Iowa: Land of Many Mills

One of my favorite little books about the history of sawmills and gristmills in Iowa is Iowa: Land of Many Mills by Jacob Swisher. Published in 1940, the book provides a great picture of the role mills had in the development of the prairie (from Native American mortars to large steam mills of Clinton).

What follows is the cliff-note's version of his chapter, Sawmills on the Frontier, infused with more detailed history when possible. Swisher's history is in italics.

When Europeans came to Iowa, more than 1/10th of Iowa was timber. The first business in many frontier towns was either the gristmill or a sawmill. One of Iowa's first sawmill was Benjamin Clark's mill on Duck Creek in Buffalo of Scott County. Clark established his mill in 1834.  (Swisher, 65). 

According to Bettendorf: Iowa's Exciting City, the mill was established 15 years before Elias Gilbert platted the town of Bettendorf. Clark's mill sat just north of the modern Route 67, and his main competitor was Samuel Hedges who operated a sawmill on Crow Creek in Pleasant Valley. Once again, you see that before settlement, the sawmill was established. The Bettendorf author make a wonderful statement when they say that there were plans to develop a town around Clark's sawmill. However, Clark was more interested in sending all the lumber to build the town of Buffalo, the town he laid out seemingly soon  after he established the mill.



The first steam operated sawmill along the Mississippi River was probably John H. Sullivan's mill in Scott County or the one "erected" in Dubuque by Caleb Booth, Francis O'Ferrall, and Peter Engle. Both were established in 1837, but the Dubuque mill was better explained. For example, the Dubuque mill ran off a 60 horsepower steam engine purchased from Pittsburgh for $3,500  (Swisher, 66). 

Caleb Booth would go on to be Dubuque's first mayor; once again showing the confluence between sawmills and the development of frontier towns. Dubuque's Encyclopedia credits Booth's mill as the first one to operated by steam engine on the Upper Mississippi. Booth would also build the first flour mill in Dubuque but not until 1848. In Steamboating on the Upper Mississippi by William Petersen, there is a note from Du Buque Visitor, the newspaper, about a steamboat bringing a steam sawmill to the area once the area was open to navigation. The article was dated December 21, 1836. Swisher says it was the steamboat Rolla, but instead of coming from Philadelphia as stated by Petersen, it came from Pittsburgh. Either way, Petersen has a great bit on the role steamboats played in transporting all the heavy machinery the mills in Iowa needed to increase production.

By 1859, there were 540 sawmills in Iowa. Iowa towns were being built by native lumber. The mills followed out from the Mississippi Valley to the western edges of the state. The real boom to Iowa mills though came from the first log raft to come down the river. In 1843, the St. Croix river booms broke due to a flood. The first log rafts came down the river. Not to be confused with the first lumber rafts that came down to Davenport as early as 1839. The first log raft had 500,000 board feet of logs and went to St. Louis (Swisher, 68-71). 

Swisher exquisitely lays out the development of the type of blades used in Iowa sawmills. The first blades used were "a single saw in a frame." The carriages would push the log through the blade. Then in 1850, the double sash saw became prevalent. Now as the carriage came back, the log could be cut so not to waste time. Then even later, these blades became gang saws. 
The use of circular saws became prevalent in 1860. The handicap of the circular saw was that you couldn't have a blade larger than 72 inches. Also, 5/16ths of an inch of the log was lost to sawdust with every cut. The final advancement was the use of a band saw. While invented in 1855, it took until 1889 for the proper quality of steel to be used (Swisher, 73). 

In 1859, 1,680 Iowans worked in the sawmills earning around $450,000 in salary. By 1889, 6,800 Iowans were employed earning more than $2 million in wages. It all ended though by 1904. Swisher references a Marshalltown Times Republican article from November 25, 1904 detailing the end. 

Swisher then gives a plug to the prevalence of planing mills in Iowa. In essence, in 1859, Iowa planing mills produced around $500,000 worth of planed lumber. At it's peak in 1923, mills planed $23.5 million worth of planed lumber. The largest finished product was doors followed by window (Swisher, 75). 

Swisher ends with a list of all Iowa mills he felt mentioning. Here are a few of the unique sawmills in Clinton County 251: DeWitt Steam Mills; Cassidy’s Sawmill built 1855; Lombard’s Sawmill Clinton; Parmlee’s Sawmill Clinton built 1856; Work’s Sawmill, Dewitt Tonwship