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Mill Was Gathering Place For Residents

The wheel of fortune was turning, turning, turning, --- grinding corn for daily bread. Every pioneer family in Harlan treked "down to the old mill" to have their corn ground. Neighbors met each day at the mill. Picture the wheel turning and Dow Shackleford, the first miller grinding corn as he stood there covered from head to foot with the white meal dust. As one old timer said today, "we children called him Santa Claus because he was always so white he looked like he was covered with snow." Ben Rice, great grand father of J. Ray Rice owned the mill that was located near the end of the Main Street bridge over Clover Fork River. In later years, Henry Rice, son of Ben Rice, took the mill over. For many years he served the pioneer citizens of Harlan and finally sold it to W.C.L. Huff.

Toll Charge

How did they charge for grinding the corn? Before it was ground it was carefully weighed and one-eighth was set aside as pay for work done. "Back in the days before the bridge was built," someone recollected,"we used to cross the river on the rocks when the river was low, or somebody would set us over on a horse. In the summer time the river was very low, therefore the power to run the mill was short and families ran out of meal. As is often said, necessity is the mother of invention, old timers turned to the next best thing, "gritted bread." A few holes punched in a piece if tin served as the gritter. A few ears of corn gritted would make enough for one meal.

Ole' Swimming' Hole

In the good old summer time youngesters could have been seen diving from the window of the old mill into the river below. If the tide was high, logs could be heard chugging and turning over the mill dam, roaring down to the saw mill. At the banks of the river near the old mill served as a "family laundering place. A half a dozen or more wash boilers stood along the river bank. Many a family wash was done there according to thse who remember.

Flourishing Business

Men who rode to mill horse back, hitched their horses to trees or a post near the mill. Every day in the week the mill did a flourishing business. In the winter when the river froze over, it served as a skating rink for the town. A few years later Bill Lewis saw the need of ice in the summer time. The first "ice house" was on the corner across from the Methodist Church. Ice could be kept for many month as due to the thickness of the walls, which were about a foot apart and filled wth saw dust.

River Furnished Ice

The opening was at the top. The river froze so deep and solid that large chunks of ice could be cut in the winter time and placed in the ice house and would last most of the summer. People who had a need for ice such as ice cream freezers could go there and purchase as much as they needed. The old bridge that was torn away is now at Kitts and is still in use. Some of the old mills around the county were W.C. Farmer's Mill, near Chevrolet; Center Hall Mill, John R. Pace Mills, Creed Smith Mill, Blantons Mill, near Wallins; Si Spurlock Mill, Fowlers Mill and the Jim Huff Mill, at Cumberland.

Cost Of Living

The cost of living back in the good old days was cheap but a days work wasn't worth much. A well known old timer remarked the other day, "I've worked hard many a day in the boiling sun for just 50 cents." He could also remember when eggs sold for three dozen for a quarter. Frying chickens could be purchased for a dime a piece and good sized hens for a quarter.

Sunday September 7, 1952

Volume 51 number 211

pages 1 & 8

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