Established in 1682, the Wye Grist Mill is the oldest working mill in Maryland and one of the few surviving and still operating colonial-era mills on the East Coast. Over three centuries it has been part of war, nation-building, industrial invention, and agricultural heritage. During the American Revolution, it and hundreds of similar mills on the Eastern Shore shipped barrels of flour through the Chesapeake Bay to General George Washington's Continental Army, helping earn the region the name "the Breadbasket of the American Revolution." Among its prominent owners were Richard Bennett III, Edward Lloyd III and IV of Wye House, and Colonel William Hemsley, commander of the Queen Anne's County militia and a provisioner to the Continental Army from 1779 to 1783. In the 1790's, Oliver Evans, called the father of the modern factory and the first great American inventor, used the mill to develop automation ideas that transformed American factories. It still grinds flour using two massive grindstones powered by a 26 horsepower overshot waterwheel and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.