The _Old Mill_
                                and the
                            _Covered Bridge_

    [Illustration: The water wheel on the mill in Carillon Park is an
    example of the âovershotâ type of wheel, in the operation of which
    the water comes down over the wheel from above. As the water strikes
    the paddles or pockets, the wheel turns, and with it the mill
    machinery.]

    [Illustration: Until it was moved to Carillon Park, this Covered
    Bridge was in daily use southeast of Dayton. It was on the Feedwire
    Road and spanned little Sugar Creek about one mile east of
    Wilmington Pike. Neither the largest nor the smallest of Ohio
    bridges, this one is typical of the medium-sized structure. It is 55
    feet long and 14 feet wide.]

    [Illustration: Water wheel]

The old grist mill and the covered bridge are links with Americaâs past
which, even today, have not passed entirely from the scene. Each was a
part of the fabric of our young and growing nation and each made its own
contribution to our progress.

By todayâs standards, the old grist mill, driven by water-power and with
everything except its grinding stones made of wood, is somewhat
primitive. Yet even today, one must admire the fine craftsmanship with
which the water wheels and the various wheels and shafts which
transmitted the power were fashioned.

The old mills, and particularly the grist mill, marched with the pioneer
who wrested the wilderness from savage beast and Indian. It is debatable
whether the grist mill or the saw mill had priority in our productive
history. But it is altogether likely that the grist mill came first in
construction, with the meeting house a close second. The Bible and the
plow, and sometimes the rifle, always advanced together. âTo mill and to
meetingâ was an old-time admonition.

The covered bridge, battered by time and tempest, is bound up in history
and geared to the march of events. Washington and his men clattered over
many a covered bridge. The floors of scores of them resounded with the
hoof-beats of the caravans that moved westward and southward to bring
the invigorating breath of civilization to virgin areas. Those that
survive are mute reminders of a unique craftsmanship and the sturdy
qualities of our early builders.

The grist mill represents a pioneer American industry with a charm and
picturesqueness all its own. We are so absorbed in the tumult of mass
output that we scarcely realize the part played by the old mills in
rearing the cornerstone of our vast industrial activity. The phrase,
âhorse power,â now geared to myriad millions of units, in all
likelihood, began with the horse-operated grist mill. A horse provided
the power. The creaking water wheels with their rhythmic splash, were
the outposts of the hydroelectric age which has harnessed rivers and
falls and wrought marvels of production the world over.

    [Illustration: Covered bridge]

    [Illustration: Old Mills, quite a few of which are still in
    existence, are picturesque reminders of an earlier day and favorite
    subjects for artists. This is particularly true where the mills were
    built of stone as was frequently the practice in the eastern part of
    the country. A limited number of these mills still operate and find
    a market for their product because many people believe that meal
    ground between the old-style millstones has a superior quality.]

                           The Old Grist Mill

In the early days of the seventeenth century countless little mills
buzzed busily throughout the inhabited part of this country, supplying
many of the things essential to the life of the colonists. They were
operated by hand power, animal power, and wind and water power.
Sometimes the water power was furnished by tides. It is interesting to
note that, in their primitive way, they projected the mechanical
principles used in present-day industry. The staff, post, wheel, crude
pulley, wedge, inclined plane, and screw were all in use. Those pioneers
builded well, little dreaming of the wonders that would be unfolded by
the industrial revolution.

The grist mill represents a striking evolution in the process of
satisfying the hunger of man. The Indians pounded corn in a hollowed
rock which was a crude mortar. Peasants all over the globe performed the
same kind of service to obtain flour from wheat. It was the earliest
hand power era. The Puritans, Cavaliers and Pilgrims probably obtained
their first grist in this way. They were familiar with the use of
grinding stones in Europe, so it was not long before the grist mill
sprang up in the first clearings. As a matter of fact, some of the first
millstones in this country were imported from England and France. The
first mills were operated by hand or horse power. Then came the familiar
water wheels. One of the characteristic features of the old grist mill
was its picturesque location.

