Smoky Valley Roller Mill - History
by Chester C. Bruce

Just below the Coronado Heights ridge of the fertile Smoky Valley in central Kansas lies a Swedish-American settlement with the place-name of Lindsborg.  This community lies nestled along the Padoucas River as the Smoky Hill River was earlier called because its source headed in the land of the Comanches who formerly were known as Padouces.  Here on the northern bank of this river, offering a suitable if vexing watercourse, a Swedish immigrant established an important element in any 19th century agricultural economy, a water mill.  The establishment...soon after the coming of the first settlers in the 1860's was a pattern that had been repeated many times in pioneer America. 

The community's first water-powered flour mill was precursor to the Smoky Valley Roller Mill was built by Charlie Johnson, an immigrant carpenter.  "Qvarn" Johnson or Miller Johnson as he was called to distinguish him from other Johnsons in the community, built a wooden structure housing two grinding stones and a saw mill in 1872.  From a wooden and stone dam constructed about the same time as the mill, power was drawn to grind the grain and cut the logs ferried across the river because there was not a bridge across the Smoky until 1877.  For about the next decade Miller Johnson practiced the lost art of "dressing" the millstones...[These stones are now in front of the mill as a monument to Charles and his brother Otto Johnson.]  What the daily output of his Lindsborg Mill was or how rough or imperfect the flour was that he produced remains unknown.  However, Corn Johnson, as Miller Johnson was later known, did advertise "Good Flour and good turnout as any other mill in Kansas." 

Miller Johnson sold the grist mill in 1882 to J.G. Bergsten and Francis Johnson.  Since the Smoky had flooded in 1881 and "washed away", what The Smoky Valley News said was, "the apology for a mill that stood on the river bank...", substantial improvements were made to the mill and dam.  During the winter, work was begun on the dam so that it would provide more power.  Construction on the dam and mill sites continued through spring, summer, and early fall despite the fact that work was "being pushed" in late July in anticipation, perhaps, of harvest.  Speculations about the resumption of operation by the mill began in early October.  A bird's eye view of the accomplishments during the last 10 months were recorded in The Smoky Valley News.  October issues of the paper noted that "Bergsten and Johnson have their water mill completed and are now grinding the farmers' wheat [and rye].  All of the machinery is of the most improved patterns, the building is one of the best and the work done on the dam is such as promises to be permanent.  These gentlemen have spared no expense in putting up their mill, and being highly respected by all, will without doubt, make their enterprise a success." 

The predictions of the paper proved correct.  "The water power mill has," The Smoky Valley News said in 1886, "a reputation all over the county and is liberally patronized by people from nearly every part of Saline and McPherson counties."  Clearly, the mill was a success and had developed a fine business reputation for its custom work.  Unless the mill were completely rebuilt as a roller mill, J.G. Bergsten, the sole owner since 1886, apparently reasoned that prosperity would likely be a short lived dream.  His decision to install an up-to-date roller mill was noted in The Lindsborg News in October of 1889.  "Everything from basement to garret has been overhauled...", the local editor said, "making it one of the best equipped  roller mill in Central Kansas.  No one can scarce believe that such wonderful improvements have been made, they must see for themselves in order to realize the wonderful change."  Almost as soon as the mill was operative, however, it was leased to Theodore Teichgraeber. 

For most of the next two decades the name Teichgraeber became synonymous with milling in Lindsborg.  The pull of milling on Teichgraeber's soul began in Saxony, Germany where he was born on October 5, 1851.  As a young man he learned the trade from his father as his own sons would learn from him.  In 1873 he had emigrated to the United States.  For more that a decade after his arrival in America he apparently honed his milling skills in Illinois and Missouri before moving to Kansas.  Sometime during 1886 Teichgraeber and his wife, Emma whom he married in 1879, moved to Assaria, Kansas, where he assumed  duties as a miller at the Assaria Roller Mill.  However, his stay in Assaria was short.  After about a two-year sojourn there he rented the steam-powered Crescent Mill in Lindsborg.  His tenure at the Crescent Mill was also of a short duration.  In 1889 he became master of the roaring mill on the Smoky. 

The flour trade prospered under the management of Lindsborg's "jolly miller."  Often his mill ran around the clock.  In 1890, shortly after Teichgraeber started milling operations, The Lindsborg News noted that "The Smoky Valley Roller Mills are running day and night.  Orders from abroad are coming in 'lively'".  Even as deceptive as the connotation of "abroad" might be since in the 19th century it did not necessarily mean overseas, the statement was accurate.  Flour was exported to Hull, England, as well as perhaps to other foreign ports.  Although little record survives indicating the primary trade area of the mill, the compass of its operations and volume of business were probably realistically indicated in The Lindsborg New.  In 1910 the paper said:  "This mill has enjoyed a splendid reputation for good flour not only in Kansas but in all the neighboring states.  The mill with its location and water power has been considered a very desirable property and has always been a money maker."  However, there was little doubt in the minds of townspeople that Teichgraeber was the key to the mill's prosperity.  "B(y) dint of unusual sagacity and unremitting industry," observed The Lindsborg Record, "Mr. Teichgraeber has built up a milling business, which is a source of pride to the city." 

