Industry in the Beaver Valley

A bed grinding stone wheel inside of the historic and fully restored Redbournbury Mill in the United Kingdom. The flour mills once functioning in the Beaver Valley may have used a similar set of grinding stones.

"Grinding Stone (Bed-stone), Redbournbury Mill", Ian Petticrew, geograph.org.uk, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

Very early historical references to the Beaver Valley refer to it as the "mill lands" because of the high concentration of them in the area. By the early 1700s, the settlers had established at least four mills along the North and South sides of Beaver Creek: two sawmills, one fulling mill, and one gristmill. Joseph Robinson was constructing a mill at the corner of Beaver Valley and Beaver Dam Roads as early as 1712, followed by Richard Green several years later. There followed a flurry of mill construction within the Beaver Valley during the early 19th century to reach a total of six mills. At the end of the first quarter of the 19th century, Beaver Creek was dammed, more or less, from one end to the other with never much more than a quarter of a mile between one mill pond and the next. These mills serviced the needs of the Valley's residents and provided significant additional income to the farmers who owned them. Many of these mills were destroyed by the enormous flood of 1843 and never rebuilt. It is said that the mill stone from the Green Sawmill is still embedded in Beaver Creek approximately 1/4 mile east of the junction of Beaver Dam and Beaver Valley Roads. The Tempest paper mill located across from 810 Beaver Valley Road in Delaware, which continued to produce tissue until shortly after the turn of the 20th century, was the last operating mill in the Valley. The dam and head and tail races further down Beaver Dam Road from the Tempset Mill's former site were associated with a grist mill that would have been located close to where Ridge Road intersects Beaver Dam Road.

In the end, it was a combination of things that closed these mills: the inadequancy of Beaver Creek's waterpower for modern machinery; limitations on the capital available for mill investment; and, the growing scale of American industry, which rendered them uncompetitive.

There were a variety of mills in the Beaver Valley area that produced different products at various times. The types of mills and their associated products are listed below:

• Grist Mill: grinds corn and grain into flour
• Sawmill: cuts large trees into boards for construction material and furniture
• Paper Mill: pulps wood or cloth into paper
• Fulling Mill: washes and pounds woven wool into cloth
• Cotton Mill: spins or weaves cotton into cloth
• Wool Mill: spins and weaves wool
• Clover Mill: crushes clover flowers to release seeds, which were then cleaned and collected for future planting