Thorncliffe Main with associated coke ovens is shown on the 1850 Ordnance Survey map (see map extract in Archive Album), to the west of the later Thorncliffe Colliery. The colliery was served by a branch off the Thorncliffe to Elsecar railway. On the 1893 OS map, Thorncliffe Main is gone apart from an air shaft and Tankersley Fan, presumably a forced ventilation shaft, has been constructed a few yards to the north of the coke ovens.