The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1874-06-21
THE BROOK STEAM Rue MILL.

We suppose that everybody and his wife
and are fond of it, his children especially
| to many of whom it is an article Of almos
daily food. But very few we imagine have
| even faint idea Of the manipulations
which the rough rice undergoes, after it
| has ripened and been cut from the fields,
before it becomes prepared for use on
the table. Having recently visited the
Brook Steam Rice Mill, of which our enter
prising fellow citizen, Mr.. Columbia, H.
! Allen is proprietor, and been shown all
through the mill when in operation, by his
brother and able assistant Mr.. Frederic k
| Allen, and having witnessed the different
processes through which sack Of rough
rice passes, from the time it is dumped upon
the floor of the mill, until it comes out the
polished and beautiful article, ready for
market or immediate use, we now propose
to give to our readers in the city and coun-
try, the benefit of our visit, end an insight
into the working of this probably the larg-
est and most perfect mill of it's kind in the
South
The Brooks steam rice mill is situated
upon TchOupitOulas street, Nos. 80, 81 and
SO, just above Lafayette street, being but a
few squares from the steamboat landing
and most advantageously located for the
speedy receiving and shipment of rice per
steamers. Fronting 60 feet upon Tchoupi-
toulas street. it is a most commodious
three-stOry brick slated building, running
back some 200 feet or more to Foucher
street, upon which it also fronts. Having
| thus the advantage of double frontage
| upon two open thoroughfares, and one of
the advantages which this mill offers above
others to our rice planters and factors is the
immense storage capacity which it possesses,
Mr.. Allen informing US that he can easily
and safely store within his building 10000
| sacks OF rough rice, and even $1,000 by
little crowding.
But now to the interior of the mill. On
entering the whirr and hum of all the
varied machinery assaiis the ear; immedi
ately before you revOlves the great fly
wheel of the sixty horse power engine which
moves the vast machinery. The engine it.
self is very large and beautiful one, both
| in its finish and it, working, costing, origi-
nally, with the boiler, we were told seven
thousand dollars. The fy-wheel turns the
long iron shaft (some 80 or 100 feet in
lengthy on which revolve the numerous
pulleys which are required to work the dit
ferent parts of the mill, machinery and
now commencing with a sack of the rough
rice just as brought from the plantation We
will describe the processes through which
it must pass, before it is prepared for the
market.
The rice is emptied from the sack into a
large bin or hopper, from which it is at once
taken by an elevator aud carried into the
upper story of the mill, where it passes
under a fan and through screen, which
thoroughly separates from the rough rice all
the trash, straw and dirt. which is to a
greater or less extent gathered mp from the
floor of tina farmhouse whom sacking the
rice to be sent to the mill. The rough rice,
thus eliminated from all trash, falls into a
long and narrow wooden trough, in which
reyolves shaft with spiral flange, called
the conveyer, extending the whole length
of the trough, where, falling through an
opening into another trough, it descends to
the large hopper, from which it is fed direct
to the immense mill-stones, which hull the
rough rice. &
These mill stones are. perhaps, the largest
in the country. They measure five and q
half feet in diameter, and their capacity is
to thoroughly hull about 400 barrels Of
rice per day. After passing through the
mill-stOnea the now hulled rico comes to a