stone, called a runner stone. A device, called a damsel, turned the runner stone against the lower stationary stone (or bed stone) at about 125 revolutions per minute. Fed through the middle of the upper stone, the ground grain made a spiral path outward between the millstones.
(8) The ground grain, or meal, fell from the outside edges of the millstone down a chute to the basement. An elevator then carried the meal up to the attic to the outer edge of the hopper boy. The grain was cooled and dried by a turning rake in the hopper boy.
(9) Another chute brought the cool, dried meal from the hopper boy to the bolter on the second floor. Meal was sorted from flour (smallest-sized particles), to middling (medium-sized particles), to bran (or largest-sized particles).
(10) These sorted grains fell down different chutes to conveyors under the second floor, moving the grain into different produce bins on the first floor.
(11) The miller packed the flour into barrels and the middlings and bran into sacks for storage or shipment.
The Mill's Power SourceWater from the Isaac Branch provided the necessary power to run the mill. The water was collected in the mill pond. The mill pond fed water to the mill race. The mill race then fed the water to the wooden water wheel. The wooden water wheel drove the gears in the mill's basement that powered the millstone. The power was sent up through the mill via the main shaft to power the mill's other machinery.
(photo captions)
· Barn, Brecknock Manor House, Tenant House, and Granary.
· Aerial view of Brecknock County Park showing Route 13 to the east, Rodney Village to the north, and Chapel Croft to the south.
· Located on the Isaac Branch, a tributary to the St. Jones River, the Brecknock Mill Pond and "G. Mill" are identified near the top of this 1868 map. (D. G. Beers, Atlas of the State of Delaware)
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