Abandoned mines in Gallatin County, Illinois
Gallatin County, Illinois has 33 mine and prospect features on USGS topographic maps published 1916–1996, including 7 mine openings (shafts, adits and air shafts); 3 of the features carry a name on the map. OSMRE's abandoned mine land inventory lists 26 problems in the county, 8 of them not yet reclaimed. MSHA's register carries 18 mines in the county with status Abandoned or Abandoned and Sealed.
Every mine and prospect feature the USGS digitized from historical topographic maps covering Gallatin County, every OSMRE abandoned mine land problem in the county, and every MSHA-registered mine here with status Abandoned. Named features are listed below; unnamed ones are counted by type. Locations are deliberately not shown: this page says what abandoned workings are in the county, not where to find them. They are dangerous and should not be entered.
- Mapped mine features (USGS)
- 33
- Mine openings
- 7
- OSMRE problems unreclaimed
- 8
- MSHA mines marked abandoned
- 18
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17 28.8%Mine openingsshafts, adits, air shafts, portals and vertical openings: the ways into underground workings
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22 37.3%Mines and surface workingslabelled mines, open pits, strip mines, placer and hydraulic workings
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4 6.8%Quarries, gravel and borrow pitsconstruction-material and industrial-mineral extraction
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4 6.8%Dumps, tailings, spoil and gobwhat mining left above ground
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12 20.3%Other reclamation problemshighwalls, subsidence, polluted or clogged water, fires, slides and gases in OSMRE's inventory
| Name on map | Feature |
|---|---|
| Berkel Mine | Open Pit Mine |
| Blue Blaze Mine | Adit |
| Saline Mines | Mine |
A name is the label printed beside the symbol on the map. "First mapped" is the earliest topographic edition that shows the symbol, which bounds the feature's age from above; it is not the date it was worked. Unnamed features (most prospect pits, adits and shafts carry no label) are in the counts above but not this list.
| Problem area | Problem | Status |
|---|---|---|
| B & W Coal Co. | P2 Vertical Openings | Reclamation Completed |
| B & W Coal Co. | P3 Gobs | Reclamation Completed |
| B & W Coal Co. | P3 Other | Reclamation Completed |
| Blue Blaz Bloc Mine | P1 Vertical Openings | Reclamation Completed |
| Burnett-love Coal Company | P2 Portals | Reclamation Pending |
| Burnett-love Coal Company | P3 Water Problems | Reclamation Pending |
| Eagle Strip - Area 1 | P2 Dangerous Highwalls | Reclamation Completed |
| Eagle Strip - Area 1 | P3 Gobs | Reclamation Completed |
| Eagle Strip - Area 2 | P2 Dangerous Piles & Embankments | Reclamation Pending |
| Eagle Strip - Area 2 | P3 Haul Road | Reclamation Pending |
| Eagle Strip - Area 2 | P3 High Wall | Reclamation Pending |
| Eagle Strip - Area 2 | P3 Pits | Reclamation Pending |
| Eagle Strip - Area 2 | P3 Spoil Area | Reclamation Pending |
| Edgar Scott Mine #1 | P2 Portals | Reclamation Completed |
| Edgar Scott Mine #1 | P2 Vertical Openings | Reclamation Completed |
| Green Hill Mine | P1 Portals | Reclamation Completed |
| Green Hill Mine | P1 Vertical Openings | Reclamation Completed |
| Mary Ann No.2 Mine | P2 Dangerous Highwalls | Reclamation Completed |
| National Mining Company | P2 Dangerous Highwalls | Reclamation Pending |
| Pickford Mine | P1 Portals | Reclamation Completed |
| Producers Coal Company | P2 Dangerous Highwalls | Reclamation Completed |
| Producers Coal Company | P3 Haul Road | Reclamation Completed |
| Producers Coal Company | P3 Pits | Reclamation Completed |
| Sunnyside Mine | P2 Portals | Reclamation Completed |
| Westside Mine | P1 Surface Burning | Reclamation Completed |
| Westside Mine | P1 Vertical Openings | Reclamation Completed |
Problem types carry OSMRE's priority prefix: P1 and P2 are threats to health, safety and property, P3 is environmental. A problem area is a cluster of problems reclaimed as one project; several rows can share one location.
