Diehl’s Mill Covered Bridge
Grant Voaden’s collection of Mill photos at the York County Heritage Trust contains a, circa 1900, Diehl Mill Landscape Photo. The right side of the photo includes the Diehl Mill Road Covered Bridge that spanned Mill Creek; separating Spring Garden Township (in the foreground) from Springettsbury Township (in the background). Today this road is named North Sherman Street. The Diehl’s Mill Covered Bridge portion of the photo was enlarged and colorized.
The whole, circa 1900, Diehl Mill Landscape Photo is shown below. Attached to the photo is an illustration by Harry A. Diehl, identifying the structures in the photo.
Harry Diehl provided the following explanations of the Diehl Mill Landscape:
A—Storage Shed.
B—Second Mill, built by Peter Diehl 1774, enlarged and improved over the years. Torn down 1948.
C—The old barn, was still standing 1960’s when property was sold to P.A.&S. Small Co.
D—The Miller’s House built after 1889 likely by the Hively’s when they separated the mill property from the farm.
E—Out house and chicken coops.
F—Roof line and back part of the Peter Diehl House, erected ca 1775 when Peter returned from Lancaster Co. It is highly possible that part of this house was originally built by J. Adam Diehl. [This was the final remaining structure from the original Diehl Mill property; it was torn down in 2013].
G—The first Diehl Mill, erected 1740 by J. Adam Diehl and his sons. The upper part was probably of log, but since they operated a saw mill, would have been covered early with wood planks. The mill still stood at the time of the Photograph; estimated to have been taken about 1900. Prowell mentions it had been standing but was gone by 1907 when he did his history.
H—Tree line located on the bank. The distance from the bank to the creek bed was about 18-feet, which would be the water head for mill operation. The wheel was probably an undershot type inside the mill proper.
I—Approximate creek bed line.
J—Covered Bridge on Sherman Street, also known as Diehl Mill Road.
K—The Albert Loucks house (1876). This was originally part of Nicholas Diehl land. Sold by executors to Daniel Loucks, the father of Albert. This was a brick house torn down in ca 1966. The land was owned by Penn Advertising at that time.
The following Aerial Photo, taken September 18, 1937, was introduced in the post 1860 Buildings 31-40 in West Region of Springettsbury Township. On this photo, I’ve added the Point of View and Field of View lines for the Diehl Mill Landscape Photo. The corresponding structures are pointed out; using Harry Diehl’s lettering.
Photos of several structures from the original Diehl Mill property will be featured in a future post. Click on this LINK for a Full View of the illustrations in this post.
Several additional York County Grist Mill posts include:
- The Mill Room was filled with Neighbors who discussed Anything and Everything
- Pinpointing the Four Mills in Stony Brook
- S. Morgan Smith’s Grist Mill; Smith Signatures
- The Massive Grist Mills at York Haven
