Wright’s Mill

For more than 100 years, Wright’s Mill was a popular recreation area. Its original dam stood a short distance below Chewacla Lake Dam, and the mill on the west bank ground both corn and wheat. Earlier owners in the 1840s included Echols, Hiram Reed, Charles Nelms, and John F. Lewis. W.W. Wright (1825–1905) owned the mill from about 1873 into the early 1900s, when it was abandoned, and for most of those years his miller was Joe Broome. Just before Town Creek enters the Chewacla lies the Gin-Saw Hole, where a water-powered gin and sawmill stood in the 1840s and which for many years was a very popular swimming hole. In the early 1890s, a clubhouse was built on the hill between Wright’s Mill and the Gin-Saw Hole, and the area was a favorite place for Auburnites before Town Creek was contaminated by Auburn sewage. Around 1900, a bicycle club was formed in Auburn, with George Petrie and B.B. Ross as prominent members, and a bicycle path was built from Auburn to Wright’s Mill, beginning where Gay Street formerly ended at Samford Avenue and following the east bank of Town Creek much of the way. Chewacla State Park opened in 1939 and included the Wright’s Mill area.

Auburn, Alabama · United States