Kymulga Mill | |
Nearest city | Childersburg, Alabama |
---|---|
Coordinates | 33°20′2″N86°18′0″W / 33.33389°N 86.30000°W |
Built | 1864 |
NRHP reference No. | 76000356 [1] |
Added to NRHP | October 29, 1976 |
Kymulga Covered Bridge | |
---|---|
Coordinates | 33°20′3″N86°18′0″W / 33.33417°N 86.30000°W |
Carries | pedestrian traffic |
Crosses | Talladega Creek |
Locale | Childersburg, Alabama |
Maintained by | City of Childersburg |
ID number | 01-61-01 (WGCB) |
Characteristics | |
Design | Howe truss |
Total length | 105 ft (32 m) |
History | |
Construction end | 1861 |
Location | |
Kymulga Mill & Covered Bridge are two locally owned historic landmarks located at Kymulga Park in Talladega County, Alabama, United States. The park is on Grist Mill Road (CR 46) off State Route 76 about 4 miles (6.4 kilometers) northeast of the city of Childersburg.
Both structures, dating back to the American Civil War, were restored in 1974 and were listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 29, 1976. [1] The Childersburg Heritage Committee purchased the tract in 1988, and with help from the Alabama Historical Commission and the Talladega County Commission, established Kymulga Park. More structural renovations were made as well. There is an admission charge to visit the park, with proceeds being used for upkeep of all structures and nature trails within this historic recreation area.
Kymulga Park was acquired by the City of Childersburg in June 2011. It is currently managed by the Childersburg Historic Preservation Commission.
Kymulga Mill is a working gristmill built in 1864 by German contractor G.E. Morris for Confederate Army Major George H. Forney, [2] who was later promoted to lieutenant colonel. Forney died at the Battle of the Wilderness in Virginia [3] before construction was completed, but his wife allowed Morris to finish it. Union Army soldiers burned most of the gristmills throughout the area during the Civil War, but Kymulga Mill was missed. The mill was sold four times before being purchased by the Childersburg Heritage Committee from latest owner Edward Donahoo in 1988, though it remained in active service through many of those years. [4]
Three water powered turbines ran the four-story mill, including lights, grain elevator and millstones used for grinding grain. Two of its five sets are French buhrs, thought to be the hardest rock in the world. Kymulga Mill continues to operate to this day, though under electricity, still making corn meal with its huge millstones. The building is now a tourist attraction open for guided tours. It also serves as a gift shop and park office.
The Kymulga Covered Bridge is a wood & metal combination style covered bridge that spans Talladega Creek, located just east of Kymulga Mill within Kymulga Park. Built in 1861, the 105-foot (32 m) bridge is a Howe truss construction over a single span. [5] The Kymulga Covered Bridge is one of two 19th-century covered bridges extant in Alabama still remaining at its original location; the Waldo Covered Bridge, also located in Talladega County, is the other.
The bridge once provided access to the Old Georgia Road or the McIntosh Road, a Native American trade route which was used by settlers and frontiersmen who ventured the area. Eventually, farms and communities spawned along the former trail. The United States government purchased land adjacent to Kymulga Mill in 1941 for the Alabama Ordnance Works, a military installation. Settlements within the tract had to be relocated. Today, the Kymulga Covered Bridge leads park visitors to a series of nature trails north of Talladega Creek. People may still find remnants of the Old Georgia Road, as well as other traces of the past.
Childersburg is a city in Talladega County in the U.S. state of Alabama. It was incorporated in 1889. At the 2020 census, the population was 4,754. It has a history dating back before 1540, when it was noted as a village of the Coosa Nation visited by the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto. It is said a member of De Soto’s crew fell ill and was left to settle in the area of present day Childersburg where the Coosa people cared for the ill explorer. The Alabama Army Ammunition Plant, important during World War II, was located 4 miles (6 km) north of Childersburg.
Bale Grist Mill State Historic Park is a California state park located in Napa County between St. Helena and Calistoga. The park is the site of a water-powered grist mill that was built in 1846 is one of only two water-driven mills remaining west of the Mississippi River.
Farmar Mill is a historic mill building. The mill was powered by the Wissahickon Creek and is located on Mather's Lane near Skippack Pike, and just west of the historic Bethlehem Pike in the village of Whitemarsh, Pennsylvania, in the United States.
The Graue Mill is a water-powered grist mill that was originally erected in 1852. Now a museum, it is one of two operating water-powered gristmills in Illinois. It is located on Salt Creek in Oak Brook, Illinois, owned and operated by the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County.
