Mining is the process of digging valuable materials out of the earth. When you think of mining, you might picture miners descending deep underground with helmets and headlamps, extracting coal, gold, silver, or diamonds from rock. But mining also happens in open pits on the surface, where massive machines scoop out copper, iron ore, or other minerals.

Mining has shaped human civilization for thousands of years. Ancient peoples mined flint for tools and copper for weapons. Later, gold and silver mining funded empires and sparked exploration of new lands. The California Gold Rush of 1849 drew hundreds of thousands of people westward, transforming the American landscape. Today's mines provide the metals in your computer, the lithium in phone batteries, and the coal or uranium that generates electricity.

Mining can also mean searching carefully through something to extract what's valuable. A researcher might spend weeks mining old documents to find important facts. When you mine a book for information, you're digging through it looking for useful details, just like a miner digs through rock looking for gold.

The word miner refers to someone who works in a mine, while mineral describes the naturally occurring substances that miners extract from the earth.