WHEN YOU SEE PAUL DUDEK
Please give him a hearty pat on the back and a big “thank you.” Paul has cut grass and whacked weeds at the Mill – a huge job and we can’t thank him enough. The uneven ground makes this job very difficult.
MEETINGS
August 11 and September 8 meetings will be at the Mill (7 p.m.). In October we will resume meeting in the Community Room at Kings Restaurant, Buffalo Plaza or in another inside location. Check the next Grist to be sure.
A THOUSAND THANK YOUS
A friend of the Society, who wishes to be anonymous, has made a donation of $1,000.00. Thanks so much Anonymous Friend!
BUFFALO MILLING CO.
In the June/July edition of Grist, we printed pictures of some flour bags found behind the walls on a house at 225 Second Street and we promised to share some information with you about this establishment.
The Freeport Planing Mill Company was incorporated in 1875 with capital of $20,000, divided into shares of $100 each. This company erected a substantial brick structure, 50 X 100 feet, with engine-house attached. It was on the site of a planning mill owned by W. P. Murphy & Co. that had burned down the same year. Murphy, McCain & Co leased the establishment in 1879. In connection with their planing mill, and sash and door factory, they ran a sawmill The sawmill handled between five and seven million feet of lumber annually. The site also included a warehouse, two stories in height and 30 X 60 feet. They fueled the boilers in the planing mill with natural gas from a well near at hand.
The Buffalo Milling Company was incorporated in 1881. It began business in September 1882 in a 40 x 65 foot building, 3 stories and basement high erected for this purpose. Buffalo Milling Company was composed of a majority of the original stockholders of the Freeport Planing Mill Company and others. There wasa 25 x 49 fiit engine-house attached. The manufacture of flour was by the Hungarian roller process, and the mill had an exclusively merchant patronage. Its capacity was about 125 barrels of flour per day.
Devereaux Chevrolet/Geo now stands on the site, and the basement section of the flourmill has been incorporated into the building currently occupied by the dealership.
Thanks to AKValley.com for information on Buffalo Milling Company and Freeport Planing Mill Company.
SMUT MACHINES
Last summer Thomas V. Cook from Butler visited the Mill during one of the Open Houses. After his visit he wrote to Sam Moore, writer for Rural Marketplace, a weekly section of Farm and Dairy, as follows:
In the building is a large machine that has a series of screens and elevators. The nameplate is as follows: Richmond Imported Horizontal Smut Machine, Richmond Mfg. Co. Lockport, NY. Any information you could provide would be appreciated. Why would a smut treating machine be located in a building that produced flour for human consumption?
Sam’s answer and article follow:
Lesson in Smut Today, when we hear the word smut, most folks think of pornography. When I was a kid, we sometimes had corn smut, and I especially remember how I hated to pull the husks off an ear of sweet corn and find a glob of the dirty-looking gray stuff. I don’t remember that we had a problem with the wheat we grew, although smut has long been a problem with small grains as well as corn.
The 1932 Yearbook of Agriculture estimated about 28 million bushels of wheat were lost in the United States every year from smut.
In 1955 Washington State University estimated that a record 34 percent of the 88 million bushels of wheat grown in the Pacific Northwest was graded as being smutty.
There are two kinds of wheat smut. Stinking smut – also known as common bunt – is identified by black, crumbling heads that give off a distinctive fishy odor. The wheat grains are merely gray, hollow shells filled with a mass of minute, black spores. A similar smut attacks oats as well.
A more destructive kind is called loose smut of wheat. With loose smut, the whole head is destroyed and turns into a powdery mass of spores that blow away to infect other plants. A similar smut attacks barley.
In both kinds of smut, the spores are released and spread by the wind or harvesting machinery. The windborne spores infect healthy plants in the same and neighboring fields, while harvesting machines scatter the smut balls into the threshed grain.
Today wheat and other grain smuts are not the threat they used to be, but there are still outbreaks of the disease.
