Documenting the interpretation history of the Mill at Lang Pioneer Village Museum Final Report By Victoria Veenstra Completed for: Lang Pioneer Village Museum (Contact: Joe Corrigan) Supervising Professors: Chris Dummitt, Michael Eamon, Jennine Hurl-Eamon Trent Community Research Centre Project Coordinator: Matthew Hayes Department: History Course Name: Master’s Thesis Date of Project Submission: March 2017 Project ID: 4666 Trent Community Research Centre www.trentcentre.ca Lang Pioneer Village Museum Mill Interpretation Research Victoria Veenstra 2016 1 Table of Contents The Water Mill – Poem 4 Figures 6 Historical Details Introduction – Living History: Engaging with Difficult Knowledge 9 Timeline 25 Canada & Ontario Context 27 Otonabee Township 42 o Other Local Mills 45 o Other Activities 46 o Distilleries 55 Lang Mill Setup 58 o Constructing a Mill 58 . Millwrights 58 . Milldams 58 . Walls 59 . Grindstones 60 . Rollers 62 . Yield 62 o Lang Details 63 o Furnishings 64 . Spittoons 64 o Oatmeal Mill 65 Early Mills and Grinding 67 o Automatic Flour Milling 69 o Dangers 71 . Accidents 71 . Floods 72 . Fires 72 . Recent Fires 75 Millers 77 Farmers & Wheat Growing 82 o Cows and Wheat 87 Mill Owners 89 o Mill Ownership Chart 89 o Thomas Short’s Foreclosure 92 Mill Owner Biographies 96 o Resources Related to Owners Mill Managers 117 o Mill Managers Chart 117 o Mill Manager Biographies 121 Bread 130 Running the Mill 2 Current Milling Process 134 o Diagram 135 Historical Milling Process 136 Wheat & Wheat Kernels 138 Mill Machinery 141 Operations Mill Opening (Spring) 160 Prepping for Milling 164 Tips for Milling 166 Mill Closing (Fall) 167 Bibliography 169 Appendix A) Ownership Documents a. Ownership Chart b. Abstract Index c. Instruments B) Maps C) Photo Collection D) Newspaper Collection: In chronological order. E) Oral Histories a. Daisy (Duncan) Fowler b. Frances Cardwell – Lang Archives c. Janet Gunn d. Nick Nickels e. Frances Cardwell – Interview “Mill Interpretation”, with Victoria Veenstra July 11, 2016 F) Primary Sources a. F.G. Ash b. Heideman Progress Report c. Humphries Account Book d. Short Death Record e. Gunn Marriage Certificate f. Short Marriage Certificate g. Lang Manual ORCA Sheilagh Grant h. Family Trees i. ORCA Five Year Plan 1980 j. ORCA Historic Sites Budget 1977 G) Personal Correspondence a. Al Seymour b. Beth-Anne Mendez 3 The Water Mill By Sarah Doudly Clarke Listen to the water mill, All the livelong day – How the clicking of the wheel Wears the hours away. Languidly the autumn wind Stirs the greenwood leaves: From the field the reapers sing, Binding up the sheaves; And a memory o’er my mind As a spell is cast – The mill will never grind With the water that is past. Take the lesson to yourself, Loving heart and true; Golden years are fleeting by: Youth is passing, too. Strive to make the most of life, Lose no happy day: Time will never bring you back Chances swept away. Leave no tender word unsaid, Love while love shall last – The mill will never grind With the water that is past. Work while yet the daylight shines, Man of thought and will; Never does the steamlet glide Useless by the mill; Wait not till to-morrow’s sun Beams upon your way, All this you can call your own Lies in this – to-day. Power, intellect and health May not always last – The mill cannot grind With the water that is past. Oh, the wasted hours of life That have drifted by; Oh, the good we might have done, Lost without a sigh: Love we once might have saved 4 By a single word. Tho’ghts conceived but ne’r penned, Perishing unheard. Take the proverb to thine heart, Take! Oh, hold it fast! The mill will never grist With the water that is passed. (Floyd) Weekly News, 12 June 1895, pg 1 Franklin F. Webb and Ricky L. Cox The Water-Powered Mills of Floyd County, Virginia: Illustrated Histories, 1770-2010. Jefferson: McFarland & Company Inc. 2012 5 List of Figures If not otherwise stated photos are taken by the author. Figure 1 – Exports of Ontario wheat and flour by ultimate destination, 1838-70 John McCallum, Unequal Beginnings: Agriculture and Economic Development in Quebec and Ontario until 1870 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980), 17. Figure 2 – Relative Important of Crops and Animals of Different Farms 1805-45 John David Wood, Making Ontario: Agricultural Colonization and Landscape Re-creation before the Railway (Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s Figure 3 – Net exports of Ontario wheat and flour and price of wheat, 1850-71 John David Wood, Making Ontario: Agricultural Colonization and Landscape Re-creation before the Railway (Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2000) 19. Figure 4 – Production and consumption in Canada, 1871 Michael Hart, A Trading Nation: Canadian Trade Policy from Colonialism to Globalization, (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2002) 66. Figure 5 – The “Choate Canal” blasted out of the rock at Gilchrist Bay to provide a channel between Stoney and White (now Dummer) Lakes. Jean Murray Cole, Origins: The