The Pillsbury A Mill

The Pillsbury A Mill, built of Platteville limestone and completed in 1881, was the world’s largest flour mill at the time. Designed by LeRoy S. Buffington, it became a classic of industrial architecture, and its interior featured state-of-art technology. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1966. The mill originally produced 5,000 barrels of flour per day, later increasing capacity to more than 17,000 barrels, and Pillsbury’s Best Flour is still sold around the world. The company rewarded skilled workers with practices ahead of many other industries, establishing an employee profit-sharing plan in 1883, while unions representing most mill employees negotiated an eight hour day in 1902. When Charles A. Pillsbury opened the A mill in 1881, its machinery was driven directly by water entering through a 400-foot canal from the river; although closed off in the 1950s, the canal still exists beneath Main Street, and the tailraces where its water emptied can still be seen below the river’s bank. In the 1880s four flour mills stood along Main Street, but this milling district never rivaled that on the west bank. Though the other mills are gone, the Pillsbury company still operates a large complex of buildings here, where milling continues at the South A Mill, trucks and trains bring grain for processing, elevators hold more than three million bushels of grain, and nearby research facilities develop new food products.

Minneapolis, Minnesota · United States