Malcolm, I do not doubt in anyway that she carried ore, as you can derive from my longer comment, that is what many bulk carriers did and still do. The point is that she has been employed (I assume to earn money) as bulk carrier. A pure ore carrier would not be able to do that efficiently as her holds are much smaller, due to the stowage factor of most ores, which don't require space in the first place, but only a strong ship.

Hi Malcolm, no doubt your thinking was influenced by Lloyds Register's decision who defines her as an ore carrier. My question was based on that qualification. As an ore carrier needs far less cubic space to be full and down, it is not economic to use her for cargoes which require far more cubic space to reach that situation. Coal would probably never fill her up completely. From an arial photo of the ship it is clear that her hatches are quite wide so the holds will have bulk-carrier related size. She may have been strengthened to carry ore, (what is normal for the great majority of the bulk-carrier fleet), but then at least one of her holds would still be empty when carrying ore. Reading that she spent most of her life carrying coal begs (for me at least) why Lloyds classified her as an ore carrier.
Compare this ship to the six Halcyon Line ships, (Stad Vlaardingen, Stad Zwolle, etc )built in Germany in the early sixties, which also have an all-midship arrangement with holds before and after this structure, and are/were classified as bulk carriers)

The Ore carrier is a subclass of the regular bulk carrier. Ships carrying ore have a special, reinforced hull structure and, moreover, they should have high-lying ballast tanks to lower the metacentric height. Lowering the metacentre extends the rolling period, and this reduces the risk of hull cracking or even breakage of the hull . Also, the crew with relatively low GM has much more comfortable living conditions.
Shipowners very often used typical general cargo vessels to carry bulk cargo, bulk carriers to carry general cargo.
My father was a member of the crew of the largest tanker at that time (1974) under the Polish flag (m/t KASPROWY WIERCH), when the crude oil tanker , during her maiden voyage , brought tens of thousands of tons of grain to the port of Gdynia w from New Orleans . Such cases have happened, are happening and will probably happen again in the future. In the past, many universal ships were built to carry various cargoes (ore-coal carriers, oil-ore-bulk carriers and others). Today, specialist vessels dominate.
Regards.