The old grist mill was a sort of community center for the people of the
adjacent countryside. The âjolly millerâ, as he has been designated in
song and story, like the New England tavern keeper of the Concord coach
days, was an important personage. He was a friend and philosopher to all
and sundry. His mill, which he often built with his own hands, was a
rallying placeâa social rendezvous. Here news was gathered and gossip
garnered and spread. The mill had a social value akin to that of the old
country store with its potbellied stove and cracker barrel. Over this
informal country club presided the âjolly miller.â Many poets have sung
of his virtues.

Many of the old millers were artisans of the highest skill, full
brothers to the builders of the covered bridges, whose craftsmanship
perished with them. One of them was Oliver Evans, a noted millwright who
lived in Pennsylvania in the late 1700âs. He introduced various
innovations. One of them was a tiny elevator with metal cups to carry
ground grain from the stones to the bins for storage. Before the advent
of these elevators the newly ground meal was ladled out of the pile
beneath the millstones with great wooden shovels.

    [Illustration: This interior view of the Old Mill in Carillon Park
    shows the mechanism by which power was transmitted from the water
    wheel to the grinding stone.]

The grist mills were usually run by water wheels. These were made up of
two immense wheels on the same shaft with spokes of heavy flat boards
mortised to fit close together at the hub and joined together at the rim
by paddles, floats, or palettes of heavy wood which made an endless,
revolving stairway. Some wheels had compartments on each float, the
better to catch the water. The overshot wheel required a dam and was
turned by the weight of the water which fell on it from above.

The wheel was located wherever the dam or flume was placed. Usually it
was exposed to the weather but sometimes it rested under a shed or
penthouse. The wheel pit was a danger hole. If a man fell into it while
the wheel was turning he had little chance of escape. Millers were known
to have been drowned in their own mills when someone opened the water
gate at the wrong time.

There were two kinds of millsâthe water wheel construction and the tub
mill. A tub mill was the simplest and cheapest of all types of grist
mill. In it the wheel was located down in a pit or âtubâ and lay
horizontally with a vertical axle, whereas the water wheel type was a
wheel rotating on a vertical plane and mounted on a horizontal axis. One
of the first mills hereabouts was a tub mill built by Daniel C. Cooper
where The National Cash Register Company lumber yard now stands.

The millstones were fashioned out of material usually common to the
locality in which they were used. New Hampshire granite was widely
employed and what was called burrstone, originally imported from France,
and later discovered in Arkansas, also came into use. A sandstone found
in New York State found its way to many mills. Before roads were opened
up to the West and South, millstones for the new settlements were broken
up, carried on pack horses to their destination, and then assembled with
iron bands to hold them together.

In size the millstones ranged from one to two feet in thickness and from
three to seven feet in diameter. All stones were âfurrowedâ, as the old
phrase went. This meant that they were âpackedâ so as to carry the meal
from the center of the stone to the edges. Thus all the grain was
ground. The nether, or lower stone, harder of the two, was fixed, that
is, immovable. The upper stone revolved with the mill spindle and could
be raised or lowered. Each stone was pierced with an âeyeâ, a hole
through which the spindle, or shaft, ran. The grain poured through the
âeyes.â Due to almost constant wear the millstones had to be âdressedâ
periodically.

    [Illustration: The face of each burrstone used for grinding wheat or
    corn consists of raised sections (lands) and furrows (grooves).
    Whole grain is crushed by the action of the lands and passes to the
    outside of the revolving stones through the grooves. Below, a miller
    in the Loranger Grist Mill, Greenfield Village, Dearborn, Mich., is
    preparing the face of a burrstone with a special tool.]