Cleaning it up. During the heyday of local flour mills, such as the one in Freeport, grain that was to be ground into flour was far from clean. Sand, bits of straw, small stones, lumps of earth, and small weed seeds, along with smut balls from infected grain, were all part of the mix. This stuff all ended up in the flour if it wasn’t removed beforehand.
When the wheat first entered the mill, it was put through a preliminary cleaning machine that removed most of the stones, straw and dirt. This machine could have been similar to a fanning mill, with a series of flat screens of increasingly coarser mesh along with air currents, or a rolling screen that passed the grain through a revolving barrel made of progressively larger screens. While the screens would remove some smut, inevitably, many of the smut balls would be broken and the fine, powdery substance inside these balls would contaminate the wheat by getting into the crease and by sticking to the fuzzy end of the wheat berry.
Most smutters depended on a percussive action that scoured the wheat free of the impurities adhering to the grains.
The grain fell through a series of revolving beaters inside a vertical cylinder, where the beaters struck the grain and threw it against the inside of the cylinder. This buffeting action knocked the smut dust loose from the wheat berry and air currents lifted and removed the impurities. Horizontal machines worked in a similar way. The scourers were usually followed by brush machines, which were similar to the scourers, except brushes were attached to the beaters. These brushes polished the grain and removed any remaining impurities, as well as the fuzz on the end of the berry.
From the smutter, the grain usually fell or was elevated to a holding bin right over the millstone or roller mill, whichever was being used to reduce the grain to flour.
An old treatise on milling said:
Wheat cleaning has been well-called the foundation of all good milling. In the screen house, as the wheat-cleaning department of the mill is termed, will be found an array of machinery almost equal in range and variety to that in the mill itself.
So, it should be no surprise that there is a smut-cleaning machine in a mill that produced flour for human consumption.
Visit a mill. The outstanding dedication and hard work of groups such as the Freeport Area Historical Society and the Carroll County Historical Society make it possible to see a bit how our ancestors lived.
The Freeport Area Historical Society is in the long and expensive process of restoring the old Valley Mills, also known as Mickey’s Mill, to working condition.
Freeport is located near the intersection of PA Routes 28 and 356, about 25 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. It is open to the public 11 to 3 on the 4th Saturday of May, June, July, August and September.
Algonquin Mill is a restored working mill located in Petersburg, OH, a little hamlet 5 miles south of Carrollton, OH, on Route 332. It will be in operation 9 to 5 October 7-9 during the 35th annual Algonquin Mill Fall Festival.
We cannot thank Sam, editor Susan Crowell, and publisher Scott Darling enough for their consent to include this article in Grist. We also appreciate that Mr. Cook took the time to ask the question and then kindly send us a copy of the article. You can reach Sam in care of Farm and Dairy, P. O. Box 38, Salem OH 44460-0038 or email to editorial@farmanddairy.com. Farm and Dairy is a weekly newspaper in existence since 1914. Farmers, rural residents, antique collectors, and auction goers from central and eastern Ohio, western Pennsylvania and northern West Virginia read it. It is truly an asset to their 33,700 subscribers. Check them out at www.farmanddairy.com.
Because of the article in Rural Marketplace, some residents of Ohio traveled here specifically to see the mill and were among the 12 to 15 visitors on July 23.
DECEMBER MEETING
Okay, so it’s August and it’s hot and who is thinking about December? Well your Historical Society is. We’re planning a dinner meeting for Friday, December 9. It will be a catered affair held at the United Methodist Church on 4th Street. This will be the monthly meeting for December. More details will be in next two newsletters.
MORE EMAILS
Let’s catch up. Frank Kinsmore requested information on Transylvania Bible School. Alan emailed Frank with the phone number of The Biblical Life Institute which is the new name of Transylvania. If you are a former student or have pertinent information, you may reach Frank by email.
Carla Dattalo Meert emailed us that she had a dream about an elementary schoolmate of hers that put her on the road to research her roots in Freeport. Her family lived there from the turn of the last century until about 1968 when her grandfather died.
