BIG WHEEL

Series

Series Name

Mining Review 18th Year

Issue

Issue No.

4

Date Released

Dec 1964

Stories in this Issue:

1. 1WARM AS TOAST
2. 2CONGRATULATIONS, GEORGE!
3. 3BIG WHEEL
4. 4DOWN TO THE SEA

Story

Story No. within this Issue

3 / 4

Summary

BFI synopsis: the ingenious invention used by lead miners on the Isle of Man.
NCB Commentary - The Isle of Man.
People come to the Island for the sea - the countryside - and the amusements.
But one of the most popular tourist attractions is a piece of mining equipment.
The Lady Isabella, as the locals call it, is almost 70-ft. high and perhaps the largest water-wheel in the world.
It’s 100-years-old. It was designed by Engineer Robert Casement. The Great Laxey Water-wheel, to give it its proper name, used to pump water out of the lead mines.
The water which drove it, passed along the aqueduct and fed onto the wheel. The drive was taken from the big crank and passed along to the pithead through a system of rods.
As well as pumping out water, the rods were used to get the men down the mine.
In 1929 the mine was closed by the depression. The crank at the pit-head no longer moves. The wheel doesn’t pump water any more, but has become a spectacle admired perhaps more for the views from the top, than for the work it did for three-quarters of a century.
A tourist attraction, but also a remarkable tribute to the ingenuity and engineering ability of its creator, the engineer, Robert Casement.

Keywords

Mining; Engineering; History and archaeology; Inventions and discoveries

Locations

Isle of Man

Written sources

British Film Institute Databases   Used for synopsis
The National Archives COAL 32   /13 Scripts for Mining Review, 1960-1963

Credits:

Sponsor

National Coal Board

Production Co.

National Coal Board Film Unit