The Washburn A Mill

The Washburn A Mill's ground floor housed the equipment that linked the power of St. Anthony Falls to the machines that milled flour. When the mill was built in 1879, water from the falls powered all its equipment, though steam engines later shared the work. Water flowed to the mill through a headrace canal, then dropped nearly 50 feet to turn underground turbines, huge horizontal wheels with blades rotated by rushing water. Vertical shafts connected the turbines to the horizontal shafts and gears that filled the ground floor, and those shafts and gears transferred the waterpower to the seven floors of milling equipment above. Miller Sheridan Granger recalled the sight of the water wheel starting, with the big shaft and rope drive setting eight floors of machinery in motion from the river's power.

Minneapolis, Minnesota · United States