Friday, January 28, 2000
Miamitown salvages river relic
BY RACHEL MELCER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
WHITEWATER TWP. — Plucked this summer from the Great Miami River, where it had sat unused since the 1913 flood, an unusual old turbine will soon reclaim its place in Miamitown's history.
Historians are working to build a monument around the 94-year-old cast-iron engine that once powered Miamitown Mills, the community's first big business.
When floodwaters washed away the grist and lumber mill, the 9,000-pound turbine was unmoved. Generations of children dove from it into the “old mill hole” of the river, where they fished and swam until pollution took over.
Many of them still live in town.
“I'm addicted to fishing. I spent hours on that thing. I fished on it, I swam around it,” said town historian Howard “Pistol” Gieringer, 81.
“The community is enthused about this. ... This is a bit of history, and we haven't recorded it yet. It's all been word of mouth.”
Photographs and paintings of the old mill adorn the walls of the Home Like Restaurant and the Historical Society building. It was built in 1816 by Arthur Henry, who platted the town around it.
Men and boys pulled stones from the mill dam out of the river about 1934, then used them to build Miamitown Church of Christ. Sitting on Ohio 128 in the heart of downtown, the church now has one of the community's biggest congregations.
Waited a long time
But the turbine sat in the water from the time it was installed in 1906, replacing an inferior wooden model, until a day in September when Mr. Gieringer mentioned it to James Bunnell over a cup of coffee. Owner of a gravel mine, Mr. Bunnell decided to retrieve it with some of his heavy equipment.
The turbine was hauled to his company and sandblasted to a shine. It stands 7 feet high and 6 feet in diameter — much bigger than the standard 3-foot-diameter turbine of its time. It turned at 20 rpm and produced 30 horsepower, enough to power two millstones at a time.
Last week, as Mr. Gieringer prepared to make a well-received pitch for funding and support to the township board of trustees, one of those millstones turned up. It had sat for more than 90 years in a mausoleum at Miami Cemetery.
So it, too, will be included in the display.
Generating money
“Personally, I think it's a pretty neat project, and I'd like to see the township ... do whatever we can — and some funding. I think it's worthwhile,” said Trustee Hubert Brown.
Historical Society members are applying for a state grant and will do some local fund-raising.
By the end of this year, they hope to have the turbine and millstone on display downtown, surrounded by old pictures and a written history.
“We have an opportunity now to show history,” Mr. Gieringer said. “We have the artifacts. We have excellent pictures. And now we can tell the total history — that's really our objective.”
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