jordans mill - a visit with london and south east millers society

8/20/2019 Jordans mill - A visit with London and South East Millers Society

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/jordans-mill-a-visit-with-london-and-south-east-millers-society 1/4The London and South East Millers

Society held another great meeting

for its industry members in early

September. This meeting was at a

former ourmill, Holme Mills in theUK, which is now a heritage mill.

It is an important mill, since from the

early era of the roller mill revolution, it

seized the opportunity to use this new

technology in the Victorian era. Bill Jordan, chairman of Jordans

welcomed all from the society to the mill and provided a short

presentation.

Bill’s brother David, vice-chairman of Jordans, was also on

hand to assist and provide additions to the presentation. Bill has

a history of our milling through the family rm as he trained atHolme Mills for six months when he left school at 18 years old.

The Mill

The mill’s formal name is Holme Mills. In 1086 in the

Domesday Book, the contemporary mill was recorded and valued

Jordans millA visit with London and South East Millers Society

by Tom Blacker, Milling and Grain Magazine

44 | October 2015 - Milling and Grain

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http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/jordans-mill-a-visit-with-london-and-south-east-millers-society 2/4

at an annual turnover of 47 shillings. It is located on the River Ivel, a tributary to the

River Great Ouse. In the local county of Bedfordshire there were over 400 mills at its

peak in the late 1890s. This was a high concentration of mills by any standard today

and was possible because the mills were supplied by the ample harvests of grain from

the wider Eastern England region. Still today, this region produces the most our

milling wheat than any other in the UK.

In 1855 the Jordan family switched from farming to flour milling under lease

at Holme Mills, until buying the mill outright in 1890. In 1894, following a fire

in the mill, a 25 horse-power water wheel was installed to work in conjunction

with a 20 horse-power oil engine. Another fire in 1899 helped to further the

technology and production capacity from the mill. These technological leaps

enabled the mill to increase production significantly and helped Jordans to

become one of the leading producers of flour in the region by the turn of the

century.Inside the mill, and located above the river on the ground oor are the gears and

mechanisms that gave the mill its power. From the water wheel, the power was

transferred to the crown wheel. This is the largest wheel in the mill and is constructed

with individually repairable timber teeth to ensure easy and quick maintenance in case

of breakages.

Milling and Grain - October 2015 | 45

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A Flour World

Museum story

No. 2

www.muehlenchemie.de

For a good time, visit the mill

Since 1889 the world-famous “Moulin

Rouge” – “Red Mill” – has enticed

visitors to Paris. This legendary

variety theatre features can-can

dancers and exotic revues, and unlike

mediaeval mills it is located in the

middle of the entertainment district

Pigalle. Because nowadays, erotic

entertainment is found downtown.

But in the old days, you went out

to the seclusion of the mill. Nestled

discreetly in a forest or on a stream

far from town, the mill was long

considered a place of permissive-

ness and forbidden lust. Mill broth-

els are known from antiquity, and

if the mill itself wasn’t the house of

ill repute, then they could be found

along the well-travelled mill road.

Indeed, milling and sensuality are so

intimately interwoven that “grind”

came to signify the sex act in more

than one language.

The Mühlenchemie FlourWorld Museum

in Wittenburg is an expression of our

company culture and the responsibility

we feel towards the miller and his flour,

as one of the most important staple

foods. The museum is a journey through

the millennia, illuminating the devel-

opment and importance of flour. It is

the only one of its kind in the world.

www.flourworld.de



Flour circuit/power circuit

In the mill, there are essentially two circuits, one cog and belt

driven circuit for powering the machines and another circuit for

the grains and our. Set over three oors, the mill was highly

innovative and advanced. At its zenith, and with the investments

made following the 1894 parafn engine re, the mill was fully

equipped for the launch into the roller milling age. With its Carter

Roller Mill System installation, Jordan’s mill made it into one of

the most advanced ourmills in the country.

Silos were installed inside the mill. They were used to store

grains for North American hard grains, as well as locally sourced

soft grains for up to 15 months. Imported grains were not just a

contemporary need. Imports were needed in the mill continuously

in the operations throughout the Jordan’s tenure. The silos are

not there today, which is a shame but it was interesting to picture

these silos storing grain ready for the milling process.

Inside the mill, the vast amount of wood materials in the oor

and piping created a very different atmosphere than a modern

mill. The only way for workers to move around were stairs,

sealed behind large metal sliding doors. There was even wood

surrounding the conveyor belts of elevator buckets. The elevator

buckets were much smaller than modern buckets; they were

merely a few inches wide and constructed wholly from metal.

The main modern material of choice in buckets is polymerplastic. When in motion, the mill’s machinery moved at a rapid

pace, grains were conveyed around the mill to the gravity-fed

roller mill machines. The atmosphere and sense of the mill lived

again.

The roller mills are working but not functional, they are set in

line just as the working mill would have been. Technical know-

how was evident in the group with some commenting how they

remember parts such as leather-belt driven power. As original

machinery and parts are present in the mill, Turner of Ipswich

and Henry Simon roller mills, record books to monitor activity in

the mill, woven our sacks and anti-moisture devices were set in

the mill to give an accurate portrayal of everyday working life.

The gulf between computerised and digitally controlled milling

was absent but the ingenuity was based on the traditional head

miller’s experience. With cottages built next door to the mill’s

delivery door, it meant that the miller and family were physically

linked to their mill as some family-owned mills are still to this

day.

In the mill’s working era, it was economical to utilise waste

products from the ourmill in an animal feed mill, which

existed on the current site of the market garden. Today, there is

no trace of the feed mill unfortunately. It was admitted that the

downfall of the mill commercially was the demand for quality

white our, competition and subsequent decline in the local

region.

The mill was the last remaining mill in Bedfordshire. However,

the desire to retell the story provided the impetus for the

renovation and in 2013, this mill was restored to a heritage mill

for future generations. This legacy will ensure that a successfulmill continues to be appreciated in its Victorian era, and mark

the development of milling in contrast to today’s size, scale and

advanced mills. This experience demonstrated that there is now

a great example of milling history brought alive in the middle of

England for other retired mills to follow.

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jordans mill - a visit with london and south east millers society

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