Quincy Mine

When we were on vacation in August our family took a day trip north to visit the Quincy Mine in Hancock, MI.  My husband went to Michigan Tech University in Hancock for a few semesters before transferring to Concordia River Forest.  It was fun to drive through the town and see the places that he has told me stories about.

The mine itself was uber fascinating.  Here is a promotional video I found on YouTube.

The tour started inside the Hoist Building, where the steam engines that raised the lowered the ore and workers out of the ground were located.  The building itself was enormous because the hoist is the largest steam hoist in the world, sitting on top of the largest reinforced concrete engine foundation ever poured!  It was an engineering marvel when it was built in 1919, but in order to appeal to investors it was also designed to be beautiful.  The interior was covered with white subway tiles and shiny brass fixtures.  Swoon.

We then took a ride on the cog-wheel train down the hill to the mine tour entrance.  The miners would have gone into the mine vertically, but they have accessed the mine horizontally for tour purposes.

We are so glad that we went.  It was so enjoyable to learn about this particular place and time in history. I don't know that we will ever have reason to go back to the UP, but if ever we were nearby, I would take another tour of the mine in a heartbeat.