Mills
North Mills
Used with
permission - (c) Rice County Historical Society
Old mill and bridge
North in 1855 built
both a sawmill and a dam on the Cannon River. The
sawmill was located on the west side of the river. He would later
build another saw mill on the same side of the rive (Curtiss-Wedge,
429). One was an upright saw and the other a circular saw.
In
1856-57 he built a flour mill on the east side of the river (Larsen,
50-51). In Northfield The History and Architecture of a
Community it is described
as, “…a wooden structure which is thought to have had a simple
waterwheel.” The
three mills shared the dam in generating power. Before
this mill was put in farmers in the area had hauled their wheat all the
way to Hastings the nearest town on the Mississippi River. North
sold the mills to his friend Charles Wheaton. He
only
owned them a few years before he sold them to Jesse Ames and his sons
(Northfield Heritage Preservation Committee,
46-47).
Ames Mill
Used
with permission - Shaw-Olson Center for College History, St. Olaf
College
The Ames Mill
Jesse Ames & sons bought
the mills in 1864. Ames
was a former owner and Captain of a clipper fleet. They
built a new flour mill in 1869, which was reconstructed from the old
North sawmill. It was one of the most successful
mills in southern Minnesota (Curtiss-Wedge, 429-430). It was
located on the west bank and is the core of the Malt-O-Meal plant now
located there (Northfield News, 11). Milling became the most
important industry in Northfield, working with the growing of
wheat in the area. In 1879 they switched from wheel power to
steam power. In the 1870s flour from the Ames mill was well known
and respected in major grain markets in the U.S. among the Minnesota
flours. At the Philadelphia Colombian Exposition it received the
highest ranking of the all the flour represented there (Northfield
News, 11-13). Some of their biggest competition was not too far
from home. The Archibald mill in Dundas revolutionized the
process of milling with the development of new technologies, which the
Ames mill was quick to adopt (Curtiss-Wedge, 429).
Granger Mill
Granger group, "impressed
with
the Ames mill decided to organize a company of well-to-do farmers” and
build their own mill a mile down stream from the Ames mill. It
opened for operation in the winter of 1873 or 74 (Curtiss-Wedge, 429).
Problems crept up between the
two mills. The
Grange mill would back up water upon the Ames dam. In
turn the Ames mill would employ its tailrace as a weapon. It
ended up in a battle of lawsuits and newspaper articles against each
other. This
battle provided no profits to their flour industries though.
During
this time Capt. John T. Ames achieved great notoriety a brilliant
writer
of Philippic invective beside his fame as a miller. He
maintained “that the Ames mill made larger profits, and paid less fro
wheat
after the Grange mill came into operation than before”. Whether
this was really the case is debatable. Both mills
appeared to be stuck on their battle and paying less attention to
improving
their operations in flour making (Curtiss-Wedge, 429).
The Grange mill accused the Ames
of controlling the wheat market to keep the price low. They
constructed their own grain elevator and maintained operation 1909
(Northfield News, 13)..
|