It is a tribute to the efficiency of the old grist mills that long after
they had been displaced by steam-driven plants, many people preferred,
and some still prefer, the product ground out by the millstones. They
maintain that the stones produce a higher grade of flour than can be
made by modern machine methods. So great was the demand for the
millstone-ground flour that a manufacturing firm in Indiana made a
miniature grist mill equipped with stones which was used in many private
homes and on some farms. Power was furnished by a motor, a far cry from
the old water wheel.

    [Illustration: This picturesque mill is located just north of Dayton
    and is more than 100 years old. It is in operating condition.]

In the heyday of the grist mill one further operation followed the
grinding. The grist was put through a bolting cloth which separated the
bran. Sometimes the bolting was done in a grist mill. More often the
sifting took place in what was called a bolting mill.

Many people who never saw or even heard of a grist mill know about the
millstones because of the popular sayings that have sprung up around
them. Everybody has heard the phrase, âhe is caught between the upper
and nether millstones,â which signifies that the person referred to is
in a jam. Another phrase is, âItâs all grist that comes to his mill,â
meaning that the individual gets all the breaks and capitalizes every
advantage. Then too, there is the phrase, ârun of the mill,â which has
become synonymous with routine product or performance, and âhe has a
millstone âround his neck.â Perhaps the best known of all is the saying,
âThe mills of the gods grind slowly yet they grind exceeding fine.â Many
a man has had this hurled at him when his sins of omission or commission
have eventually overtaken him.

The toll for having grain ground in a grist mill was usually paid in
kind. In the pioneer days the fee for grinding was four quarts out of
each bushel. Later this was reduced to two quarts. Some millers received
one-sixth of the grain they ground. Millers also kept what was called
the âmill ring.â This was the grist that remained around the stones
after the grinding was finished. No wonder the old millers waxed fat,
not only in girth but in worldly goods as well.

Although battered by time and outdistanced in the march of progress,
many grist mills still stand as a link between the slow sedate era of
American production and these humming times of swift and continuous
output. The Stony Brook Mill at Stony Brook, Long Island, is an example
of how the old mills endure. Built in 1699, it is still doing business
in the same quaint stone structure that housed it at birth.

Grist mills are closely associated with the early history of Dayton and
its pioneer personalities. The site of Dayton was purchased in 1795 by a
group of Revolutionary soldiers seeking new homesites. It was laid out
as a town the same year by Israel Ludlow and Daniel C. Cooper, and named
in honor of Jonathan Dayton, a soldier in the War of Independence, who
later became a United States Senator from New Jersey. Dayton was
incorporated as a town in the year 1805.

    [Illustration: The old Patterson Mill stood on Brown Street at
    approximately the present location of the NCR factory.]

    [Illustration: It was advertised as the Rubicon Factory.]

                             _THE RUBICON_
                                FACTORY,
                       _Two miles below Dayton_.

  The subscribers inform their friends and the public, that their
  Carding and Spinning machines are now in complete operation, having
  this season made considerable improvement in their Factoryâthey are
  prepared to Card and Spin wool in the best manner.

  For Carding common wool                          6 1Â·4 cts. per lb
   â  Spinning chain per doz.                          18 3Â·4 cents,
   â     do.    filling per do.                            15    do.
   â  Carding, Spinning and Weaving                       31 1Â·4 do.
      Cloth in 500 Reed,
   â     do.                            all above 500 in proportion,
   â     do. Casinett,                                           do.
   â     do. Satinett,                                   37 1Â·2 cts.

Every attention shall be paid to work committed to them, that it shall
be done in the best manner and to the satisfaction of those employing
them.

Produce will be received, in part payment, at the market price.

                                                           K. PATTERSON,
                                                               H. HYATT.

May 12th, 1823.
                                                                   73 if

    [Illustration: An old water wheel near Dayton, long since retired
    from active service but still in position. The millstone in the
    foreground was probably brought here on pack horses for its sections
    are bound together with iron bonds.]