The Waldo Covered Bridge, also known as the Riddle Mill Covered Bridge, is a privately owned wood & metal combination style covered bridge that spans Talladega Creek in Talladega County, Alabama, United States. It is located off State Route 77 just south of the town of Waldo, about 6 miles southeast of Talladega. Coordinates are 33°22′44.78″N86°01′43.87″W.
The Clarkson–Legg Covered Bridge, more simply known as Clarkson Covered Bridge, is a county-owned wooden covered bridge that spans Crooked Creek in Cullman County, Alabama, United States. It is located at Clarkson Covered Bridge Park on County Road 1043 off U.S. Route 278 near the community of Bethel, about 8 mi (13 km) west of Cullman.
The Tuthilltown Gristmill is located off Albany Post Road in Gardiner, New York, United States. It was built in 1788, as the National Register reports, and has been expanded several times since.
Jerusalem Mill Village is a living history museum that spans the 18th through early 20th centuries. One of the oldest and most intact mill villages in the U.S. state of Maryland, Jerusalem is located in Harford County, along the Little Gunpowder Falls River. It also serves as the headquarters of the Gunpowder Falls State Park. The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 20, 1987. Also on the National Register of Historic Places and located nearby are Jericho Farm and the Jericho Covered Bridge.
The Newlin Mill Complex, also referred to as The Newlin Grist Mill, is a water-powered gristmill on the west branch of Chester Creek near Concordville, Pennsylvania built in 1704 by Nathaniel and Mary Newlin and operated commercially until 1941. During its three centuries of operation, the mill has been known as the Lower Mill, the Markham Mill, the Seventeen-O-Four Mill and the Concord Flour Mill. In 1958 the mill property was bought by E. Mortimer Newlin, restored and given to the Nicholas Newlin Foundation to use as a historical park. Water power is still used to grind corn meal which is sold on site. The park includes five historical buildings, which were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, and 150 acres (61 ha) of natural woodland.
McIntosh Road is a historic Native American route in the northern part of the U.S. states of Alabama and Georgia. It was named for the prominent Creek Indian chief William McIntosh, a leader of the Lower Towns who helped to improve it in the early 19th century.
Idlewild is a historic plantation house and historic district just east of Talladega, Alabama, United States. The property was added to the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage and the National Register of Historic Places in 1993, due to its architectural significance.
Pine Creek Gristmill is a historic building located in Wildcat Den State Park in Muscatine County, Iowa, United States. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
Hagood Mill is an operational water-powered gristmill built in 1845 by James Hagood near Pickens, South Carolina. It was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
The Nathan Cooper Gristmill is a historic gristmill on the Black River located at 66 NJ Route 24 in Chester Township, Morris County, New Jersey. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 21, 1976 for its significance in industry.
Benson Grist Mill is a restoration-replica museum located in Tooele County, Utah in the western United States, which allows visitors to see the inner workings of a latter-nineteenth-century pioneer gristmill. It has four other historic (nineteenth-century) buildings which have been moved onto the site, as well as four ancillary structures, including an open-air pavilion. It covers 6.98 acres along State Highway 138, 0.8 mile southwest of the intersection of the Road with State Highway 36. The museum is owned and operated by a division of Tooele County.
The McCosh Grist Mill is a historic grist mill near Rock Mills in Randolph County, Alabama. The mill was built in the early 1870s, and is the oldest extant stone grist mill in Alabama. It was built by James Eichelburger McCosh, whose grandfather, Jacob Eichelburger, operated earlier mills that were similar to those in his native Pennsylvania. McCosh also owned 500 acres of farmland nearby, and later added a cotton gin to the site. The mill operated until 1958, and was purchased in 1970 by the United States Army Corps of Engineers as part of the West Point Lake reservoir project.
The Hayward and Kibby Mill, also known as the Tunbridge Mill, is a historic industrial facility on Spring Road in Tunbridge, Vermont. It includes a substantially complete water-powered 19th-century grist mill dating back to 1820, with a later sawmill added about 1870. It is one of the few surviving water-powered mills in the state, and is believed to be the only one featuring both a sawmill and grist (grain) mill. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1992.
Ruff's Mill and Concord Covered Bridge is a historical site in Smyrna, Georgia. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.
Taylor's Mill Historic District, a 26-acre (11 ha) historic district featuring the gristmill Taylor's Mill, is located along Taylor's Mill Road and Rockaway Road near Oldwick in Readington Township, Hunterdon County, New Jersey. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 11, 1992 for its significance in architecture, exploration/settlement, industry, and military. The district boundary was increased by 8 acres (3.2 ha) in 1997 to cross the Rockaway Creek and extend into Tewksbury Township.
Media related to Kymulga Covered Bridge at Wikimedia Commons