# Coalmine 'Zeche Hugo'



## bartje (Apr 4, 2009)

Hit the road again with Martino ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/martino_) again today to do some urbexing again.

Long at both our lists stood the coalmine ´Zeche Hugo´.
Seeing some pictures of it recently made us going there and checking it out ourselve.

In the centre of the Ruhr-area you can find the remains of the coalmine 'Zeche Hugo'.
Started in 1873, closed in April 2000.
More as 125 years hundreds of miners worked here in shifts to bring the coal above the ground.
In the meantime the most of the buildings are demolished.
What is left are one of the towers and the buildings which contained the offices and the clothingrooms.
At the ceiling hundreds baskets still hanging on their chains
Once it hung here full with clothing of the miners, now its empty and abandoned for years.


Bart
www.urban-travel.org

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## james.s (Apr 4, 2009)

By Jove! This is awesome, I love those cages, what were they for? I also love the pictures looking up at them. Great work!


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## bartje (Apr 4, 2009)

james.s said:


> By Jove! This is awesome, I love those cages, what were they for? I also love the pictures looking up at them. Great work!



Thnx!

The mineworkers used this to put their clothes in..


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## Foxylady (Apr 4, 2009)

Blimey, I've never seen anything like those in a coalmine before! That's different! The mines over here just have lockers. 
Fab find, bartje.


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## Urban Mole (Apr 4, 2009)

I too was going to ask their purpose.
Its a very odd looking place, but kinda cool, if you get me.

Looks vaugely like a scene from Hellraiser


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## BigLoada (Apr 4, 2009)

Yeah those cages look freaky! We have "clean" & "dirty" lockers here. Brilliant location man.


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## Reaperman (Apr 4, 2009)

Foxylady said:


> Blimey, I've never seen anything like those in a coalmine before! That's different! The mines over here just have lockers.
> Fab find, bartje.



Actually we used to use an identical system over here at some of the earliest pithead baths, though it was phased out in many collieries when bath houses were modernised in the 30's and the 50's the Lockers that were brought in used a heated air system to dry wet gear in the lockers overnight. 

There were still some examples of the chain system surviving into the seventies or eighties though they are all now gone. I don't even know of a mining museum that has a set. If it wasn't for the fact that there are photos of them in use you'd never know they existed now.

This photo is of the chains in use at Ellington Colliery, Northumberland in 1936:






Theres another shot here from 1927: http://www.dmm-gallery.org.uk/gallery/e015-004.htm​
There are a reasonable number of derelict examples of bathhouses like this in Germany and France though there are few that are on the same scale as those at Zeche Hugo which I was thoroughly impressed by when I visited last year, It was the first time tryed some Found snuff! I hope that someone climbs the headstock there soon as I've never seen any photos from up there.


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## LiamCH (Apr 5, 2009)

This is scary. Why use cages to store your belongings in? Why did it take them so long to realise that lockers might work just as well, with none of the hassle?


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## Raz333 (Apr 5, 2009)

Wow, you guys find the best of locations!


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## Engineer (Apr 5, 2009)

*Pit Baths.*



LiamCH said:


> This is scary. Why use cages to store your belongings in? Why did it take them so long to realise that lockers might work just as well, with none of the hassle?



Reminds me of the old naval hammock system, two uses for a large un-obstructed space?

Edit: I seem to remember this set up in an old WW2 film," Operation Crossbow" possibly?


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## daddybear (Apr 5, 2009)

i think thats kind of sinister looking very strange!!!good work though.


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## Dieter_Schmidt (Apr 5, 2009)

LiamCH said:


> This is scary. Why use cages to store your belongings in? Why did it take them so long to realise that lockers might work just as well, with none of the hassle?




They are German, that's why!


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## andy+katie (Apr 16, 2009)

those chains look a litle bit over the top and heavy duty to be just used for keeping clothes in!!!


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## sheep21 (Apr 16, 2009)

andy+katie said:


> those chains look a litle bit over the top and heavy duty to be just used for keeping clothes in!!!



perhaps they had big feet and there boats were very heavy 

on another note, great find. those shots you have of the chain room are just wonderful


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## Locksley (Apr 16, 2009)

Wow, awesome, I kinda thought they might have been for canaries lol.


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## swanseamale47 (Apr 16, 2009)

What an unusual find, lovely pics. Wayne


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## nutnut (Apr 17, 2009)

I am never suprised by the quality of your locations,

I just wait with baited breath to see what crops up next 

Fantastic site, report and pictures, again!


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