Dgwphotos

Newcastle, as it's name implies (taken from the City of Newcastle on Tyne, the famed coal mining city in England), was another important coal mining town in the early history of Washington State. The town was second only to Black Diamond in coal production in the state. Coal was mined in the region from the 1880's until 1963, though large scale production ended in the 1930's. Like Black Diamond and Franklin, it was a company town, orignally owned by the Oregon Improvement Company, which also owned Franklin (Black Diamond was founded by the Black Diamond Coal Company, which had previously mined near Nortonville, CA, before moving to the Pacific Northwest), which later sold both towns to the Pacific Coast Company when OIC went bankrupt. PCC also owned Black Diamond. The coal mining area is now largely a part of King County's Cougar Mountain Regional Wildland Park. The Ford Slope Mine was the largest producer of the Newcastle area, and operated from 1906 to 1926. The shaft

I was able to work more on the Roslyn IR project just before graduation. I was hoping to finish up the project around September, but was never able to do so. (Hopefully I will be able to do so this spring, as Roslyn's snowed in right now.) I'm not sure what this structure was, but it bears some resemblance to a fan house, though it's much smaller, and there is no exhaust vent or housing for the fan itself. It's near the site of the No.1 and No.2 mines. This is another unknown foundation from the site of the No.1 and No.2 mines. This structure is the concrete tunnel that made up part of the No. 3 mine in Ronald, a small town about two miles from Roslyn, and also owned and operated by the Northwest Improvment Company as part of the Roslyn coal field. The shaft appears to have been closed by the Federal Office of Surface Mining by knocking the shaft down. (I've seen a photo of this shaft in its original configuration on Ghosttowns.com.) I like the quality of the IR tha

One of my photos of Newcastle made the King County Parks blog !