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4 THE NEW TANNER THURSDAY, AUGUST 16, 2007 BACK THEN: This photo, taken by a photographer from Owen Sound, shows the flour mill at the right and the west arm of the mill pond, now known as Fairy Lake. The mill was at the end of Mill St. The line of houses along Main St. shows there were no houses west of Main St. This photo was probably taken before 1856 because the railway which arrived there, had not yet arrived. The mill didnt change much over the next century. Actons first industry still flourishing Flour mills have been here since 1828 First settlers recognized importance of water power BUSY MILL: Dover Industries, Halton Flour Division on Mill St. W. is one of the busiest places in Acton as trucks loaded with grain arrive and leave with flour for bakeries around the province. Saddlebag Methodist preachers, the Rev. Ezra, Rev. Zenas and Rufus Ad- ams trudged up the Niagara Escarpment through the dense pine woods of Upper Canada to settle on Lot 28 Concession 2 in Esquesing. They obviously perceived the sparkling stream we now call the Black Creek could be dammed to create a mill pond to power a saw mill. This they built just below the present dam spill- way. Later they constructed a grist-mill a little further down the stream on the site of the present flour mills, Actons first industry. Prior to the founding of the mill, area pioneers had to trudge to Lot 24 on the Sixth Line with their grain to have it turned into flour. It was known as Mc- Callums Mill. A general perception that the leather industry is Actons oldest but the flour mill preceded the first tannery by at least a decade. The first tannery was built in Acton in 1842 by Abraham Nelles. Later water from the mill pond damned by the Adams was channelled through a cast iron pipe to the tannery, bought by the Beardmore family in 1865. By this time the flour mill had become a familiar fixture at the bottom of Mill St. A photo taken by a photographer from Owen Sound before 1856 shows the outline of the flour mill which stood for almost a century before any major changes were made. There have been other grist mills in Acton. Within living memory there was one on Mill St. W. between where Dennys Insurance offices and Halton Hills Furniture are located. It was set back from the street leaving a passageway for horses and wagons bringing grain in to be chopped. In the early days of Acton there was also a flour mill near River St., in the same building with a saw mill and a woolen mill. It was torn down in 1873 to make way for a plow company. Those of us long in the tooth can recall when trav- elling medicine man shows would park their wagons on the lot behind what is now Halton Hills Furniture and next to the old grist mill. There was usually some kind of entertainment such as a dancing bear or a ma- gician to entertain. Then the medicine man would peddle bottles of some kind of elixir at a dollar a bottle, which he spouted would cure anything from the common cold to the pains of rheumatism and gout. The mans spiel was con- vincing. Mesmerized people in those cashstarved depres- sion days would pull out dollar bills from pockets, purses and unmentionables to buy the magic elixir. It wasnt until much later this scribbler discovered the al- coholic content of the bottle surpassed the medicinal tonic somewhere around the 80 per cent mark. Buy- ers could get instant relief at a time when the sale of hard liquor was prohibited except, of course, for medicinal purposes. Other flour mills existed but it was the original mill which withstood the test of time under a number of proprietoirs. Actons Early Days re- cords that Charles Glebe, a miller, who started building the fine brick home at the corner of Mill St. W. and Park Ave. ran into finan- cial difficulties. Financial matters went against the builder and worry drove him to commit suicide by going to the (railway) sta- tion early one morning and placing his head under the wheels of a train, the book declares. One of the best known millers in memory, of course, is the late Dave Lindsay who lived in a fine home on Park Ave. An avid sportsman and horseman Dave was a familiar figure around Acton in his big Packard car which some- times also acted as lorry for his hounds, of which he was very proud. He was also a familiar figure around the race tracks. Many an Acton better has won money put- ting a few dollars on Dave Lindsays horses, which he kept in a barn at the rear of his property. Dave Lindsay, because of his evocation, was usually covered in flour, the trade- mark of most millers. He eventually sold the business and there were a number of millers before Brian Dolotowicz purchased the business, then called Ziggle Mill, in 1983. Dolotowicz said the old rat-infested wooden mill on the verge of closure by the health department needed to be replaced and he did it with cement and steel, creating a new, more modern complex of silos and buildings. He was understandably proud of taking the mill from one of the last of the small flour mills to the largest independent flour mill in Canada. Cost? About $7 mil- lion over 20 years with 40 employees. The mill was awarded the Chamber of Commerce Business of the Year award in 1993. Dolotowicz, after being wooed for 18 months by Dover Industries, sold the Acton business, now known as Halton Flour Mills, to Dover Industries in May of 2003. Banned from setting up again in North America, Dolotowicz still operated a business in Cuba supplying restaurants and hotels with bakery products. Since Dover took over they have continued to modernize and meet new regulations imposed by the government. The latest was installation of larger steel silos in their cement blankets so the large trucks which feed grain to the mill could be accommodated in one silo. More expan- sion equipment was also installed on the mill top to reduce noise and dust levels. The mill is an immense departure from the old wooden buildings which produced flour for well over a century with water power and later electricity but the aim is still the same qual- ity products with the most modern equipment. Wouldnt the Adams brothers be impressed with the tall steel structures of the mill of they were around? -Hartley Coles When Dover Industries installed new larger steel silos at their Halton Flour Milling plant on Mill St., Acton, last year it was another step in the process of updating a mill which has stood on this site since around 1830. Mill Street of course, got its name from the mill established by Actons founding fathers, the Adams brothers, who settled this area around 1825.