Australia's first big iron ore mining from the 1890s at Iron Knob on the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia

Iron Knob township and hill on Eyre Peninsula, South Austraia, in 1932.
Image by J.S. Palmer, courtesy State Library of South Australia 

Australia’s first commercial iron ore mining was started at Iron Knob, on South Australia's Eyre Peninsula, in the 1890s by the Mount Minden Mining Company.

Before that, the first small deposits of iron ore, found close to Adelaide in the 1840s, were used as flux in the copper smelters at Kapunda, Burra and Wallaroo.

By 1870, it was suggested that the South Australian governor give a £2,000 bonus for the first 500 tons of marketable pig iron smelted from South Australian ore.

The first iron ore was produced at Gawler, north of Adelaide, in 1871 followed by smelters that opened at Mount Jagged near Victor Harbor in 1873. Early in 1879, the Port Augusta iron works were operating.

In 1890, the Iron Monarch Company sank several shafts near Iron Knob but only found copper. Mount Minden Mining Company found iron and worked leases at the Iron Knob and Iron Monarch deposits in the 1890s. But, in 1896, it forfeited these leases for not paying rent.

BHP (Broken Hill Proprietary) pegged out claims over the area to secure its supply of flux for the Port Pirie lead smelters. The leases were granted in 1899, at £2 per year. (The leases were extended in 1920 and 1937, the second being granted on condition that BHP would build a blast furnace at Whyalla.)

Initially, ore was taken by bullock teams to Port Augusta and loaded on barges for transport to the Port Pirie smelters, replacing the flux previously obtained from Donnelly's Quarries near Quorn. By 1902, a tramway to Hummock Hill (Whyalla) and a jetty had been completed.  In 1907, the Iron Knob mine employed 60 men who produced 2,500 tons of iron ore per week. After 1915, production rose as the mine began supplying ore to the Newcastle steelworks.