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Mill news and topical information - Archive page 15

watermills Lording's Waterwheel on the Wey and Arun canal

Lording's Waterwheel, an unusual wheel used to lift water from the River Arun to the summit pound of the Arun Navigation, has recently been rebuilt. Its first public demonstration was on 23rd May 2004. There was brief coverage of the waterwheel in the August 2004 issue of Old Glory magazine.
Item: #374, Posted: 26/9/04.

windmills Millwright Ben Hassett, and his work on Flowerdew Hundred windmill

Ben Hassett who started his career working with Derek Ogden, is now running his own millwrighting business. His most recent project was major structural work on the windmill at Flowerdew Hundred, which was built in 1978. The work necessitated lifting the buck off the trestle for inspection and repair, and the removal of the old crowntree.
See also:Item #150, Item #162
Item: #373, Posted: 26/9/04.

watermills Woodbridge tide mill special meeting

Woodbridge tide mill is working towards a Lottery bid for a £400,000 restoration, and held a special meeting this week to show the public their plans, which would restore the mill to grind corn once again. Tasks envisaged in the work include installation of hand-held audio guides, the replacement of the water wheel, dredging mud, redesigning the entrance lobby and putting in new lights, heating and fire protection equipment.
See also:Item #277
Item: #372, Posted: 26/9/04.

windmills Heritage Days in Malta focus on windmills

The Maltese contribution to European Heritage days this year focused on the contribution of windmills in Maltese culture.

Activities took place at various times in the period 17th - 24th Sept, at Xarolla windmill at Zurrieq, Ta Kola Windmill in Xaghra Gozo, and Ta Ganu Windmill in Birkirkara.
Item: #371, Posted: 26/9/04.

windmills Windmill Hill windmill buck back in place

The buck of Windmill Hill windmill was lifted back into place on 23rd September, delayed by strong winds earlier in the week. Scaffolding around the mill will remain in place for a couple more months as there is still much work to be done by millwrights IJP inside the buck, and in completing its weatherboarding.

Update:[8/11/04] There is another report on the event on the Sussex Mills Group site.
Mills: [Herstmonceux]
Item: #370, Posted: 26/9/04.

windmills DeZwaan Windmill gets a spruce up

The Holland Sentinel ran a short article on sprucing up the DeZwaan Windmill, which will celebrate its 40th anniversary in April 2005. The article consists of 2 photos of miller Alisa Crawford doing maintenance work on the blades and gallery deck on 22nd Sept.
Item: #369, Posted: 26/9/04.

windmills New website for Woodchurch windmill

Woodchurch windmill, Kent has a new website. The site currently gives details of how to find the mill and opening times, with more to come in future on the mill and its history. There is also a section for members of the Society of the Friends of Woodchurch Windmill.
Mills: [Woodchurch]
Item: #368, Posted: 21/9/04.

windmills Changes In Store For Shore Road's Sur Mer, Chatham, Massachusetts

The Sur Mer property, Chatham, Massachusetts is in for some changes, since the current house is too small for the owner's needs. The property includes a windmill - one of a number on Cape Cod which have been moved around, and this is notable both for its shoreline location, and also for the wildflower meadow which was planted around 20 years ago leading up to the mill.

The outline plans are to move the current (historic) house off the property, and to replace it with a larger (better insulated) one more suited to year round occupation on this exposed spot, but negotiations are ongoing with the towns Historical Commission who would like to keep the existing house on the property.
Item: #367, Posted: 21/9/04.

mills Millers Tale - National Trust Mills, Autumn 2004 magazine

The Autumn 2004 issue of the National Trust Magazine has an article entitled "Miller's Tale" which talks about, and illustrates with photos by Andrew Montgomery, a number of the National Trust's watermills: Bourne Mill, Quarry Bank, Cotehele Mill, Flatford Mill, and Houghton Mill. The article states that the Trust owns 25 mills, which are detailed on National Trust Mills, and my own page on the subject.

Wicken Fen windpump is also illustrated in a later article in the magazine, in a news item about the Trust's purchase of additional land around this nature reserve.
Item: #366, Posted: 21/9/04.

mills SAVE Britains Heritage: Buildings of the Month

SAVE Britains Heritage which campaigns for threatened historic buildings in Britain, is highlighting two mills at the moment as it's Buildings of the Month.

These are the derelict windmill at Horsford, Norfolk, and Weston watermill in Oswestry, which retains its machinery.
Mills: [Horsford]
Item: #365, Posted: 21/9/04.

windmills New photo of Dutch Windmill, Golden Gate Park

The number of photos at flickr tagged as "windmill" continues to climb slowly, with most of the images still being wind engines. The latest image is of The Dutch Windmill, Golden Gate Park, which also has another earlier photo on the site.
Item: #364, Posted: 21/9/04.

windmills Dereham windmill attacked by vandals

Vandals damaged the entrance door and windows of Dereham windmill last week, and set off fire extinguishers inside the building.

The mill is owned by Breckland Council but leased to the town council on a peppercorn rent. The Friends of the windmill have plans to return the mill to working order, with hoped for Lottery funding. The mill dates from 1836, and worked by wind till 1922, then by paraffin engine till 1937. Later history saw it listed in 1972, and bought by the council in 1979, whereupon it was visually restored and opened in 1987.
Mills: [East Dereham]
See also:Item #225
Item: #363, Posted: 15/9/04.

mills Mills open for London Open House weekend

London Open House is this forthcoming weekend, 18th-19th Sept, and around 500 buildings across the Capital will be open. Included in that list are the following mills: Check out the search page, or the full list of buildings for more details.

London Open House is part of the European Heritage Days - in the UK the rest of the country opened their doors for Heritage Open Days last weekend (sorry I forgot to remind you!), for which a number of other mills were open, as can be found via their search page.

