[7] In the late eighteenth century shareholders or 'adventurers' in the mines included the engineers James Watt (who may have lived in Polgooth for a time) and Matthew Boulton, the industrialist John Wilkinson, local entrepreneur Charles Rashleigh (who built the port of Charlestown, from which much of the tin was shipped), landowner Lord Henry Arundell, and the potters Josiah and John Wedgwood.

[8][9] By 1800, over 1000 people were employed at Polgooth though, judging by a contemporary visitor, not in the most cheerful of conditions: "The shafts...are scattered over a considerable extent of sterile ground, whose dreary appearance, and the sallow countenances of the miners, concur to excite ideas of gloom, apprehension, and melancholy.

In 1824, a travel guide noted that "The whole surface of the country in [this] vicinity, has been completely disfigured, and presents a very gloomy aspect...The immense piles of earth, which have been excavated and thrown up, have quite a mountainous appearance: roads have been formed in several directions leading to the places or shafts, where the miners are at work; and the dreariness of the scene is only enlivened by the humble cottages, which have been erected for their residence.

[3] More recently, from the 1960s onwards, large numbers of bungalows and suburban houses have been built, thanks to the proximity of St Austell, Truro, and the south Cornish coast.

[12] George Fox, founder of the Religious Society of Friends, stayed at the farm in 1656, 1663, and 1668 when meetings of Cornish Quakers (much persecuted at the time) were held there.

[3] In 2000 the prime minister Tony Blair visited Polgooth Post Office for a photo opportunity, to the bemusement of several residents.