In those early days, manufacturing in the Miami Valley was limited.
Here, as elsewhere throughout the country, the stone block for crushing
corn was succeeded by the hand mill which, in turn, was superseded by a
mill operated by horse power. The next step was the change to water
power which brought the water wheel into use.

The first mills immediately around Dayton were built by Cooper who at
one time owned most of the downtown district. He set up the first mills
within the limits of Dayton proper at the head of Mill Street. The
street received its name in 1795 because of the ease with which mills
could be located there.

About 1798 Cooper moved to a 322-acre farm located south of Dayton where
he built a grist mill. It was known as Rubicon Farm. Through subsequent
events it became bound up in the history of Dayton. It was bought by
Col. Robert Patterson and later became the site of the NCR plant, as
well as Old River Recreational Park and the adjacent lands.

Patterson was not only an able soldier and a doughty woodsman, but
something of a statesman as well. He founded in Kentucky what is today
the city of Lexington, heart of the famed bluegrass country. One of the
early governors referred to him as âone of the earliest, bravest, and
best of the pioneers and heroes who made the Great West.â

Once in Dayton, Colonel Patterson impressed his personality upon the
town. He owned a grist mill, a fulling mill, a saw mill, and a double
carding machine. All these were located on the Rubicon Farm. They were
at their best around 1809. In October 1815, while in full operation, all
the mills were destroyed by fire. Always resourceful, Patterson
recovered quickly from the blow. He built a grist mill known as âThe
Stone Millâ which became a Dayton landmark. It was located on the Brown
Street road where the Rubicon crossed it. Stonemill Road takes its name
from this fact.

Rubicon Farm was destined to be linked with the drama of American
industry. Colonel Patterson had ten children, the youngest of whom was
Jefferson. He succeeded to ownership of part of the estate and the
mills. Here on December 13, 1844, his son, John H. Patterson, founder of
The National Cash Register Company and a notable figure in industrial
development, was born and spent his boyhood, serving a hardy
apprenticeship in work.

As the years sped on, Dayton and vicinity became an important milling
center. By the winter of 1822-23 there were fifty grist mills along the
Miami River. Montgomery County, alone, had eleven grist mills.

While some of the old grist mills still perform their time-honored task
to the music of purling mill streams, the vast majority have vanished,
or stand as crumbling landmarks of another generation. Yet in their day
they were indispensable to life and labor. The memory of them will
always be as green as the moss that clung to the dripping paddles of the
great water wheels.

    [Illustration: When the mill was not in operation, the water was
    deflected from the water wheel, as shown in this view of a mill near
    Bristol, Tenn.]

                           The Covered Bridge

    [Illustration: For many years the covered bridge was a familiar part
    of the country scene in America. This bridge still stands in the
    White Mountains, New Hampshire, with Mt. Liberty in the background.
    Photo by Winston Pote from A. Devaney, Inc., New York.]

Like many other supplanted or vanishing features of early American life,
the covered bridge is enshrined in song, legend and story. It has been a
prize subject for etchers and painters. Innumerable post cards bearing
the picture of some famous bridge crowd the mail pouches, especially in
the New England States.

Just as the railroad sounded the doom of the Conestoga wagon, the
Concord coach and the narrow inland canal, so did the automobile end the
larger era of the covered bridge. The motorist wanted a steel, iron or
concrete ground-hold for his car when he dashed across a river. Although
the old bridges were built for good, solid wear, and sometimes a lot of
tear as well, they could not stand up against the speedster. They were
built for slow traffic. In the old days, teams were obliged to proceed
at a walk, under penalty of a fine ranging from $2.00 to $5.00. The
motor car, however, had stout allies in bridge destruction in fire,
flood, and changes in highway routes. Many of the oldest and best known
of the covered bridges were destroyed by fire or high water.

