Hall's Mills: Kewaunee County's 1st Grist and Saw Mills

Abraham Hall was a Lake Michigan mariner until he lost his schooner Rochester off Two Rivers Point in 1848. Hall was shipping on the west shore of the lake but, without a vessel, entered the employ of John Volk’s Kewaunee lumbering business. He didn’t remain long and in May 1852 opened the first mercantile on the Door Peninsula.*  Known as Wolf River when Hall settled there, the place is called Algoma today.

The lumber Hall’s account book shows sold in 1851 appears to be in error based on land records, but from May 1852 on, there was a steady stream of notations of items sold, price and the names of purchasers who came from as far as Bailey’s Harbor and Sandy Bay, the town now known as Carlton.

Having opened his store, Hall began building his saw and grist mills on the South Branch of the (now) Ahnapee River just beyond the present Algoma Hardwoods. When Hall’s brother Simon and family arrived from New York in 1855, they moved into a log house near the frame store building, the log blacksmith shop and the mills and Simon began working with his brother.

Hall’s gristmill was the only such place east of Green Bay and north of Manitowoc. It drew customers from Door County and the southernmost parts of Kewaunee County who brought their grain by boat. It was a boon to the Belgians who had recently arrived in the two counties. As they walked through the thick forests, they carried grain sacks hanging down their backs attached to their heads with a corner of the sack wound in a cap-like fashion. Keeping their hands free, they could push away the almost impenetrable branches while carrying a stick to assist in walking or perhaps to frighten an animal.

Water powered the mill that was felt to be quite an impressive place. Impressive as it was for the time, Hall’s was a small mill compared to those being built 20 years later. Hall's high dam held the water in a mill pond thus furnishing the power. When the Record described the mill’s workings during the 1870s, it explained with the following: “To release water from the pond and permit it to flow thru the race and exert its forces against the paddles of the old water wheel that moved the machinery and made the stones go round, a small gate was raised by the aid of a long sweep lever.” 

Grinding was not always fine, said the paper, because the mill stones were old fashioned, however Hall’s stones were French burr stones that were thought to be far superior to any other, It was said the French stones speedily pulverized the grain to a uniform thickness. More than likely Hall’s stones came from John Noye’s warehouse in Buffalo, a place destroyed in a May 1879 fire.

The Hall mill had its own fires. When the grist and sawmills were destroyed by fire in late 1866 or early 1867, they were rebuilt only to burn again in the 1870s. The brothers were still operating in the spring of 1881 when “Anonymous” wrote a letter to the Record's editor. Anonymous called for a new first class mill that would meet the needs of residents while not being built “after the fashion of bygone days.” While the author felt a new mill would increase business, the author seemed to be saluting the accomplishments of the Halls, saying he didn’t want outsiders to come to compete with those who “assisted in developing the county.”Simon Hall and his sons went into milling at Maplewood, 10 or 12 miles north in Door County, after the brothers retired from the Ahnapee business in 1888,

As the timber along the river and in the surrounding area disappeared, the need for a small mill disappeared as well. As new and more modern gristmills were being built, Hall’s faded away. The machinery was removed and it wasn’t long before the old mill began its decay. Michael Haney and his brother John owned the property in 1893 when a storm leveled the old frame structure, the oldest mill in the county. The grist mill, which was connected to the sawmill, saw little damage then. Eventually some of the buildings were razed and in time the dam washed away.

The postcard dates to the early 1900s after the dam mill had deterioriated and the dam had washed away. The photo was taken facing northeast toward Plumbers Woodwork, the large brownish building. The Veneer and Seating Co., today the Hardwoods, is visible to the right of the Plumbers, behind the trees.

During the cleanup after the Haneys bought the property, one of the old mill stones was among the articles they found. The Haney brothers felt they were preserving history by saving one old, well preserved and almost perfect stone when they put it in the wall of the new one-story brick structure they built in 1906 on the southeast corner of 2^nd and Steele.  The Haney building was sold and resold over the years, finally being torn down and replaced with the Savings and Loan building that is now the Bank of Luxemburg. The old millstone was lost during demolition and surely buried in some landfill. It was found during the clean-up 100 years ago and might well be found again. Will anybody know what it is or that it came from the first gristmill on the Peninsula?

*Door County was created in 1851. Kewaunee was set off from Door in 1852. Jacques Vieau had a “jack knife” trading post along Jambo Creek years before. He was also known to be in Kewaunee at times. A “jack knife” trading post was one that opened and closed quickly.

Sources: Ahnapee Record; The Commercial Development in Algoma, Wisconsin c. 2006; Here Comes the Mail, Post Offices of Kewaunee County, c. 2010; Old Peninsula Days, Hjalmar Holand, c. 1925; Yours Truly, From Kewaunee County, c. 2013.