By CELESTE BAUMGARTNER
Ohio Correspondent GREENVILLE, Ohio — Bear’s Mill began operation in 1849 and it is still grinding – it’s one of the few operating water-powered mills still in Ohio. The mill is on the National Register of Historic Places.
In 1824 President James Monroe granted 333 acres to Major George Adams, said current mill owner Terry Clark. Adams had always wanted a flour mill but first he had to build a sawmill to cut the wood for the flour mill, Clark explained.
Two contractors had a falling-out during construction of the flour mill and that’s when Gabriel Baer bought it; a misspelling at the county courthouse changed his name to Bear, and he kept it that way.
Bear finished building the mill, Clark said, and heard about the French buhr stone – a type of rock-like granite or sandstone which was only quarried in France.
“So, Gabriel Bear got on his horse, rode to the coast, got on a ship and went to France,” he said. “Two years later he came back with three French buhr stones; and they cost $6,000 a set in 1848. That’s about $150,000 a set today, but there are no more French buhr stones. They were sought after by world millers because they kept cool in the grinding process.”
There were many changes and many millers at Bear’s Mill, but Clark still uses those buhr stones. The mill can grind about 3,000 pounds of grain in eight hours.
“If you feed it too slow, the two stones touch, it overheats and kills the vitamins and minerals,” he said. “A burnt smell comes up and out of the stone; hence the phrase ‘keep your nose to the grindstone.’”
The millrace, situated on Greenville Creek, is 10 feet deep, 25 feet across and 800 feet long, Clark said. It was hand-built in 1847-48 by school kids for 50 cents a day. Two turbines sit 10 feet underwater. The mill uses about a million gallons of water in eight hours.
Bear’s Mill supplied meal to the Union Army during the Civil War. It was temporarily closed in 1862 because of fears that Confederates were going to burn it down. They posted guards to prevent that.
“Today I grind about 1,000 pounds a week and send it to Afghanistan to a couple of cooks that want good products for their troops,” Clark said. “So it is doing the same thing it was built for – to feed the people.”
He and his wife, Julie, an artist, bought the mill in 1978. King’s Island Amusement Park was going to buy it, take it down and rebuild it as part of the theme park.
“I came out and got the first contract on the place and sent King’s Island back to Cincinnati with no mill,” Clark said. “I learned from trial and error; there was a book on practical milling, made in 1924, geared towards the roller mills, but there were three pages on the buhr stone. At first I had a lot of chicken feed – I was burning that grain.”
Clark and Julie operated the mill independently for 20 years; he has a fascination with old buildings and she was drawn by the rustic beauty of the place. In 1999 they started a nonprofit organization, The Friends of Bear’s Mill, to keep the historic mill open for the public to enjoy.
It offers rotating art exhibitions and, because Julie is a potter, the gallery has a selection of local handmade pottery. The mill store stocks gourmet and kitchen products in addition to the mill’s stone-ground flours and meals. The newest project is spelt.
“Spelt is a genetically unaltered grain. Dan Kremer, a local farmer, is growing 50,000 pounds a year,” Clark said. “He used to ship it to Texas, about 1,500 miles away, and then ship it back and bag it and sell it. He heard about Bear’s Mill, which is only 30 miles away, and now he ships it right here to our mill.
“We take it over to Bakehouse Bread in Troy, which is 30 miles away. They bake the bread for their customers and our customers; it is a collaboration of the farmer, miller and bakers, which really cuts down on energy.”
Bear’s Mill, at 6450 Arcanum-Bear’s Mill Road in Greenville, is open year-round and has many special events. For information phone 937-548-5112 or visit www.bearsmill.com |
