Ballingarry Coal Mines.

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Ballingarry Coal Mines are located near the village of Ballingarry, County Tipperary, Ireland. close to the border with County Kilkenny, the mines are now disused and have flooded. The ballingarry mines produced anthracite, a hard, smokeless fuel with a high calorific value which produced relatively little ash content when burned.

The Ballingarry Mines are an extension of the Leinster coalfields which include the better known Castlecomer mines in County Kilkenny. The deposits in ballingarry are highly faulted consisting of three strata the lowest averages only 9 inches (229 mm) thick the other two averaging 24 inches ( 610 mm), throught its history flooding flooding form the nearby mountains was an everpresent problem.

The mine was opened some time around 1826 by The mining Company of Ireland by the 1840's the mine was producing about 50,000 tons a year, by 1866 twelve mines were in opperation in the area. Many of these were later abandoned and between the years of 1941/50 those remaining were managed by the government under the name Mianrai Teo.

In 1953 the mining rites to the area were purchased by Mayo man Tommy O'Brien for £50,000, O'Brien was recently returned from Lancashire in England, within a short time many returned to the area to work in the mines, within three years 330 were employed in the mines and the outlook looked good wath a new pit opened nearby at Gurteen and imported British coal up £1 10s a ton in the Dublin market. Wages paid to the miners varied between £15 and £25 Ir depending on quantity of coal produced.

Unfortunately by the early 1970's the mines were in financial difficulties, in 1971 100 miners lost their jobs the following year a further 150 jobs were lost when the mines went into receivership. In 1973 an undergroung fire occured which fortunately did not claim any lives, shortly after the mines closed and the pumps turned off, resulting in the mines flooding.

In 1978 Kealy Mines was formed to exploit the Tipperary coal, this company was owned by Patrick Keating a civil enginee from Ballylooby in Tipperary and Gilbert Howley, a County Mayo man, they reopened the Lickfinn mine near New Birmingham employing 34 people. The Electricity Supply Board initally expressed an interest in purchasing the coal, tests were done in a turf burning station which resulted in the firebars overheating.

Financing their operations became a problem for Kealy Mines and the company was taken over by a Canadian consortium in 1982. Flair Resources Ltd., trading as Tipperary Anthracite which was headed by John Young, a Tipperary emigrant to Canada. Tipperary Anthracite increased the workforce to 80 people and made some investment in new plant and machinery, to extract the estimated reserves in the pit of some 3 million ton. However by 1985 Tipperary Anthracite were in financial difficulties and were forced into reeivership. Ablack cloud overhung the whole affair when financial irregularities regarding IDA grants were investigated by the Gardai and highlighted on RTÉ current affairs programme 'Today Tonight'.

In 1989, Emereld Resources was granted a licence to reopen the mines and for a while sporadic work continued at Lickfinn-Earl's Hill.Unfortunately this was short lived and the mine soon closed, today there is little evidence in Tipperary of an industry which sustained many hundreds of families.