YorksPast

The story of an old stone structure in Springettsbury Township reveals it has history as a Still House and Farm Mill. The former Still House is located at the northeast corner of North Sherman Street and Lower Glades Road, which is on the property of the Springettsbury Township Wastewater Treatment Plant.

The story of this structure has been shrouded in speculation since the first time I was told it began as a whiskey distillery. That was about 30-years ago, when I began using Grant Voaden mill research for a section about related mills for my ‘Barshingers in America’ book. During that research it was Lila Fourhman-Shaull, then Assistant Librarian at the History Center, who showed me a more recent photo of this old stone building, next to the Springettsbury Township sewage treatment plant. Lila asked if I knew anything about it being an early still house. She indicated that was something occasionally recalled when stories were shared about its later use as a farm mill where livestock feeds were custom ground for Glades area farmers.

At that time I was focusing 100% on the Barshinger family history book, so most of the details of that chat with Lila were quickly forgotten. However items and questions from our conversation were hurriedly jotted down in margins of Barshinger family research pages.

Two things resulted in a successful search earlier this week for those items jotted down about 30-years ago. A York County Mill Consortium project was announced in January, to review and update Grant Voaden mill research files. That prompted me to immediately pull out my notes from 15-years ago when Terry Koller and Ray Kinard proposed a similar project, with the ultimate goal of writing a book about their findings.

Terry Koller and Ray Kinard were the tour guides on an OLLI bus tour “Old Mills of York County.” The April 30, 2010, bus tour began at 8:30 am with attendees meeting in the lower Penn State York parking lot. We were instructed to pack a lunch for mid-day picnic at Rudy Park, and that the tour would finish at about 4:30 pm. There were stops at 6-mills in morning and 5-mills in afternoon. Between stops there was commentary by our tour guides as we passed many more mill sites along the way.

One of the drive-by mills in Springettsbury Township was the 1-1/2 story stone mill next to the Sewage Treatment Plant. Terry called this “Glades or Codorus Powder Mill due to the type of construction.” In the notes from the chat with Lila thirty years ago, was “Recalled hearing Lower Glades mill built of stone reclaimed from reducing size of a powder mill at Deep Run.” That was an early name for Dee Run in Hellam Township, near the Springettsbury Township line. This memory might be the reason Terry Koller speculated the stone structure at the bottom of Lower Glades Road was a power mill at one time. A Newspapers.com search did not reveal any articles about the powder mill, so that memory might be the only source of such a connection.

However several sources were found to begin documenting the history of the stone structure at the bottom end of Lower Glades Road as a early Still House. I started by doing a deed search of the property on which the stone house sits. That deed search follows for a property that is consistently about 200-acres:

1970 new & present owner is Springettsbury Township Sewer Authority
1954 new owner is Alva R. Long
1939 new owner is Martin Schaefer
1891 new owner is Horace Smyser (1853-1941) & son of Henry
1845 new owner is Henry Smyser (1812-1900) & son of Michael
1837 new owner is Michael Smyser (1778-1845)

Three Smyser generations owned this land for over a century. In 1876 Henry Smyser (1812-1900) owned the site and his property boundaries are plotted on the following 1876 York County Atlas. Henry Smyser obtained the shaded property in 1845. Michael Smyser (1778-1845) was a wealthy farmer and innkeeper, with several large farms in West Manchester Township. He appears to purchase the 194.3-acre tract in what is now Springettsbury Township in 1837 for use by his third son Henry, who becomes the owner via Michael’s Will of 1845 (Will Book S, page 504).

Within the map, the location of the Smyser Homestead is pointed out, as is the location of the Smyser Still House across the road. On the Smyser property several tenant houses are noted by the map maker. Tenant’s, i.e. renters, show up in early U.S. Census records as having no real estate.

For example the following is the 1860 Census taker record sheet for the Henry Smyser family. It indicates his closest neighbors are all renters. Two of those Smyser neighbors gave their occupation as Stiller: 53-year-old Peter Bishop and 28-year-old Andrew Shetter. It is logical they were operating the distillery for Henry Smyser.