Other countries events may still be to come, for example France is also the 18th-19th September. Their Search engine allows you to specify "moulin" as a specific theme.
Mills: [Keston] [Upminster] [Wimbledon Common]
Item: #362, Posted: 14/9/04.

windmills Upminster windmill passed on 35 year lease to the Friends Trust

The online version of the June 2004 newsletter from the Friends of Upminster Windmill reports via a Stop Press line that on Tuesday 22nd June the Council granted the Trust a 35 year lease of the Mill. This is a significant step in securing the future of the mill, which the Friends have been working very hard on for a good number of years.

The newsletter also tells of continued work to make the mill watertight - and ironically also of efforts to bring mains water into the mill. It also notes that the new wind turbines at Fords Dagenham plant are visible from the mill - illustrating that wind power is still a force to be reckoned with.
Mills: [Upminster]
See also:Item #331
Item: #361, Posted: 14/9/04.

windmills Pictures of Penn State windmill reconstruction

As part of a course at Penn State University, a number of students researched and designed a medieval post mill. The objective was to construct an approximately half size mill, which would be ready for the Medieval Mill conference that the university hosted in April 2004.

A good series of pictures showing the reconstruction are now on the project site. These show the reconstructed buck, and windshaft assembly. The mill trestle construction is planned for this autumn.
See also:Item #198, Item #197
Item: #360, Posted: 14/9/04.

windmills Restoration work on Wray Common windmill

After purchasing Wray Common windmill at auction earlier this year, the new owners have sprung into action to get a restoration programme underway.

On 26th August, as a very visible indicator of progress, the cap was lifted down, after the mill had been covered in scaffolding to allow a full survey of the mill. Millwrighting supervision was by Luke Bonwick of Bonwick Associates. Now the cap is off, to be worked on in a nearby workshop, work is continuing on the interior and exterior of the tower.
Mills: [Reigate]
See also:Item #320
Item: #359, Posted: 13/9/04.

energy Historic University of Massachusetts turbine destined for Smithsonian

The experimental wind turbine, built between 1973-1976 at the University of Massachusetts, Renewable Energy Research Laboratory is being dismantled, initially to be placed in storage, but finally destined for an exhibit on the history of renewable energy at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.

The turbine, one of the first modern turbines in the USA was at the leading edge of research, with variable speeds and blade pitch, computer control and fiberglass blades.
Item: #358, Posted: 12/9/04.

windmills Jonathan Creek DVD with Kellogg's Cornflakes

750g packets of Kellogg's Cornflakes currently include one of 6 different BBC programmes on DVD. Amongst the selection is an episode from Jonathan Creek - Series 2 Episode 2 - Time waits for Norman, originally broadcast in 1998. As always in the early episodes of this production, Jonathan Creek is living in Shipley windmill - which thus features in a few scenes. The promotional packs are of course also trying to sell you something - which in this case includes the entire first two series of Jonathan Creek for £26 inc P+P. (That's a good few pounds cheaper than Amazon.co.uk).
Mills: [Shipley]
Item: #357, Posted: 10/9/04.

windmills Brill mill photos on flickr

The flickr site provides a location where you can upload your photos for others to see. In recent days there have been some photos of Brill post mill uploaded - front and side views.

The site allows uploaded images to be tagged with keywords, and it was through the windmill tag that I found the Brill images. There are other mill images to be found via other tags such as windmills, kinderdijk, watermill, waterwheel.
Mills: [Brill]
Item: #356, Posted: 6/9/04.

mills Rough Wood Mills Album

I've mentioned the Rough Wood site a number of times, as its pages covering (mostly) Sussex windmills, containing a good description and fine recent photos, have grown up. The site now has now pulled all of these pages together into a dedicated Mill Album, with additional vintage views provided from old postcards, and a number of watermill images also included.
Item: #355, Posted: 6/9/04.

windmills Windmills on 2005 calendars

Calendars for 2005 are beginning to appear.
As in previous years, dedicated windmill calendars are very thin on the ground.

The SPOOM bookstore also has it's Old Mills 2005 calendar with photos by Allen Davis for $11.95. In previous years this has been just North American watermills, but this year the images include 3 windmills, and are more international.

Since its common to also show all the images on the back cover of the calendar, I see that the following calendars also include at least one windmill image

Item: #354, Posted: 25/8/04.

windmills Musical picnic at Heage windmill

Brass ensemble Crich Brass provided the music for a summer picnic at Heage Windmill on Sunday, organized by The Friends of Heage Windmill. The selection of tunes included traditional brass band tunes and excerpts from popular musicals.

The picnic also served to display the monks bench seat donated in memory of windmill volunteer Ann Watson who died recently.
Mills: [Heage]
Item: #353, Posted: 25/8/04.

watermills Thoroughly Ancient Mill - Traditional production at Mapledurham

The July issue of the Berkshire Living magazine contains an article on Mapledurham watermill. The article majors on flour production - after all this is a working mill, and mentions the Patisserie Franco Belge in Henley which is a regular customer. There's also a taste test, comparing bread made with the mill's flour compared to bread made with a shop bought wholemeal flour.
Mills: [Mapledurham]
Item: #352, Posted: 21/8/04.

mills A run through of archives : J - S

A third installment of archive sites found via the EnrichUK.net portal.


Item: #351, Posted: 20/8/04.

mills A run through of archives : F - I

More archive sites found via the EnrichUK.net portal. Its a real shame that many of the sites make it impossible to link to individual results. Part of the aim of the lottery funding is to make these records accessible, and although Internet access does mean that more people can access the items remotely, making it impossible to bookmark or link to the results once they have been found seems to me to be counter to the original aims.


Item: #350, Posted: 19/8/04.
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