Gristmill

Built by Old Sturbridge Village, 1939

The Gristmill was one of the first buildings constructed at Old Sturbridge Village. Built on the site of the Wight family’s original gristmill, the mill is made of recycled old timbers and new lumber. The mill’s massive millstones and other parts came from the Porter Gristmill in Hebron, Connecticut.

Gristmill owners served their customers by grinding grain into flour and meal for baking or provender for feeding livestock. By Massachusetts law, a miller could charge a fee or toll of 1/16th of the grain bought to him as payment for milling the rest. But rural milling was changing along with the rest of the economy; even in the countryside, cash fees were beginning to replace traditional tolls.