Delaware Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1843-1874, 1873-03-20

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About the time Of Of the Revolution the town
became well known station for the export Of
quercitron bark, md all the while tho escE n
mills were busy ~ Pc naeesx hr1 of NJ
Shall we take Z % - a. historic mi 4 Tho
best location fora structure yhere water power
feet could IA s. Il he sh0e, vAs ssleeted Y
1852 for mill-Luiiding which still stands, and
which were for many years the most famous IN
the country, regulating the price OF grain for the
United StaiAs- Tia hRAinennu sooR. ovesnoRea
/ and necessitated the building, Up lily, 81 the
structures Represented in the engraving on page
! 81, the whole group. on the two sides OF The
stream, being under one ownership, and
known as "Lea's Brandywine Mills"
Hitler would come the long lines Of Cones-
| toga wagons, from distant counties, such rs
Dauphin and Bsrlys, with fat horses, and wag.
oners persuading them by means OF biblical
oaths jabbered in Pennsylvania Dutch. From
| these mills Washington removed the runners
| Tor upper stones), lest they should be seized
and used by the British, hauling them up INTO
| Chester county When independence was Sc
cured the State of Delaware fastened TO pass
laws putting foreign trade on more liberal
Footing than the neighbor commonwealths,t thus
Isecuring for her niills the enviable commerce
with the West Indians. Much shipping was
thus attracted to Wilmington, and the trade
with Cuba In eorn-meal was particulariy large.
1t was found, however, that the -four of maize
invariably rotted In a tropical voyage, and
thereupon the commodity known rs kiln-dried
corn was invented at the Brandywine Mills
two hundred bushels would be dried per day
on brick floors, and would be thought great
amount, though the "pan-kiln" now IN use dries
two Thousand in the same time. The dried
meal was delivered at Havana perfectly fresh,
and pay received, in those good old days Of
barter, in jamaica rum, sugar and cofiees. In
the old times flour was heaped in the barrel:
| and patted down with wooden shovels then
when full, a cloth was laid over the top, and
the latest journeyman on the premises clam
bered up to seat on the heap, TO "cheese II
down" and imprint his callipyge upon it,
Flour thus made and branded was always saft
to bring a high price, but never so high as IN
| the short epoch OF the Continental currency
when the old entries Of the Brandywine Mil
books show (17S0) wheat bought at twenty
four pounds bushel, a pair of the Miller
leather small-clothV at eighty pounds, and somt
three or four hundred barrels of his flour charg
| ed al a gross sum of twenty-one tliousan'
Ipounds.
The fine old mills are still in lively operation
manufacturing into meal about million bush
i
principal proprietor received us in his domain
the living image of easy, old-fashioned pros
perty, and narrates the long history Of th
structures, showing his little museum Of curiosi
ties-now whales jaw bequeathed from tn
old fishing days, now q Revolutionary cannon
ball-aLd helps us TO realize the ancient time
by means of the music Of the mill, which i
loquacious now as 1t was under George Ill.
Walton, Whann & Co. boast that fully one
| hal arriv onId apar ttraQ nf n
= Wilmington are in connection with their bus
ness. What is that business? Why, it is tn
revival of the fertility Of the South, exhauste
: by the land-murdering agriculture Of slavery
: The demand from the cotton regions since tn
/, war has been enormous for the best artifcii
fertilizers, and the appreciation Of the particr
J, lar kind made by WaltDn, Whann & 90. Is vel
S marked. Planters have learned the fact, whic
s science and experience demonstrate, that II
j. liable compost must be now used for the II
munerative culture Of cotton, as well as of the
corn and other staples; and their preferences fc
e tine superphosphate prepared by this firm owe
most other fertilizers Is evinced by the fact tina
their demand has for several years been largel
= in excess of the supply. We need not wonde
s then, at the formidable preparations made fc
l. this mighty Overdriven business The cargot
a discharging by means Of steam-power into tn
g barges proceed from mills covering sever.
r acres of ground, aud worked by three engine
q aggregating one hundred horsepower. Thin
T Of it the strength Of one hundred horses owe
taskcd day by day to provide this magic powdt
ID through which the tired real horse is /
Is drag the plough in so many thousands of di
Is tant acres. The machinery for grinding Ii
n organic materials is Of the most approved e.
Is cellence, and Is tested by the turning out wit
e. the power stated, Of full fifteen hundred toI
le of the phosphate per month. A visit to u
stcrehouse Of this factory is strange sight, +
Oh Winding the tourist Of the open-air cemetery
ny the Capuchins at Rome. It is a realm Of bone
ne Bones from the South American pampas. bon
W. from the pork-packing houses of Cinciuna
bones from the grazing plains of Texas, con
SO here to minsle. The skeletons of half co
er tinent meet In these whirling mills for a Or
se digious Dance of Death, being most emphatic,
ty ly denied what is the last wish of all sentie
re- creatures-rest for their bones.
~ This factory is on the Christine River, ju
a, outside the limit of the city. On Redcll
ed Creek-a tributary to the Christine, runpiI
lie into Ill PARALLEL with the BrandywDe--
10 number of mills have seated themselves, atIraS
ed by Its swift torrent, amid scenery of ste
raj and rapids comparable to that ON the Lehis
= about Mauch Chunk. OF these the most i
or, teres.ing traditions attach to the FaulklaI
au Mills. Their name may remind the reader
ne the first novel of the late Lord Lytton-Fa
=, land, written in 1S2S-but it was given 10 Il
IL
at settlement, Faulks Land.
" The association with this site is that of Div
IL Evans, the true inventor of the ocomotiv
Ut who here worked aud dreamed in mill el
p riched with his contriyances.
=; Evans, like Fitch, is one of the worlds 10
ei renowns. Had the legislators of his time DO
Z sessed sagacity enough to endow his invention
the advantages of steam-transport would la,
u, been anticipated by several years, and tb
III glory would have radiated from the DelawaI
u River instead of from the Hudson. His desig
~ for locomotive was sent TO England in IT'S
- disputing priority with the "steam-w wagons" {
ID james Watt. He built steamboats, at Philade
. phia in 1902, and 1903, and ran them success
u fully, ante-dating by five years the Clermont
+ Robert Fulton-Fulton, whom people are b.
II gning TO regard, with Mr.. Stone, auther of IL
4 recent History Of NeU York, as the man wi
T. has received the greatest quantity of uudeser
&c ed praise Of all who ever lived. Oliver Evan
= born in 100 of respectable family, was mi
y Ter at Falkland where his smaller Invention
were first nut muse.
y The plank just under the apex of the roc
.e which lie used TO retire TO as his private stId
VI was shown until 1867, when the old mill w
W burned. Up among the swallows, as he Law ,
~ the board-to which, as Beecher expresses
III lie "broueht the softness"-the children of |
p genius were conceived and delivered t
III mill was full of his labor-saving machines, viii
W clattered to the babbling Redclay One of
We notions was the mll-"elevator" Gan impro,
~ inent of something lie had seen in Marshal
,inS mill at Stanton), by which grain was raised
7ii the top Of the building in buckets set alo
10 a revolving belt which passed from the roof
i'o the bottom, distributing the wheat with spo,
) q 10 the holt