralogical Magazine, 56(1), 124-125.
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