Lindsborg's "jolly and successful miller on the Smoky" was often locked in struggles which pitted his efforts against those of nature.  Sometimes the struggles had a humorous side as Evidence by this statement: "The low water he says is caused by Rodney Jenkins letting his chickens go down to the river and drink.  If Mr. Jenkins doesn't keep his chickens away from the river, Mr. Teichgraeber threatens to bring suit for damages(.)  There isn't water enough to keep the mill going and water Jenkins chickens at the same time."  More often the struggles were not amusing.  Despite all precautions catastrophes sometimes occurred, especially when heavy rains upstream turned into floods downstream as happened on at least two different occasions.  In 1891 rampaging waters swept away the mill dam and in 1903 flood water invaded the mill and turned 1500 bushels of wheat stored in an elevator into chicken feed.  Undoubtedly substantial outlays of capital and labor were required each time to repair the damages.  Indeed it may well have been because of struggles like these with the Smoky that the local paper was prompted to remark that "...his career has known its serious reverses, reverses that would have unnerved a less energetic man." 

Problems other then those of nature also taxed the genius and physical well being of Teichgraeber.  He explained some of the situations that he had faced in an article in The American Miller.  He recalled that "...the water was getting low, so I sent my engine to the shop to have her fixed up, and I thought she would do for a while.  I got her back in fine shape---looked like brand new.  She worked fairly well, but she was too light and on Nov. 24, in the morning about nine o'clock, she tore all to pieces.  The connecting rod had broken and she went head, first shoving out the stuffing box, but as that was not enough, she got steam once more and blew out the cylinder head.  The piston head went twenty feet, landing against the wall.  No one was hurt although the engineer was filling the lubricator and stood along side the cylinder.  I wasn't around having been scalded on the 18th, six days before so I laid in bed.  I had been looking after things in the engine room, and when I came near the steam pump plug blew out, striking me below the seat on my right leg.  There was 100 pounds' pressure on the pump and boiling hot water, so it didn't take long to give me a good scald.  I was laid (u)p for weeks." 

He also told of another experience saying that 

On July 11, 1897, I was putting in the 36-inch Little Giant wheel (water turbine) which I brought at the time, thinking that my 30-9 inch Victor would not be strong enough, as I was adding some more machinery then.  I had a derrick for letting down the wheel; and when the wheel was nearly over the flume, one of the posts what held the iron guy ropes broke and down came wheel, derrick and all.  I was near the wheel, pulling on a rope to swing the wheel over the flume, and the quick jerk threw me down.  The next moment the derrick struck me on the head.  It knocked the sense out of me for a while and made a soft spot above my left ear.  It also knocked my left shoulder and back, together with my clothing.  They had to keep my head cool on ice for a couple of days---that was all. 

For Teichgraeber, however, these brushes with misfortune were only a part of what he called "a streak of bad luck".  On October 14, 1897, more misfortune visited him.  Fire broke out in the upper story of mill.  Flames belched from the window and roof of the frame tinderbox and soon spread to a corn field directly north of the mill.  A fierce south wind fanned the flames and fears that the blaze would consume Lindsborg were felt by many.  Alarm spread quickly.  Bethany College students and professors, townspeople, and merchants who closed their businesses came and battled the  fire with water buckets.  By nightfall the conflagration was out and the town was safe.  But the first mill built in McPherson County Kansas was left a smoking ruin and this owner with a loss excess of 10,000.  "Mr. Teichgraeber has," wrote The Lindsborg News on the day after the fire, "the sympathy of the entire community." 

Within a week after the fire the decision was made to rebuild the mill just west of the old site.  Plans were drawn first for a fifty barrel mill and then later for a 100 barrel mill consisting of a brick main building measuring thirty-two by forty-six feet, an adjoining office measuring fifteen by thirty-two, and a dump and wagon scale measuring sixteen by thirty-two feet. [This is the present structure celebrated today.]  By early November these plans were underway and work in progress presumably on the stone foundation of the main building.  For approximately a month construction moved forward on the first and second stories of the mill as evidenced by a statement from The Lindsborg News on December 10 saying that "Teichgraeber's Mill has been moving along very nicely during this nice weather.  The second story is nearing completion." 

