Mining History Moves, Literally!
The big shovel at Hill Annex Mine is moving.
By Britta Arendt
For nearly 50 years, Hill Annex State Park offered a lesson in Minnesota’s iron ore mining history from the town of Calumet.
At its height, this mine was the largest producer of royalty ore for the state of Minnesota, fueling the steel industry during two world wars. Then, in 1978, when ore recovery was low, operations at the pit shut down, the buildings and equipment were sold to the state and tours were soon available.
As part of establishing the mine as a park, the state converted the Community Club building (circa 1915) into a museum and visitors center and preserved other buildings at the site, including a laboratory and maintenance shop as well as a 107-year-old wooden water tower. In 1986, Hill Annex Mine was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. When it was
officially named a State Park in 1988, the legislature preserved its prospect with future mining.
The 625 acres of School Trust Lands at the site still hold significant mineral potential. Calumet Reclamation Company has plans to reclaim previously mined materials, or tailings, through a process called scram mining.
During the years while mining ceased, it was one of just a few locations in the state where prehistoric fossils were accessible to human exploration. With the mine left mostly undisturbed for years, paleontologists from the Science Museum of Minnesota were able to study ancient
drainage systems of the Cretaceous Period.
The most famous fossil to come from Hill Annex was found during the summer of 1967 by Vincent and Gary Garlough. The brothers found a piece of a crocodilian skull that was later confirmed to be a Teleorhinus or prehistoric marine crocodile.
Visitors who took the tour of the park learned about the process of mining iron ore while aboard a trolley bus. The trolley conductor would narrate the mine’s story as he drove past decades of mining dust, down into the mine pit and through a ghost town of historical buildings left as if miners stopped working just a few days prior.
One of the park’s most popular
attractions was a massive loading shovel once used in open-pit mining. Big enough to hold an entire family, the digger was a popular spot for photos.
In preparation for the return of mining at the site, Hill Annex was removed from the park list two years ago. Since then, the DNR has led efforts to preserve the important history of the mine operation, the people who worked there and the communities surrounding it.
Working together, the DNR, IRRR and local community partners have found new homes for the mining equipment and artifacts from the park’s Clubhouse Museum – in places where they can
continue to be enjoyed by the public.
The cities of Calumet, Marble, Bovey, Coleraine and Nashwauk have all taken pieces of Hill Annex to be displayed in their public spaces. Museums like the Minnesota Discovery Center, Itasca Historical Society and Minnesota Museum of Mining have also rehomed items from the site for mining exhibits.
Bovey Clerk Tara Werth said her city took some of the engineering items from the Hill Annex Museum. She said the process took about a year to find places for all of the historical artifacts.
“We plan to create historic displays in City Hall for now but the larger plan is a welcome center or museum,” explained Werth. “We also received some very huge tires and they are being used as play equipment in the dog park which is set to open June 1.”
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About the company mining the area:
Calumet Reclamation Company, founded by Hibbing native Jim Bougalas, plans to reclaim the stockpiles left behind at Hill Annex Mine to supply its sister company, North American Iron, with pig iron production in North Dakota. The company expects to create 150 local jobs, generate
$450 million in taxes and royalties, and support a “fully domestic supply chain for America’s steel industry,” according to the company’s website (calumetreclamation.com). In November 2022, Calumet Reclamation Company, a subsidiary of Scranton Holding Company,
of Hibbing, Minn., was granted a 20-year lease on the property estimated to contain 150 million tonnes of legacy mine tailing stockpiles. The stockpiles are located within a 20-mile area adjacent to Calumet and east of Marble, Minn.
With long-term leases on in-ground minerals already established for the Hill Annex Site, 80% of all proceeds from those state leases and mineral royalties will go to the Permanent School Trust Fund to benefit K-12 public schools in Minnesota.
