"The Winchester Sun" on-line issue June 6, 2000 A dedicated group of determined digging detectives has unearthed a piece of Clark County history. A big piece of history, about two-thirds of a ton. The Red River Historical Society conducted a dig last November on the Danny Shimfessel farm on the Wade's Mill Road to uncover the site of a mill which operated on the Big Stoner Creek in the late 1800s and found, not only a millstone, but a water wheel turbine as well as other artifacts of an early Clark County commercial center. The story began when Larry Meadows of Clay City and his wife Jean, members of the historical society which operates the Red River Historical Museum in Clay City, were driving around the back roads of eastern Clark County. Ever on the alert for history, they spotted a pair of millstones in the yard of Ernest Turley. "My wife had heard of Wade's Mill so we stopped and asked Mr. Turley if the stones came from there," Meadows said. "He said he didn't know if they came from there or not, but he had heard the mill was located on what is now the Danny Shimfessel farm." "We went to Danny's house," he continued, "to ask permission to go on his property and look and his wife said he was in his truck on the farm. She called him and he said he would meet me there." What they found intrigued Meadows. "We looked at the mill site and it looked promising," he said. "So we asked for permission to investigate, photograph and excavate, and Danny was gracious enough to allow us to." That was three years ago. Meadows and other members of the society worked off and on for a couple of years at the site, then decided it was time to get serious. "We did a little bit of work two years ago," he said, "but in the fall of 1999, we dedicated ourselves to finish the investigation and excavation." What they found was evidence the area around the mill site was an important commercial center in Clark County in the second half of the 19th century. "We uncovered a segmented flint millstone," he said. "It took several different pieces to make each stone. It had an iron band around it to hold the stones together and metal center. "It was a French flint burr stone," Meadows said. "It was imported from France and the different stones were used as ballast when they were shipped over to the United States." Meadows said the fact the stone was flint - and segmented - was significant. "The best millstones made out of stone couldn't grind wheat fine enough to make flour," he said. "The material was too coarse. Of course corn meal is a little different ballgame. But we could tell a lot just by looking at this stone. It's different when you grind wheat for flour because the grain is a lot smaller than corn." After unearthing the stones and taking them to Clay City to put in the museum's collection, Meadows and the society set out to search for the tale behind the tale. "We know William Wade was running a mill there in the early 1870s, up to the late 1880s and 1890s," he said. "And I was told the mill actually ran up until about 1919, about the time of World War I." That the mill ran when it did during the 19th century was evident by the stone water wheel turbines, Meadows said. "The turbines replaced the older mills with the wood water wheels," he said. "They could produce more horsepower with less water. And we found some things in the ground to indicate they also used the mill to generate electricity, which is not unsuual." Meadows said an 1877 business directory and atlas of Winchester and Clark County mentions William Wade as operating a custom mill, general merchandise and dry goods store. "I feel real sure all that is tied in together," he said. "I would say it was all probably installed by then." But Wade's Mill may not have been the first one at that site, he added. "We found records where he bought the property in the 1860s from John A. Judy," Meadows said. "Several Clark County historians said they had heard it used to be called Judy's Mill, but we don't have the documented evidence to support that." "But I know one thing," he added. "Somewhere along the line he really modernized the mill with these turbines and that segmented stone." Mills were a common sight along Clark County streams in the 1800s and meadows said there was another mill close by Wade's Mill. "There is another mill site about half a mile upstream from Wade's Mill before you get to Little Stoner," he said. "It was on Wilbert Shimfessel's farm and it was the Scobee mill. But it had a conglomerate stone, a local stone." Meadows said a piece of the puzzle from Wade's Mill was missing, which made it difficult to tell just exactly how it worked. "We know the turbines, which weigh about two-thirds of a ton together, ran side by side in unison," he said. "But we don't know how the gearing worked. What I would say happened is what happened to a lot of the old mill sites. When they had those scrap iron drives during World War II a lot of these mills got stripped of their metal." The society hired Charles Spurgeon to operate his backhoe at the dig and three members of the excavation crew were employees of Meadows Golf Course in Clay City, which Meadows operates. "The reason we did this dig in November was because the golf course wasn't busy then and I was paying my guys anyway," he said. "But they're all members of the society too." The millstone and water wheel turbines join a collection at the Red River Historical Museum which now totals 120. "They're about 65 percent millstones and 35 percent grindstones," Meadows said. "We're just collecting what we can with the limited amount of funding we have." And even if that collection is impressive, Meadows says it is by no means the largest. "The largest, I would say, is at the Museum of Appalachia in Norris, Tenn.," he said. "And Levi Jackson State Park in London has a big millstone collection. But they started collecting theirs 60 years ago in 1939, when they were easier to get to then." And he only has one regret about the latest dig. "The only thing I regret about finding the turbines was that Wilbert wasn't there," he said. "He died between the time we found the site and last November, when we really started digging. He would have been real excited about that." "But I will say this," he added. "I couldn't expect any landowner anywhere to be as accomodating and helpful as Danny was. He was very kind to us." The society's next mission in saving history in the Clark and Powell County region is to attempt to preserve the redstone quarries in northeastern Powell County near Pilot Knob where conglomerate millstones were made. Then it's on to the Clark-Powell line on the lower falls of Lulbegrud Creek at Stewart's Mill and Meadows promises a surprise at that dig. "We found an old map of the area and discovered another building across the creek and up a little bit. We're not sure what kind of building it was and what kind of activity took place there, but we do know there's a real good freshwater spring there, and we have an idea what it was."