Notable LGBTQ Participants in Mining, Minerals, Metallurgy, and Geology
The global mining industry is one of the top sectors in the world with 2022 total revenues of US$ 943 billion according to Statista. Many manufacturers rely on mining's output, such as the auto and appliance industries. Technology also relies on the rare minerals that the mining industry extracts.
The mining sector is also one of the world's oldest industries, having been present since ancient times. Today, some of the largest and multi-national companies in the world are in the mining sector, including Brazil's Vale, Australia's BHP, Great Britain's Glencore and Rio Tinto, and Canada's Barrick Gold.
Given this, it is insightful to study the presence of the LGBTQ community within the industry. This includes labourers, unions, geologists, surveyors, metallurgists, geophysicists, geochemists, and company management. The sector is male-dominated which makes being an out LGBTQ individual in mining challenging.
Much of the mining industry is under a microscope at this time to its damaging effects on the environment. Given its multi-national presence, it is a bell-weather industry for social policies and labour relations.
Much like many other labour-intensive industries, mining and geology, unfortunately, have a reputation for being homophobic. This reportedly occurs despite general corporate policies of acceptance and tolerance. Even within the largest mining union in the United States, there is no LGBTQ resource group. Despite this, it has been reported that the first openly gay campaigning for homosexual law reform took place within a mining community in Atherton, Lancashire in 1964 with the founding of Lesbian and Gays Support the Miners.
We have been able to identify the following notable members of the LGBTQ community in the mining, minerals, metallurgy, and geology fields.
Australia
- Frank Howarth, geologist
Denmark
- Count Eigil Knuth, geologist
Germany
- Friedrich Karl Flick, coal mining
Great Britain
- Mark Ashton, mining union activist
- Steve Bronski, mining union activist
Hungary
- Franz Nopsca, geologist
South Africa
- Cecil Rhodes, diamond mining
United States
- Pierre Amariglio, Eco Oro Minerals
- Allan Cox, geophysicist
- Kristina Johnson, Board member of several minerals companies
- Brianna Titone, geologist, geochemist, and mining consulting
- Clyde Wahrhaftig, geologist and geophysicist
See Also
- LGBTQ Participants in the Energy Sector
- LGBTQ Environmental Activists
- Climate Change and Weather Experts from the LGBTQ Community
- Auto and Transportation Experts Who Identify as LGBTQ