Number of railway wagons repaired from January to June 1930 = 87 Number of men and boys employed on wagon repairs = 41 Total wages paid for railway wagon repairs in same six-month period = £2,475 4/3d  Number of Horses and Ponies Underground = 34 Surface = 8 Cost of keeping one horse or pony week = 9/6d. (48 pence in new money) Miles of Railway track belonging to the colliery on the main line and siding = 24 miles  Number of Motor Vehicles  In 1930 there were 50 miles of underground roadways kept in repair - Chatterley Whitfield was a wet pit and they had to pump water so it could continue to operate. In 1930 they had 16 underground pumps and the average amount of water pumped out of the mine in a 24-hour period was 542,000 gallons (2.46 million liters). This water was pumped into a pond on the surface and the water re-pumped to the boilers and washeries. After Wednesday, January 1, 1947 (Vesting Day) a policy of modernisation took place throughout the whole mining industry. In 1952 mine cars and locomotive haulage were introduced underground at Whitfield and a new mine car circuit installed on the surface. The building to accommodate this is still standing. With the advent of cheap oil supplies from abroad in the late 1950s, contraction in the coal mining industry began to take place. The collieries most affected by this were the older ones where the best coal had been worked out and at which it was difficult to mine coal economically. Chatterley Whitfield was one of the victims of this period, output declining from over one million tons per year in 1937 to 408,000 tons in 1965. Coal drawing stopped at the Institute shaft in 1955 and the Middle Pit in 1968. In 1974 it was decided that Whitfield coal could be more easily worked from Wolstanton Colliery and an underground roadway was driven to join the two pits. In 1977 coal drawing at Chatterley Whitfield came to an end. After coal production stopped at Chatterley Whitfield on Friday, March 25th, 1977, a brave venture was started by an independent charitable trust to turn the colliery into Britain’s first underground mining museum. Before any visitors could take this underground trip much preparation work had to be done on site. Derelict buildings were renovated, the underground galleries were made safe, for visitors and mining machinery restored in its original working condition in order to show in great realism the life and working conditions of local miners and to preserve an example of the country’s industrial heritage.