Although the covered bridge, as we know it, is distinctly an American
institution, it did not originate in this country. There is a record of
a roofed bridge built over the Euphrates in Babylon in 783 B.C. The
Tiber at Rome was crossed by several covered bridges. The best known
structure of this type in Europe is across an arm of Lake Lucerne in
Switzerland. It has a steep, arched roof, is built entirely of timber,
and is used only by pedestrians.

The covered bridge in this country underwent no evolution such as was
the case with the great girder and suspension structures that span our
big rivers. It began with a simple pattern and followed that pattern
with few changes. The origin is interesting. In the early days when our
civilization was young, the ferry was the traditional method of crossing
a river. It was slow, cumbersome and inadequate. The farmer who wanted
to drive a flock of sheep or a herd of cattle to the market found it
difficult. Then began the era of open wooden bridges. The log pilings
soon became subject to rapid decay and to destruction by floods and ice
floes. Stone piers then replaced the wooden pilings, but these did not
prevent the bridge floor from rotting under attacks of the weather. To
meet this situation a shed was built over the floor. Soon the shed had
sides. Before long there was a path for pedestrians. In this way the
covered bridge came into being.

For years there has been a difference of opinion as to why the old
bridges were covered. Some have maintained that it was to prevent the
horses from shying at the water. Others have contended that the roof was
built to protect the driver, while still others believed that the
bridges were roofed to provide a refuge from storms. The basic reason
was to protect the floor from the elements.

    [Illustration: Covered bridges were part of the Dayton scene until
    the early 1900âs. This bridge spanned the Miami River at Third
    Street. It was built in 1839 and razed in 1903. Another covered
    bridge crossed the river at Main Street, and another on the site of
    the present Dayton View bridge.]

    [Illustration: This sign on the Carillon bridge is original and
    specifies the fine that was imposed for violation of the âlaw of the
    bridge.â]

  $5 FINE FOR RIDING OR DRIVING OVER THIS BRIDGE FASTER THAN A WALK

  $20 FINE FOR DRIVING OVER THIS BRIDGE MORE THAN 20 HORSES OR CATTLE AT
  ONCE

  $5 FINE FOR CARRYING FIRE OVER OR UNDER THIS BRIDGE IN AN UNCLOSED
  VESSEL

Most covered bridges were built along identical lines. They usually had
a single tunnel with sides boarded to the eaves. The two-tunnel bridge
was something of an exception. One of the few changes in bridge
construction came with latticed sides which relieved the bridge from the
gloom that pervaded the original type. This gloom had its compensation
for lovers, who found freedom from prying eyes in the friendly dark.
More than one old structure was called âThe Kissing Bridge.â

The original bridges with the planked sides afforded a great opportunity
for the billposter. The walls blazed with lurid circus posters,
advertisements for patent medicines and brands of tobacco. It
represented the first phase of what has come to be known as âoutdoor
advertising.â

The covered bridge also afforded an opportunity for robbers to ply their
trade. It was easy to hide in the deep shadows, pounce upon the
unsuspecting wayfarer, and despoil him of his possessions. Murderers
also lurked in those dark confines. Crimes on the covered bridges were
numerous. This led a contemporary writer to say:

âBoys have lost a yearâs growth by going through a covered bridge; girls
have become gray before their time; stout farmers have had a queer
feeling when the moon is high, the roads deserted, and the echoes of the
horsesâ hoofs are loud and strong.â

The two main types of covered bridges were the lattice truss of wood and
the Howe truss of iron and wood.

One outstanding fact in connection with the old bridges is that they
were not built by engineers or professional bridge-builders, but by
local carpenters who put up the houses and barns in the adjacent
countryside. This explains what has been termed their âhomely
simplicity.â They represented honest work. Those men had no knowledge of
scientific building. Wind pressure and load limit were the first
considerations. One builder constructed his bridges âhigh and wide as a
load of hay.â That was his only specification.

