Rising Sun Colliery brickworks

In 1908, the Wallsend and Hebburn Coal Company established a brickworks at Rising Sun Colliery, mainly to supply common bricks for the company’s own collieries. The bricks were fired in a 16-chamber Hoffman kiln, each chamber capable of holding 10,500 bricks. Some time before 1963 the height of the kiln chimney was lowered and an electric fan installed to supplement the draught circulation. An Octopus automatic feeding system was installed in 1965.
The raw material for the brickworks was primarily shale from the Main Coal seam under Rising Sun Colliery. However, opencast shale was brought in between 1963 and 1965, from Ewart Hill and Acorn Bank; and between 1965 to 1968 shale from Wardley.
Weekly production at the factory in the 1960s was 86,000 bricks.
Dates: 1908 – 1960s
20th Century brickworks
Source: Davison, P J, 1986. Brickworks of the North East, 56 site 4, 60.