BANK TOP

Amid the North Yorkshire Moors is the isolated location of Rosedale, once the centre of ironstone extraction.
In the 1856 this now peaceful spot was a hive of industrial activity. This is Bank Top, a centre for the transportation of stone ore by rail to the giant steel works at Middlesbrough.
The nearest mine was Hollins Mine, which closed in 1886, and the ore was moved to Bank Top via an inclined tramway. The complex here also included coal depots, railway cottages (still standing) and an engine shed.

Today, when the fog lifted for a while, it shone in the stormy skies and the occasional rays of sun. Then the rain came again and we got absolutely soaked to the skin. The row of arches are the remains of kilns. Iron ore was tipped into the kilns and roasted (calcination) to remove impurities. This process both reduced the weight of the ironstone and made it more pure for the blast furnaces.