Carla continues: “My grandparents Salvatore and Rose Dattalo owned the house at 101 Market Street for all that time. My father Elmo and his 5 siblings (Bettina, Louise, Sam, Hermie and Mamie) all were born and grew up in that house and all now sleep in Freeport Cemetery along with a deceased baby sibling (Luigi) who was a victim of the early 1900 influenza epidemic, and my mother Signe Dattalo Thompson. (when my dad died in 1966 she always said it was comforting to know she would lie between my dad and old man Michillini). Sam and Hermie were victims of WWII, Aunts Bettina and Louise owned a small magazine, newspaper, and candy store on Third Street, east of Market Street next to the Railroad Station, until Bettina died in 1965. All attended Freeport Schools and when I was in 9th grade, I had the same English Teacher as my father, Mrs. Elizabeth Schaffer. (Anyone else remember her?) My 5 brothers and sisters all attended St. Mary Elementary school and later public school. John graduated from Freeport High in 1965 (32 in Grad Class) and went on to become Finance Director of Penna School System Bus Transportation. He passed away and is also in your cemetery. Pat lives in Virginia and is Chief X-ray Tech at a Hospital, Carla (me) lives in Florida and am ready to retire from the local Telephone company, Signe is a Widow and lives in Ocala, Fl., Elmo lives in Washington D.C. and is in the legal research business, Paula lives in Texas.
“Even after all these years, (my mom moved us to Florida when my dad died in 1966) I still consider Freeport my home. I looked over the site you have and was happy to see names I remembered, Pearl Schweitering, Liz Canterna
( lived across the street from my grandparents), and Mr. Shoop ( probably the son or grandson). What a way back machine for me. This was such a wonderful morning! “
If you remember any of the Dattalo family and would like to share these memories with Carla, she can be contacted by email.
Vic Rutoski, Jr. writes: “I became aware of the Freeport Area Historical Society web site and have just finished reading all the past newsletters. In regards to "Freeport Christmas Past" written by Rod Chapman I remember being a part of erecting the Christmas Trees every year from around 1954 through 1960. The trees were purchased and erected by Freeport Boy Scout Troop 512 from St. Mary's Parish. This was a yearly project and I presume both a fundraiser and community project. Frank Cook was the scoutmaster at that time and along with his committeemen and scouts we erected the trees every year. I remember a few of the committeemen as being Paul Rassau, Richard Furhman and Charles Sobolewiski. I believe the scouts carried on with this project through the 1960's.
Vic Rutkoski Jr.
19660 Puritas Ave. Apt 144
Cleveland, Oh 44135
GETTING IN TOUCH
As you should know by now, you can reach us through the website and also email the editor.
ELSEWHERE IN THE COUNTY
Some of our members have been attending meetings of an umbrella group, which consists of all the historical societies in Armstrong Co. The plan is to work together to make it easier to get grant money.
The umbrella group is meeting again in August with the state to find out more about obtaining funds. The county already gave a grant to start a county website and it is operational. Visit the web page. It includes links to all county historical societies.
MASSEY HARBISON
At some time in the not too distant future, we hope to erect a plaque at the corner of Mulberry Way and Fourth Street where Massey’s home was located. A fund has been started and we welcome contributions to it.
TIDBITS IN TIME
June 19, 1905 – Mary Orris, better known as Mary Smackenhammer, who has a reputation for wickedness extending up and down the Allegheny River, is in trouble again with the law. Mary was enjoying a keg of beer when she took exception to a remark made to her by Lefty Imms. Mary hurled a beer glass at Lefty, which struck his face and cut him. Mary landed in the county jail.
July 10, 1905 – A family of four can be fed for $1.65/day if the housewife will take advantage of summer economies and lower meat and vegetable prices, according to the American Research Foundation. The foundation recommends a menu of stewed figs, scrambled eggs, toast and coffee for breakfast, fruit, salad, toast, cupcakes, milk, coffee or tea for lunch and meat loaf, cabbage, creamed potatoes, tomatoes, cornmeal muffins and beverage for dinner.
Thanks to Valley News Dispatch for these tidbits.