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Arclar MineAbandoned and Sealed 1986-07-17Underground coal · A & F Coal Company Inc · MSHA ID 1102800
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Central Prep PlantAbandoned 2005-03-03Surface coal · Black Beauty Coal Company · MSHA ID 1102912
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Cottage Grove AugerAbandoned 2003-07-09Surface coal · Midwest Auger Co. · MSHA ID 1103102
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DREDGE #IAbandoned 2001-08-20Surface metal/non-metal · Imi-South Llc · MSHA ID 1101740
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Eagle Loading DockAbandoned 1981-06-01Facility coal · Peabody Coal Company · MSHA ID 1101781
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Eagle Mine No 1Abandoned 1974-05-21Underground coal · Peabody Coal Company · MSHA ID 1100597
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Eagle No. 2Abandoned 2006-01-31Facility coal · Peabody Coal Company · MSHA ID 1100598
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Eagle Prep PlantAbandoned 1980-03-28Facility coal · Peabody Coal Company · MSHA ID 1101780
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Eagle Surface PrepAbandoned 1995-10-16Surface coal · Peabody Coal Company · MSHA ID 1100596
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Eagle Valley MineAbandoned and Sealed 2002-08-12Underground coal · Big Ridge, Inc. · MSHA ID 1102846
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EqualityAbandoned 1980-09-01Surface coal · Peabody Coal Company · MSHA ID 1102749
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Jader Mine No 3Abandoned 2012-03-28Surface coal · Jader Fuel Co Inc · MSHA ID 1102832
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Jader Mine No 5Abandoned 1987-11-04Surface coal · Jader Fuel Company Inc · MSHA ID 1102861
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Mine No 5Abandoned and Sealed 1985-04-25Underground coal · Lovilia Coal Company · MSHA ID 1102774
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Moore Auger PitAbandoned 1972-06-01Facility coal · Diversified Materials Inc · MSHA ID 1101660
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N.A.A.M. No. 11Abandoned 2007-02-01Surface coal · North American Auger Mining Inc. · MSHA ID 1103142
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Wild Cat Hills AugerAbandoned 2003-07-09Surface coal · Black Hawk Mining Inc · MSHA ID 1103056
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Wildcat Hills Mine - Cottage Grove PitAbandoned 2020-08-12Surface coal · Peabody Midwest Mining, LLC · MSHA ID 1103017
Status and date are as reported to MSHA by the operator. Each mine's own page carries its accident, citation and inspection record.
| Feature type | Features |
|---|---|
| Strip Mine | 14 |
| Open Pit Mine or Quarry | 6 |
| P2 Dangerous Highwalls | 4 |
| Adit | 4 |
| P1 Vertical Openings | 3 |
| P2 Portals | 3 |
| Gravel Pit | 3 |
| Mine Shaft | 3 |
| P2 Vertical Openings | 2 |
| P3 Gobs | 2 |
| P3 Pits | 2 |
| P1 Portals | 2 |
| P3 Haul Road | 2 |
| Mine | 1 |
| Gravel Pit | 1 |
| P2 Dangerous Piles & Embankments | 1 |
| P3 Other | 1 |
| P1 Surface Burning | 1 |
| P3 High Wall | 1 |
| P3 Water Problems | 1 |
| Open Pit Mine | 1 |
| P3 Spoil Area | 1 |
A USGS feature is a symbol on a historical topographic map, there when the map was surveyed; it may since have been sealed, reclaimed, built over or reopened as a working mine, and the map does not say which. An OSMRE row is a problem the abandoned mine land program tracks, not a mine. An MSHA mine is a registered operation whose operator reported abandonment, a record that starts in the 1970s. The three overlap and are never added together. The county is assigned from each feature's coordinates against the Census 2023 county boundaries. The full method is on the national page.
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USGS, Consolidated Prospect- and Mine-Related Features from 7.5- and 15-Minute Topographic Quadrangle Maps of the United States (USMIN)
597,612 point and area features digitized from about 106,350 historical topographic maps published 1886–2006; public domain (CC0). A feature is a map symbol, not a field-verified site, and the map does not say whether it was still worked.
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USGS Fact Sheet 2025–3003, The Abandoned Mine Inventory of the United States
States that as of 2025 there is no comprehensive national inventory of abandoned mine features, and that the detailed national database now being built will not be published.
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OSMRE, Abandoned Mine Land Inventory System (e-AMLIS), public Problems layer
One row per abandoned mine land problem in a problem area, with its type, funding program and reclamation status; mostly coal mined before the 1977 Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act. Coordinates are the problem area's.
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MSHA, Mines dataset (Mine Data Retrieval System)
Every mine registered with MSHA since the 1970s; a mine reads Abandoned or Abandoned and Sealed when its operator reported that status. Refreshed weekly.
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US Census Bureau, 2023 cartographic county boundaries (1:500,000)
Each feature's county is assigned by its coordinates against these boundaries, not copied from the source file.
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GAO-20-238, Abandoned Hardrock Mines (March 2020)
Federal agencies had identified at least 140,000 abandoned hardrock mine features on federal land and estimated more than 390,000 more not yet captured in their databases.
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Abandoned Hardrock Mine Reclamation (AHMR) Program, US Department of the Interior
The program the USGS inventory is compiled for. Its appropriations and the 674,000 field-confirmed feature count on this page were provided by the program manager, Office of Environmental Policy and Compliance, and are cited with permission (2026-09-08).
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IMCC-NAAMLP Hardrock AML Report
Page 48 carries the two figures this page leans on: USGS estimates 633,181 of the 725,690 mine features it recorded from historic topographic maps, 87 percent, are hardrock; and state and federal agencies have submitted more than 724,000 AML features to the national database being built, already more than the historic maps hold. Year-by-year AHMR funding is on page 35.