History of Dummer Township (Dummer: Township of Dummer, 1993), 73. Figure 6 – Mills on the Indian River. Dianne Robnik, The Mills of Peterborough County (Peterborough: Trent Valley Archives, 2006). Figure 7 – Industries at Lang Developed by the author from the local directories. Figure 8 – Whiskey Advertisement Peterborough Examiner June 1 1860 Figure 9 – ‘S’ pieces on building exterior used for support. Photo By Author (2016) Figure 10 – Shaft bearing housing mill exterior. Photo By Author (2016) Figure 11 – Patterns carved on millstones by millwright John Storck and Walter Dorwin Teague, Flour for Man’s Bread: A History of Milling, (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1952), 104. Figure 12 – Mortar and pestle style of grinder used by Canadian first nations. 6 John Storck and Walter Dorwin Teague, Flour for Man’s Bread: A History of Milling, (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1952), 45. Figure 13 abc – Types of waterwheels Adam Lucas, Wind, Water, Work: Ancient and Medieval Milling Technology, (Boston: Brill, 2006),31. Figure 14 - Roller floor of the Los Angeles mill. John Storck and Walter Dorwin Teague, Flour for Man’s Bread: A History of Milling (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1952), 320. Figure 15 - Part of the purifier floor of the Los Angeles plant of General Mills. John Storck and Walter Dorwin Teague, Flour for Man’s Bread: A History of Milling (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1952), 320. Figure 16 – Insurance Advertisement Peterborough Examiner October, 20 1859 pg 1 Figure 17 – Lang Mill Burnt Original Mill Binder, Lang Archives. Figure 18 - Certificate of Inspection 987.10.2bu Lang Archives Figure 19- Close up Photo of Scale Photo by the Author (2016) Figure 20 – The year of four farmers: various years (1805-45), locations, and stages. John David Wood, Making Ontario: Agricultural Colonization and Landscape Re-creation before the Railway (Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2000), 90. Figure 21 – Threshing with a flail on the barn floor, one of the manual methods of threshing wheat in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Felicity Leung, Grist and Flour Mills in Ontario (Canada: Parks Canada National Historic Parks and Sites Branch, 1981), 35. Figure 22 – Winnowing grain from the chaff using a shaking screen and the wind, principles reproduced in machines designed for cleaning grain in mills. Felicity Leung, Grist and Flour Mills in Ontario (Canada: Parks Canada National Historic Parks and Sites Branch, 1981), 36. Figure 23 – Thomas Short Family Tree Created By Author Figure 24 - Steamer Otonabee on Rice Lake: A reconstruction, based on a sketch by E. Whitefield 1855. Richard Tatley, Steamboating on the Trent Severn, (Belleville: Mika Publishing Company, 1978), 19. Figure 25 – Richard Short Family Tree 7 Developed By the Author Based On Nelson, Forest to Farm, 430. / Short Family History, Otonabee- South Monaghan Historical Society / Cemetery Transcripts Box 3, 2 Keene Upper Cemetery, Otonabee Township, Accessed at the Trent Valley Archives. Figure 26 – Current Milling Techniques Drawing by the Author 2016 Figure 27 - Wheat on its shaft. Photo by Author (2016) Figure 28 - Wheat kernel with seed coat (left) and without (right). Photo by Author (2016) Figure 29 – The Parts of a Wheat Kernel Photo by the Author (2016) 8 Living History: Engaging with Difficult Knowledge Introduction The aim of many living history sites is to transport their visitors back in time – to let them experience life as it really happened in various historical eras. Many visitors leave with the perception that life was simpler back then, which is a problematic assumption. The uncomplicated lifestyle that living history sites portray has been critiqued by many academics including Thomas Schlereth head of American Studies at Notre Dame.1 Lang Pioneer Village located just outside of Peterborough, Ontario still offers this type of narrative. Expanding the stories told at Lang to encompass more complex narratives that include social history rather than just milling process mechanics would offer the site many benefits, not only a more accurate version of history but also potentially attracting more visitors and offering them a richer experience. Those sites that have incorporated diverse stories and complex historical narratives have benefitted from increased visitation and have better met visitor expectations. Living history sites offer a place to bring together cutting edge academic work with a wider public. Origins Skansen located in Stockholm, Sweden is generally credited with being the first open-air museum. Founded in 1891 by Artur Hazelius, Skansen united “artefacts with their functional context” which “linked the artefact to people, events, 1 Jay Anderson, Time Machines: The World of Living History (Nashville: The American Association for State and Local History, 1984), 73. 9 and places in a novel way.”2 Living history museums crossed the ocean to take form in North America as house museums.