There were three other Stillers in Spring Garden Township during 1860, all lived in the Freystown section of the township, which became the eastern part of York City. J. M. Bradstreet & Son’s 1866 Gazetteer of the Manufacturers and Manufacturing Towns of the United States indicated there was one large distillery in the Borough of York, which is likely where the Freystown Stillers worked.

There are no Stiller neighbors of Henry Smyser in the 1850 U.S. Census. A Stiller neighbor, 34-year-old John Lower, is in the 1870 U.S. Census. Therefore, it appears the Distillery on the Smyser farm was established between 1850 and 1860.

The Grant Voaden file (GV-46) notes record the last powder was made at the Powder Mill along Deep Run before Z. K. & Henry Loucks purchased the property. That purchase appears to occur in 1872 per Deed 5M-46. Therefore the memory that Lower Glades mill was built of stone reclaimed from reducing size of a powder mill at Deep Run is possible, although still hard to prove.

The early evidence of the Still House can now be combined with findings of eight years ago, when I was doing the research for my series of posts about the Codorus Navigation Works. The mill dam for Mundis Grist Mill, was part of that system. Mundis Grist Mill (GV-47) is along the Codorus Creek at North Sherman Street, just north of the stone structure at the northeast corner of North Sherman Street and Lower Glades Road.

Grant Voaden interviewed Roy Mundis (bottom of History page 4 of GV-47), who recalled his family acquired Mundis Mill in 1920 and “He remembers that in 1920 when his family moved there the Revenue Agents were moving their equipment for inspecting whiskey from that distillery across the road on the property of the Smysers, so that distillery was in operation up to 1920.” Through and after prohibition, this was locally know as the Smyser Feed Mill, where custom livestock feeds were ground, powered by electric motors.

Horace Smyser was the property owner in 1920, when Roy Mundis was describing the Revenue Agents were moving their equipment for inspecting whiskey from that distillery across the road on the property of the Smysers. Horace Smyser owned the property from 1891 to 1939. His property boundaries are plotted on the following 1937 aerial photo.

Following Horace Smyser, the next two property owners are Martin Schaefer from 1939 to 1954, and Alva Long from 1954 to 1970. This 206-acre site was the second major Springettsbury Township property that Alva Long purchased in the early 1950s. His first purchase was 331-acres surrounding the intersection of Mt. Zion Road and Whiteford Road in 1950. That is where his popular Avalong Farms Dairy Bar and Drive-In was located.

The Smyser family homestead, when owned by Alva Long, is shown located on the west side of North Sherman Street, across the road from the old 1-1/2 story stone structure seen at left. This 1963 photo is from the Vintage Aerial web site–Photo 184-CYO-12.

On May 8, 1970, Alva Long sold the 206-acre farm along North Sherman Street to the Springettsbury Township Sewer Authority. Groundbreaking for the wastewater treatment plant occurred on June 12, 1970 and the plant was put into operation on August 10, 1971.

The sewage treatment facility does not just service Springettsbury Township. Paralleling Mill Creek and then Codorus Creek’s east side, the Mill Creek interceptor allows sewage from surrounding municipalities to flow via gravity to the Springettsbury Township Wastewater Treatment Plant. Included are: Red Lion Borough, Windsor Borough, Dallastown Borough, Yoe Borough, Windsor Township, and portions of Spring Garden and York Townships.

The old stone structure on the northeast corner of North Sherman Street and Lower Glades Road has a history as part of the Wastewater Treatment Plant. Look for that in a future post.

Click on this LINK for a yorkblog.com Full View of the photos and illustrations in this post.

Links to related posts:

Mundis Mill at midpoint of Codorus Navigation

The last Hellam Township Distilleries

Pinpointing the Four Mills in Stony Brook

1860 Buildings 21-30 in West Region of Springettsbury Township