Museum Mile

Item Description

Explore The Sterling Hill Mining Museum, located in Ogdenburg, NJ with these three VIP Passes.  You will also receive The Sterling Hill Mining Museum Map & Guide and The Sterlining Hill Mining Museum Newsletter.

Sterling Hill is an enduring geological mystery and a world-famous mineral deposit. And, it’s all right here in New Jersey, just an hour’s drive from midtown New York!

The industrial complex that was once the Sterling Hill zinc mine is now open to the public as the Sterling Hill Mining Museum. Join us for underground mine tours, fantastic displays of "glow-in-the-dark" fluorescent minerals, extensive outdoor displays of mining machinery, and exhibit halls packed with things you've probably never seen before!

What You Will See

Within the mine passages are numerous pieces of equipment used while the mine was in operation, plus exhibits on the mining process.  Visitors will see the lamp room, the shaft station, mine galleries dating to the 1830's, and much more.  The entire tour route is well lit, and no climbing is involved — visitors walk on hard-packed gravel the whole way.  All parts of the route are wheelchair-accessible.

The Rainbow Room

For many visitors the most anticipated part of the mine tour is the Rainbow Room, where brightly fluorescent zinc ore is exposed in the mine walls, exactly as it was in other parts of the mine where ore was produced.  Illuminated under ultraviolet light, the walls glow bright green and red, the green signaling the presence of willemite, one of the main zinc ore minerals at Sterling Hill. 

While in the Rainbow Room visitors are invited to take a piece of the fluorescent zinc ore home with them as a memento of their tour.

Numerous items of mining-related equipment are scattered about the grounds to add to your experience at Sterling Hill. 

Here you will see sinking buckets, stamp mills, sheave wheels, crushers, ball mills, drum hoists, compressors, track drills, ore cars, and more, all brought to Sterling Hill from mines throughout the U.S. and Canada. 

Numerous bronze sculptures also grace the grounds and depict various aspects of the life of a miner. 

Visitors are welcome to browse the grounds adjacent to our main parking lot to view these outdoor displays, many of which are labeled to tell you what they are.

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