There was a lot to see at Falls Mill. Across from the shed full of old farm equipment, there was an old wooden barn and an antique steam engine.
We couldn’t figure out what the steam engine might have been used for, but it looked pretty solid and impressive!
We walked over behind the barn and could see one of the falls along Factory Creek.
These were created with a man-made stone dam built across the creek. It looks like some stone retaining walls I’ve seen, which I guess is pretty much what it is.
That must have taken a lot of work! The Farmer and I kind of wondered how they managed the water flow while building the dam.
Not surprisingly, the mill is located on top of a hill. At the bottom of the hill there’s a spring nestled in the hillside beside the creek. They’ve got a neat system that was built to get the spring water without walking down to the spring.
It starts with a pulley system and bucket at the top of the hill.
The pulley line goes down through the trees to reach the spring.
At the bottom, they put a pipe into the spring, so they’ve got a gush of water coming out to flow into the bucket.
I took a video when someone filled the bucket, then started pulling the bucket back up.
The bucket was moving so fast the camera wouldn’t stay focused in on it when it got up among the tree limbs.
You can hear the sound of the water wheel in the background. We were standing near the top of it, looking down at Factory Creek.
You can see just a bit of the wheel in the corner of the picture. It’s amazing how such a little bit of water turns such a huge wheel.
But that’s a story for another day.
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