One of the most important places in Blount County’s early history was its grist and flour mills. In the first part of white settlement here, game was plentiful and the streams were full, but the residents also hungered for bread from their corn and wheat crops. The corn had to be ground for meal and the wheat seed removed from the chaff to make flour. The early mills provided not just a place to do that but also a community gathering place for gossip, local events and national news. It was a place where everyone had to go but was also the social center of a community.
Early mills were powered by water, and Blount County has one of those old mills still in operation in Cades Cove. Many of us have gazed in wonder at the wooden wheel turning, the sight taking us back to early days in Blount County.
Another of those early mills remained in operation until recently. Clover Hill Mill, I am told, has been boarded up. Established in the 1820s, historians tell us that it was the bedrock of that community. In its early years, Clover Hill was a thriving place with a church, general store, school and a distillery. No small part of that was the grist mill. Its wooden wheel was powered by the headwaters of Baker’s Creek. Located at the junction of Clover Hill Mill Road and Clover Hill Road, it was the center of a community…