In commenting on the work of those covered bridge builders, a well-known
engineer wrote:

âThose early builders knew nothing of the theory of stresses; indeed
many of them did not even call themselves engineers, but the long and
honorable service of the structures they built, under loads far greater
than the builders could have foreseen, is a striking testimonial to the
excellence of the materials and the skilled workmanship that went into
their construction.â

A second striking fact in connection with the bridges is that the
abutments were piled stone. The structure was held together by pegs of
hard wood. No mortar, cement, bolts, or nails were used. The marvel is
that so many of them have stood up for more than a century. In their way
they were masterpieces of construction.

A third feature of interest is that while most of the old bridges
followed the same lines of construction, no two were precisely alike.
Many writers have emphasized the fact that each bridge has a certain
individuality. Nor was this individuality lacking in attractiveness.
Some of the structures were architecturally beautiful with an old-time
charm.

    [Illustration: On many a covered bridge it was a long way through
    and the trip was much more pleasant in the daytime than at night.]

Crude as were the methods and materials employed, the old bridge
builders left monuments to their skill. The bridge across the Schuylkill
River near Philadelphia, built in 1813, had a span of 340 feet in
length. When constructed, it was the longest span in the world. Another
long bridge was at Charlemont, across the Deerfield River near the scene
of the famous massacre of settlers by Indians in the early New England
days. It was 324 feet long.

    [Illustration: There were many different types of covered bridges.
    This one was built with two lanes, although speeding traffic was
    much less of a problem in its day than now.]

The covered bridges cost from $300 to $6,500. They were built by towns,
individuals and companies. Often a lottery provided the cost of
construction.

As on the old turnpikes, toll was charged on many of the bridges. The
rate for a foot passenger was two cents; for a cow, two cents; one
sheep, one-half cent; a horse, four cents; horse and rider, six cents;
cart, sleigh, sled, or wagon and one horse, ten cents; two horses,
thirteen cents; wood per cord, fifteen cents; all other loads with one
horse, ten cents.

Most of the private companies operating covered bridges fared
exceedingly well. Some bridges paid as high as 18 to 20 per cent a year.

The exaction of tolls created bitter opposition in many communities and
became an issue in politics. The Lyman covered bridge between Hartford,
Vermont, and Lebanon, New Hampshire, completed in 1804, was known as the
âInter-State Hold-Upâ because the tolls were so exorbitant. Even
ministers were forced to pay to cross the bridge.

So deep-seated was the unrest over toll charges that in many instances
the tolls were withdrawn. The first free covered bridge across the
Connecticut River, where the earliest of the bridges was built, was
opened to the public in 1859. This bridge, which spanned the river
between Norwich, Vermont, and Hanover, New Hampshire, was built by the
two towns at a cost of $6,500. It was 400 feet long and stood 40 feet at
low water.

The classic covered bridge story and the perennial delight of all
writers on the subject deals with a farmer who drove up to a long bridge
with a load of hay on the way to market. He stopped at the entrance and
squinted down the dark tunnel. Then he said:

âI can git through this end all right, but there ainât room to squeeze
through that little hole at the other end.â With this remark he turned
his team and drove back home, his hay unsold.

Another anecdote is connected with the âWalk Your Horsesâ sign at the
entrance of the Hartford covered bridge. A woman was summoned to court
for disobeying this injunction. She hired a clever lawyer and contested
the case. When it was called in court the lawyer said:

âYour Honor, the law reads that a fine be imposed on any man who drives
a horse across the bridge faster than a walk. I move that this case be
thrown out. My client is a woman and she was driving a mare.â

The case was dismissed.

The covered bridge served purposes for which it was not originally
intended. On wet nights it became a sort of informal community center.
Preachers, on occasion, used it for camp meetings. The local militia
drilled in it. Once a school teacher, whose little red schoolhouse
burned down, held some of her classes under its shingled roof.

    [Illustration: The view from the Dayton Art Institute is one of the
    finest in the city, but it has changed materially over the years, as
    is evidenced by this drawing made in the 1840s. The covered bridge,
    standing on the present site of the Dayton View bridge, was part of
    the scene when this sketch was made.]

