Not Your Grandfathers Mining Industry, Nova Scotia, Canada

King Quarry

Quarries in Purcell’s Cove, some of the oldest quarries in Halifax, played a key role in building the city.

The King Quarry is likely the oldest quarry in Halifax. It began in the 1700s and like many former mines and quarries, it is now a beautiful lake. Former surface mines and quarries often become lakes because they naturally fill with rainwater and water from underground springs. Water is pumped out of most mines/quarries to keep them from filling so when operations are done and the pumping stops, the sites fill naturally.

King Quarry had two working areas, about 200 metres apart. The stone was hauled to a government wharf just east of the working areas and shipped around Point Pleasant Park to Halifax’s waterfront.

King Quarry produced what is called ironstone. The stone is 480 million years old and was a common building material in Halifax in the 1800s. The quarry's stone was used in many of Halifax's oldest and most beautiful buildings, including the legislature's foundation, the Morse’s Tea building and others around Historic Properties, the Citadel, Martello Tower in Point Pleasant Park, All Saints Cathedral, the lower 70 feet of the Dingle Tower, Fort Charlotte on George’s Island and Fort Clarence (where the Dartmouth oil refinery is today).

Ironstone oxidizes/rusts due to its high iron content. It was not considered the most attractive stone so it was often combined with granite or sandstone trim to make a building look better. As a 1914 government report put it, ironstone’s appearance is “not likely to encourage its use for any of the finer purposes.”

At its peak in the 1800s, King Quarry employed about 160 men and produced as much as 100 tons of stone per day.

The quarry’s output in 1910 was about 600 tons and the stone cost $2 per ton at the wharf for building blocks.

Like many old mines and quarries, King Quarry had different names under different operators. It has also been called Bluestone and Dalhousie, the latter because Dalhousie University was the quarry’s last owner and used its stone in many campus buildings.

There's also a Queen Quarry in Purcell's Cove. (Historical government-owned quarries were often named for whoever sat on England's throne at the time - sometimes kings, sometimes queens.)

The Queen Quarry was also one of the first to operate in Halifax. Its granite was used to build buildings like Martello Tower in Point Pleasant Park, the Citadel and Sherbrooke Tower on McNab’s Island. The government took the quarry over from contractor John Trider in 1828 when the Citadel’s reconstruction started.

Stone was moved by tram to the Queen Wharf in Purcell’s Cove and shipped to Halifax.

The Purcell’s Cove Quarry, another quarry nearby, was used for building stone after the Queen Quarry ceased production. Purcell’s Cove Quarry later also produced armour stone and rip rap. The quarry was semicircular in shape, 125 metres in diameter with the western face over 35 metres high. Holes were drilled at the top of the working face, filled with explosive and blasted to free stone so it could be collected. A home was built on the quarry floor after operations ceased.

The Coughlan Quarry was operated for several generations by the Coughlan family, stone cutters who produced monuments and building stone as far back as the early 1900s. A tram carried stone from the Coughlan Quarry to the Queen Wharf. This was the last quarry to operate in Purcells Cove – it shut down in the 1960s.