Women Mining Asbestos in South Africa, 1893-1980

In the period from 1893 to 1980 the asbestos mines of the north-west Cape and the north-eastern Transvaal were important sources of employment. The methods of extraction were simple; and in many mines until the early 1950s the basic labour unit was the family. Even by South African standards labour conditions for black and Coloured workers were harsh. A mixture of political skills and the isolation of the mines allowed British-owned companies and their subsidiaries to escape the strictures of the various Mines Acts. According to the Department of Mines records, the mining companies, and the few historians who have written on the subject, female workers had disappeared from the industry by 1955. In fact, until the 1980s, females comprised up to half of asbestos mine workers in South Africa, in an example of a contemporary mining industry dependent upon female labour.