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460 Kms. North-East of Adelaide and 110 Kms. South-West of Broken Hill.

Mr. Arthur J Smith first pegged a claim in March 1906 and it was known as Smith’s Carnotite Mine, later to become Radium Hill.

Mr. Smith worked the mine for the next two years and (Sir) Douglas Mawson, an outstanding  geologist and explorer named the site Radium Hill (1906) and the mineral “Davidite”, which contained radium, uranium, plus ilmenite, rutile, magnetite, hematite, pyrite, chalcopyrite intergrown with quartz and biotite, together with minor amounts of chromium, vanadium, and molybdenum.

 

The claim lapsed in 1908 but was then taken up by the Radium Hill Company when more shafts were sunk and a total of 350 milligrams of radium were prepared, together with 150 kg. of uranium. Radium Keith Lively was born at the Mine in 1913. The miners and their families lived in tents and humpies on the banks of Olary Creek. Mining ceased in 1914 at the outbreak of World War I. In 1923 the Radium and Rare Earth Treatment Company N.L. restarted mining operations which ceased in 1931.

 

Radium Lively’s elder brother Harry was a miner who suffered the only serious accident during this time when while “bogging out”, his shovel struck a detonator which exploded and caused the shovel to take off his left heel.

The next phase of activity commenced in 1944 when Reg Sprigg, a government geologist, accompanied by Harry Lively and Tommy Carpenter made a detailed geological survey. In 1946 the Department of Mines commenced preliminary exploration work followed by diamond drilling in 1947. By 1950 a camp of 40 men had been established. In March 1952 an agreement was entered into between the Commonwealth Government, the Government of South Australia, the Combined Development Agency of the United States and the United Kingdom – which provided for the purchase of the uranium output, initially for defence purposes.

Immediately after the signing of the agreement plans were formulated and executed to bring the mine into production. Men who played key roles in the development of this project were Sir Thomas Playford, Premier of South Australia, Sir S. Ben Dickinson, Director of Mines, Reg Sprigg Geologist G.P.H. Jeffery, Chief Executive Officer, and Terry Rogers, General Manager. The mine was officially opened on 10 November 1954 by the then Governor General, Field Marshall Sir William Slim.

The Main Shaft was sunk to a depth of 420 metres, topped by a headframe 40 metres high. The longest  underground drive extended from the Main Shaft at co-ordinate 6800N to3800N a distance of 915 metres. The orebody lodes  dipped at angles from 30 to 70 degrees and ranged up to 5 metres in width averaging 1.2 metres. Mining methods followed conventional procedures for narrow stope mines as practised elsewhere in Australia. A large upcasting exhaust fan designed to 

operate in conjunction with the downcasting main shaft was the principle mine ventilation system. 

The ore was hoisted to the surface in skips at a speed of 305 metres per minute where it was crushed to –1.5” and pre-concentrated by Heavy Media separation using Ferrosilican suspension S.G. 2.85.  Further fine grinding by Ball Mills prepared the ore for the Flotation process where reagents of diesel fuel, linseed fatty acids, peltogen, and cresylic acid enabled uranium enriched concentrate to be filtered from waste material. A total of 150,000 tons of concentrate were railed to Pt. Pirie for further refining which produced 860 tons of yellow cake.

This yellow cake was worth about 15 million pounds whilst the Government had invested 6.75 million pounds in developing the Radium Hill and Pt. Pirie centres. The mine was officially closed on December 21, 1961. A total of more than 3000 people had worked at Radium Hill for varying periods of time during the life of the mine. Unfortunately by 1987 there were 54 ex-miners who had died of lung cancer.

The supply of electrical power to the field was by means of a high voltage (132,000volts) transmission line from Morgan some 201Kms. distance.

Because the average rainfall was only 190 mm. per year and the evaporation rate about 2.500m., water was piped in from Umberumberka Reservoir near Broken Hill, some 85 Kms. distance. The maximum delivery rate was 5.6 million litres per week. Cost, 23 shillings (1/10th of a week's wages) per 1000 gallons (4550 Litres).