Brocton Arch was erected in 1913 as a symbol of prosperity for the Village of Brocton and Town of Portland, known as the "Home of the Concord Grape," during the town's centennial year. Approved by the Portland Centennial Association, the double-span steel arch was designed by local contractor E. J. Baily to stretch as wide as the streets and high enough for interurban cars of the Buffalo and Lake Erie Traction Co. to pass beneath it. In the summer of 1913, under the supervision of Village Superintendent George Ferguson, Sr., fabricated steel beams were brought to town by train, hauled to the center of town by double teams driven by Charles Blair, and raised with a gin pole and block and tackle while horses held the girders in place for assembly. Anchored in concrete at the four corners of the intersection, the twin curved spans crossed like a giant X and rose to the height of a three-story building, with a reinforced steel ring, or corona, about six feet in diameter at the crossing point. The spans were illuminated by local electrician Adison Burton, and when construction was completed a festival featured a parade of bands, floats, firemen, and veteran groups marching down Main Street beneath the arch. After World War I, a straw dummy of the Kaiser was hung from the corona and burned above a bonfire built in the street below. The arch was decorated again for the community's 1963 sesquicentennial celebration, when another parade passed underneath. The only major change to the arch came in 1946, when the original hanging "Brocton" sign was replaced with a neon-lighted one after corrosion made the first sign hazardous. Built at a total cost of $1200, with $300 from the Village of Brocton and the rest from local citizens, the twin arch still stands as a landmark of community pride and is believed to be the only remaining four-way street arch in the United States. At dusk it is illuminated by 124 bulbs that switch off at midnight, and in December white lights are mixed with red and green. Also associated with the site is a millstone donated by C. Harris and Melvina Burton, once used in a gristmill at the mouth of Slippery Rock Creek in the 1820s and cut from a granite boulder later identified by a state geologist as having been carried from northeastern Canada during the glacial period.