2-362-365 - Worldwide Photography/Heritage-Images

Manvers Main Colliery, Wath upon Dearne, near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, 1963. Taken for a cover image for the NCB Coal Quarterly Magazine, the photograph shows a British Coal worker on a gantry above a rail truck. Manvers was sunk on land belonging to Earl Manvers in in the late 1800s and this was followed by the second shaft, sunk between 1900 and 1901. A third shaft was added later. Manvers was the regional headquarters for British Coal and the also housed laboratories. The site also included the Manvers coking plant which was at the time the largest industrial site in Europe. The coking works closed in 1981 with the colliery closure following a few years later on 25th March 1988. The site later became home to one of the largest warehouses in Europe, belonging to the Next group, as well as many national call centres which include O2, the RSPCA, RBS and EON.