Splitting of the slate blocks with hammer and chisel to produce roofing slates requires great skill. This process was not mechanised until the second half of the 20th century, and some slate is still produced in this way. These quarrymen are working at the Dinorwic Quarry, Wales, about 1910.
The existence of a slate industry in Wales is attested since the Roman period, when slate was used to roof the fort at Segontium, now Caernarfon. The slate industry grew slowly until the early 18th century, then rapidly during the Industrial Revolution in Wales until the late 19th century, at which time the most important slate producing areas were in northwest Wales. These sites included the Penrhyn Quarry near Bethesda, the Dinorwic Quarry near Llanberis, the Nantlle Valley quarries, and Blaenau Ffestiniog, where the slate was mined rather than quarried. Penrhyn and Dinorwig were the two largest slate quarries in the world, and the Oakeley mine at Blaenau Ffestiniog was the largest slate mine in the world.[1][2] Slate is mainly used for roofing, but is also produced as thicker slab for a variety of uses including flooring, worktops and headstones.[3]
Up to the end of the 18th century, slate was extracted on a small scale by groups of quarrymen who paid a royalty to the landlord, carted slate to the ports, and then shipped it to England, Ireland and sometimes France. Towards the close of the century, the landowners began to operate the quarries themselves, on a larger scale. After the government abolished slate duty in 1831, rapid expansion was propelled by the building of narrow gauge railways to transport the slates to the ports.
The slate industry dominated the economy of north-west Wales during the second half of the 19th century, but was on a much smaller scale elsewhere. In 1898, a work force of 17,000 men produced half a million tons of slate. A bitter industrial dispute at the Penrhyn Quarry between 1900 and 1903 marked the beginning of its decline, and the First World War saw a great reduction in the number of men employed in the industry. The Great Depression and Second World War led to the closure of many smaller quarries, and competition from other roofing materials, particularly tiles, resulted in the closure of most of the larger quarries in the 1960s and 1970s. Slate production continues on a much reduced scale.
On 28 July 2021, the slate landscape of northwest Wales was awarded the status of a UNESCO World Heritage Site,[4] whilst as early as 2018 Welsh slate was designated by the International Union of Geological Sciences as a Global Heritage Stone Resource.[5][6]
^Jones p. 72
^"Story of Slate". Museum Wales. Retrieved 22 February 2023.
^Lindsay p. 133
^The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales; https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1633/
^"Designation of GHSR". IUGS Subcommission: Heritage Stones. Archived from the original on 24 February 2019. Retrieved 24 February 2019.
^"The Newsletter of the Heritage Stones Subcommission, A Subcommission of the International Union of Geological Sciences, Nº5, p. 4;" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 August 2021.
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