The story of the covered bridge is not altogether a narrative of the
past. No one knows accurately just how many were standing at the peak of
their use. One thing, however, is certain. There was a time when the
entire New England countryside and a considerable portion of the rest of
the country, was dotted with covered bridges. They crossed streams in
twenty-six states. One reason why they were so widespread lay in the
fact that when New Englanders, the first builders, moved west or south,
they constructed the same type of bridge that they had known and found
satisfactory back home.

    [Illustration: The walls of covered bridges lent themselves only too
    well to the activities of the bill poster. Such posters as these
    extolled the virtues of the products they promoted in the days of
    the covered bridge.]

One of the most zealous of the covered bridge historians has computed
that there are still 2,000 of the old structures intact and still in
use. Ohio ranks first with 592 bridges and Pennsylvania next with 336.
Indiana has 202. Vermont with 200, has more covered bridges than all the
other New England States combined. Massachusetts, where many of the
earlier bridges were built, today has 26, while Connecticut is at the
bottom of the list with only 7.

Of the 2,000 bridges still standing, many have unique names and
associations. The second Lyman bridge, which replaced the âInter-State
Hold-Up,â was called the âBridge of Spooks.â It was dimly lighted at
night by swinging kerosene lamps. Children avoided it after sunset and
grownups went through in a hurry.

One of the oldest and most noted of the covered bridges is Esperance
bridge on the famous Mohawk Valley Turnpike on which all stagecoach
traffic in and out of Albany, New York, traveled. The first bridge on
this site was built in 1793 and was destroyed by a freshet. The present
structure went up in 1811, the second to be erected by the State of New
York. No covered bridge ever earned more money. The tolls by 1846
amounted to $1,000,000. More than 700 teams crossed in a single day. In
view of its long and fruitful history New York has preserved the bridge
as a state monument.

Most of the covered bridges are gone but they are not forgotten. Their
distinct place in the category of early Americana is widely recognized.
Many have become museum pieces. States and individuals are conserving
them. Henry Fordâs collection of covered bridges at Dearborn, Michigan,
is the largest in the country. The inclusion of a covered bridge in
Carillon Park is recognition of its status in the evolution of American
life.

    [Illustration: This is the longest single-span covered bridge in the
    United States. It is 210 feet long and is located near North
    Blenheim, N. Y.]

    [Illustration: The diorama in the Wagon Shed depicts a scene in the
    Miami Valley as it might have appeared in the early part of the
    nineteenth century.]

The diorama in the Wagon Shed presents a composite picture of some of
the Carillon Park exhibits as they would have appeared in actual use.
The three-dimensional, accurately scaled model shows a canal boat
approaching a lock. Passengers sitting on the top deck are dressed in
the costumes of the day. The boat is the packet type designed to carry
passengers and representing in its day a considerable degree of luxury
in travel.

In the background is a covered bridge and to the left, an old mill built
beside a stream. At the right a settlerâs cabin typifies the rural
housing of the day and the settler, himself, watches the boat pass.
Traveling the road beyond the canal is a Conestoga wagon and a Concord
coach.

Thus, against the background of the rich countryside which made possible
the great development of the Miami Valley, are many of the elements
which contributed to the way of life of its early settlers.

                             CARILLON PARK
                              DAYTON, OHIO

               One of a series of Carillon Park booklets.
                            Price ten cents.

                                 E15SS
                           PRINTED IN U.S.A.

                          Transcriberâs Notes

âSilently corrected a few typos.

âRetained publication information from the printed edition: this eBook
  is public-domain in the country of publication.

âIn the text versions only, text in italics is delimited by
  _underscores_.
{'title': 'The Old Mill and the Covered Bridge by Anonymous', 'source': 'Project Gutenberg', 'lang': 'en'}