As a trustee of the Ecton Mine Educational Trust, whose premises are used by teachers in the Ecton Hill Field Study
Association to run one-day courses in geology or chemistry as applied in mineral processing, in order to encourage
youngsters to think of careers in the mining industry, I was interested to see that last Sunday the BBC's Countryfile
programme was to focus on the Manifold valley, where the old Ecton copper mine (which had one of the earliest Boulton
and Watt steam engines and, for a time, the deepest shaft in England, and was around 1760 -1790 the UK's largest
copper mine) is located.
I watched the programme and was disappointed to see no mention at all of the Ecton mine - just a bit of the geology, where a team with a professor from Leicester university were clearing plants from a rock exposure to show the folded strata more clearly.
When I commented about this to the other trustees one, who works for the National Trust, owner of part of the surface area covering the mine's site, said:
"The BBC spoke to me before putting the programme together, and I gave them lots of encouragement to look at Ecton, but they were only interested in filming "projects" - things where a group could be shown physically doing something active on camera - I gave them the contacts but at the end of the day they just pick what they want to put in the programme for entertainment rather than information or interest - the joys of working with the media!"
Tony Brewis
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