Carbon Cliff, Illinois: Where the Coal Ran Out

Carbon Cliff, Illinois sits on the bluffs above the Rock River in the Quad Cities, and its name tells you exactly what it once was. By the middle of the nineteenth century, this area was a coal mining center. The Carbon Cliff mines were the first worked on the west side of the Rock River, and the black seams visible in the limestone face of the bluff gave the place its plain and descriptive name.

The Chicago and Rock Island Railroad reached here in eighteen fifty-four, moving the coal to markets east and west. But the seams were not deep, and by the turn of the twentieth century the supply was nearly exhausted. The mines closed.

The town pivoted to clay. The Argillo Works had been producing fire brick and drain tile since eighteen sixty-five, and that industry carried the community forward. Carbon Cliff was formally incorporated in December of nineteen oh six.

It remains one of the smallest municipalities in the Quad Cities region.