Lady Isabella - The Laxey Wheel
Trams
The earliest records of mining in Laxey date back to 1780, but the Great Laxey Mining Company was formed in 1846. This was at its most succesful in 1874, however it had already become the largest producer of zinc blende in Europe by 1854.
The Laxey Wheel was completed in 1854 and named after the Lady Isabella Hope, wife of the then Governor. The Mines engineer, Robert Casement, designed it under the direction of Richard Rowe, a Cornishman, and the most famous of the Mines Captains. The wheel is 72 1/2 feet in diameter and is capable of producing 200 horsepower. It was used to drive the pumping rods in the Engine shaft and could raise up to 250 gallons of water per minute by this method from 200 fathoms below the surface. As far as is known, this is the largest working water wheel in the world.
The most important mineral mined here though was lead with a high silver content. Between 1856 and 1913 the mine produced one fifth of the total British output of zinc.
The first proper records of men working in the mine are dates 1877 and show a total of 660 men employed, with 405 of them underground.
The mines closed in 1929, by which time, unfortunately, operations were limited and only a few people were employed.
The wheel is situated about one and a half miles from the chalets.