
While making a preliminary survey of the Hunter River in 1797, Lieutenant John Shortland reported finding coal in the region. After several aborted attempts, coal mining was underway in earnest by the 1830s. This newsreel item from 1957 depicts miners entering and leaving the Awaba State Coal Mine near Newcastle. We see them underground using picks and shovels and loading coal onto carts pulled by pit pony. The clip then shows the ‘modern way’ to mine coal, with advances in technology involving more sophisticated machinery and transport.
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.