Threlkeld Quarry and Mine

Overview

Threlkeld, three miles east of Keswick, was worked for over a century as a microgranite quarry — and, on the same hillside, for lead and zinc since the 17th century — before closing in 1982 and reopening as the Lake District's mining museum.

History

The granite quarry was founded in the 1870s by H. Harkewitz, an entrepreneur of German descent, to supply railway ballast for the Penrith-Keswick line; output grew from a few hundred tons a year to 80,000 tons by 1894, as the stone found further markets supplying Manchester Corporation Waterworks' Thirlmere scheme, the Crewe-Carlisle railway, and roadstone and dressed facing stone for buildings across the north of England. Harkewitz formed the Threlkeld Granite Company in 1892 and also built a precast concrete works producing the ‘Threlkeld’ flagstones used in many northern towns. In 1936 the company merged with the Cumberland Granite Company of Embleton to form the Keswick Granite Company, and Threlkeld closed the following year as the less profitable of the two sites. It reopened in 1949 after modernisation for what proved its final phase of working; the internal railway was later dismantled in favour of trucks and excavators, and daily output reached 500 tons in the 1950s. The quarry, by then owned by ARC Ltd, finally closed in 1982. On the same hillside, Gategill and Woodend mines — together usually known as Threlkeld mine — had been worked separately for lead, and later also zinc and barytes, between 1661 and 1928.

What remains

The Lakeland Mines and Quarries Trust negotiated a lease in 1992 and, working with volunteers, restored buildings, cleared old plant foundations and landscaped the site to open the Threlkeld Quarry and Mining Museum, which now displays vintage excavators, cranes and locomotives, runs a narrow-gauge railway and an underground simulated mine tour, and holds a geological and mining museum covering the district's granite, lead, zinc, tungsten, graphite, barytes and fluorite workings.

Abandoned workings can be dangerous — unstable ground, uncapped shafts, flooding and bad air are common even where a site looks safe from the surface. This entry describes history and general location only; it is not an access guide.

Recorded claims

Individual factual claims, each attached to the source(s) that support it below. Where sources disagree, both are kept.

• Threlkeld's granite output grew from a few hundred tons a year at opening in the 1870s to 80,000 tons by 1894, as demand grew from railway ballast, roadstone and the Manchester Corporation Waterworks' Thirlmere scheme. ¹
• Threlkeld closed in 1937 after its 1936 merger with the Cumberland Granite Company of Embleton, being judged the less profitable of the two sites, before reopening in 1949 for its final 33 years of operation. ¹
• Nearby Gategill and Woodend mines, together known as Threlkeld mine, were worked for lead — and later also zinc and barytes — between 1661 and 1928. ²
• A March 2020 permission-visit report describes a steam-powered Ruston Bucyrus excavator surviving in deteriorating condition among the museum's collection, alongside restoration work by Lakeland Mines and Quarries Trust volunteers since 1992 to repair buildings and clear old plant foundations. (uncertain) ³

Photographs & further reading

This page doesn't try to reproduce everything — these are the best original sources found for this mine.

Images

Sources

1. (secondary) History — Threlkeld Quarry and Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Threlkeld Quarry and Mining Museum — Wikipedia
3. (observational) Threlkeld Mining Museum, Cumbria — March 2020 (permission visit) — 28DaysLater

Record created: 20 August 2026 · Last researched: 20 August 2026