Hydropower at Sharon Mills used the energy of falling water from the River Raisin to do work, first as mechanical energy for a grist mill and later as electrical energy. Early Sharon Hollow settlers built a dam on the River Raisin to form a mill pond and raise the water level by several feet, increasing the power produced as water fell before striking the turbine. Water from the mill pond entered the head race, where a check dam could be raised and lowered to control water height, then flowed through a tunnel under the mill to spin a turbine. The turbine at the grist mill originally connected to belts and gears that drove machinery, but when Henry Ford renovated the mill in the 1930s, he replaced the old turbine and added a solid brass generator. As water spun the turbine, it turned a shaft with a metal coil rotating between two poles of a magnet, generating electric current. After passing through the turbine and losing most of its energy, the water flowed into the tail race and then rejoined the main channel of the River Raisin. Electrical energy proved more useful than mechanical energy because it could be transported through wires with less loss than energy transferred through moving parts such as gears.