I wanted to describe what it would be like to mine with a pickaxe in my story, but I'm having trouble finding any resources that describe that style of mining since pickaxe's generally aren't used anymore.
I also wanted to include a fight scene were people used them as weapons.
Does anyone know of any good resources on historical styles of mining or using pickaxes?
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Nov 20, 2008 - 18 29
Look up anything published on the Pike's Peak gold rush, South Pass, Deadwood, the 49ers, etc. There are several history/historical archeology books about Mining Tools Technology, Miners, descriptions of the tent cities and excavating adits, shafts, prospect pits etc. as well as road building in the mountains.
Coal miners stories and memoirs might also help!
Fighting with pickaxes- it happened, bbut it's not easy. They are curved, designed to swing down and towards you, so as to strike and pry away from the rock face, so swinging at someone and actually hitting them with the sharp or pointy bits instead of bludgeoning them with the top curve would work best if you were above them.
Otherwise, I think it would be a lot like fighting with clumsy staves.
Have you considered crowbars and sledgehammers? Those are used with the pickax, and much handier in a fight.
82,895 / 50,000
Nov 21, 2008 - 01 26
Surface mining or underground?
If it's undeground then you/ they would have been using a miner's pick, smaller than the one you usually find, lighterr and short enough to be swung single handed in a small space - try mining museum websites for pictures, Cornwall etc.
Yes, you could have a fight with a pick axe, you can have a fight with anything but it wouldn't be the best of weapons, needs a sliding two hand grip to get maximum force and doesn't work too well out of the vertical. Give them guns or saucepans or waffle irons or something else!
51,455 / 50,000
Nov 21, 2008 - 17 04
My novel's set during the California Gold Rush, and while my miner isn't using a pick axe (though I'm sure he owns one), I'd actually recommend raiding the history section of your local public library--particularly the Children's Section.
While it may be a little embarrassing to haul a bunch of kids books to the checkout counter, they're actually really great ways to learn a lot of information in a short amount of time. I suspect you could find a fairly good overview of the mining process from such books. I know I did. Good luck to you! :D
51,569 / 50,000
Nov 28, 2008 - 12 01
Children's books are AMAZING resources! Yes indeed!
I heartily concur with this recommendation -
and am often seen with stacks of kids books under my arm!
While it may be a little embarrassing to haul a bunch of kids books to the checkout counter, they're actually really great ways to learn a lot of information in a short amount of time. I suspect you could find a fairly good overview of the mining process from such books. I know I did. Good luck to you! :D
66,952 / 50,000
Nov 28, 2008 - 12 47
Nothing of any help here, but... everything I see the title of this thread, I read it as "Mining with a pancake". Every. Time.
101,965 / 50,000
Nov 28, 2008 - 14 19
for mining with a pickaxe, the resources already shared are good
I actually saw two men start to fight wiht pickaxes - they BOTH put their feet on the metal head and slid it off -- so they then had two solid bits of wood to fight with --
much easier to fight AND defend like that....
CJ
101,965 / 50,000
Nov 28, 2008 - 14 20
oh and waht are you mining?
cos most mining would START with a pickaxe to creat a hole or crack -- then they would put wooden wedges in the crack or hole and use great big hammers to split the rock,
so the pickaxe would not be used for stone or rock as much as for dirt
CJ