Most of the industries in Nigeria depend heavily on the use of refractory materials. For instance the iron and steel industries, cement, glass, refineries, bakeries and ceramic industries. However, almost all the refractory materials used by these industries are imported. Consequently, it leads to the draining of Nigeria’s foreign reserve and this in turn negatively affects the economy of the Country. Therefore, there is the need to increase the local production of the refractory materials in order to reduce their importation and thereby boost the economy Nigeria. Hence this researched work was carried out to investigate and see if the Birnin Gwari and Maraban Rido clays in Kaduna state, Nigeria can serve as refractory materials. The clay samples were obtained from the mining sites and processed to produce fireclay brick test specimens which were fired between 250oC and 1400 oC. The fired bricks were then tested for refractory properties such as: the linear shrinkage, bulk density, apparent porosity, cold crushing strength, thermal shock resistance and refractoriness (Pyrometric Cone Equivalent) using ASTM standards. The obtained results were as follows: The Linear shrinkage was 10% and 8.0%; apparent porosity 24.65% and 21.55%; bulk density 1.75 g/cm3 and 1.96 g/cm3, cold crushing strength 165.0 Kg/cm2 and 216.9 Kg/cm2, refractoriness 1300 oC and 1400 oC and thermal shock resistance 16.67 and 32 cycles for Maraban Rido and Birnin Gwari clays respectively. The results as compared with the standard refractory bricks, showed that both clays are suitable for fire clay refractory materials while bricks produced from Birnin Gwari clay are also suitable for batch furnace applications. Both clays can be used for lining of nonmetallic melting furnances.