Within a week, however, the weather had turned bad.  As a result, construction on the mill's third story was probably delayed until January of 1898.  Just when construction on the mill proper was completed or the first machinery placed in it during the opening months of 1898 is seamed with ambiguity.  From existing evidence it seems probable that this 6,000 refurbishing operation... began in January under the supervision Ehrsam and Company of Enterprise, Kansas.  With machinery purchased from this well-known company during the previous December, the mill was rebuilt during the next several months.  In the basement grain conveyors and elevator boots were installed as well as a separator for corn and rye grinding.  Here also the line shaft was placed and connected to the bevel gear drive of a 75-horsepower Little Giant and a 50-horsepower Victor water turbine that drove the entire upstairs. On the roll floor were located four double 9" x 18" roller stands and two stands of 9" x 24" mills for wheat; one three high stand 7" x 18" roller mill for corn and rye grinding.  Also placed on this floor were a steam generator, a wheat heater, flour, bran, and shorts packers with the necessary scales.  To the next floor the following equipment was installed: three purifiers with 2 Star Dust Collectors, one bran duster, grinding, flour, and by-product bins, and all wooden spouting.  Installed on the top floor were three Wolf gyrators for bolting plus centrifugal reels, two Invincible grain scourers, one Invincible separator, and one Star Dust Collector for cleaning dust.  Thus with erection of this unintentional monument some six months after Teichgraeber had lost his shirt, he could look to the promise of the future. 

For almost a decade after the mill resumed operations, Teichgraeber labored there before his world began to fall apart in 1907.  In late February his wife, Emma, died.  As the year wore on clear signs of the strain of her death became evident.  Teichgraeber frequently remarked that "it isn't' right that mother should rest alone out there in the cold ground and I be here," he said, with the return of winter.  As Christmas season drew near, recollections of his wife haunted him and his grief grew.  On Christmas morning Teichgraeber was told that his youngest brother, Emil, was seriously ill.  On December 26, he left for Emporia to see him.  Before he could arrive, however,  his brother was dead.  Immediately he summoned his oldest daughter, Minnie, to attend the funeral.  When she arrived on the next day, December 27, stunning news awaited her.  She was told that on that very "Friday morning Mr. Teichgraeber, in company with another brother, went to a barber shop and while sitting in the shoe-shinning chair having his shoes shined, he suddenly drew a few long breathes and expired without uttering a word." 

As news of the unexpected death of the jolly old miller arrived back in Lindsborg where he was laid to rest, The Lindsborg News remarked that " His friends believed he died of grief" and eulogized him.  "Every movement," the paper said "for the upbuilding of our community, our churches and schools found in him an earnest supporter and the unfortunate and needy looked upon him as their good genius who was always willing to extend aid and relieve distress."  The impress of his career upon the community was unmistakable.  Across the years his name would be remembered long after the dam was gone. 

Yes, remembered at least in part because his sons, Emil and Carl, followed their father's path.  They had grown up to milling in Lindsborg, hammering out their mastery of it on the spot.  Reputations as "good millers" and "excellent managers" ensconced their work as proprietors of the mill after their fathers death.  But by 1910 thorns of discontent apparently sprang from seeds that had previously borne flowers of contentment in this family estate.  Their brothers-in-law, William Hagstrom & Emanuel Hagstrom purchased it for $36,000.  An experienced miller and part owner of the New Pearl Mills in McPherson, Kansas, J.F. Andrews was hired to manage it, although he did not stay long.  Carl and Emil Teichgraeber departed to a nearby community, Marquette, Kansas, to "make the old mill hum" there. 

The change in ownership soon brought the mill under the aegis of William Hagstrom, a man who stood apart from his predecessors. He was an inventive genius, "a splendid type of the American genius in the world of mechanical inventions" said The Lindsborg News.  As might be expected, however, milling was not the real bent of this genius whose life was crowed with the affairs of his native city and acts of kindness to those who came to the mill pond to skate in the winter and swim and fish in the summer.  Like so many men of genius he apparently had little heart of mind for rout work.  Though the haze of scanty records allows only glimpses of this business, one fact stands clear in the end---the mill did not succeed under Hagstrom.  In 1927 the mill discontinued operation drawing to a close the Hagstrom era of the mill and making way for the mill's new owners, the Runbeck brothers. 

The decision of the new owners, the Runbeck brothers, to reopen the mill did not come until during the threadbare Thirties.  In 1934 this enterprising family logically added the mill to their business operations that already embraced stock-raising, farming, and the operation of a grocery store.  Undoubtedly because of the diverse business ventures conducted by the Runbeck Brothers, the responsibility for operating the mill was delegated primarily to two of the brothers, Clarence and Art.  The results of Clarence's industry in manufacturing the flour and Art's selling of the special pancake mix as well as other patents was soon evident. Even as the dark days of the depression hovered over the nation like a dark cloud, residents with razor-sharp memories recall that the mill slowly expanded its production, although custom milling remained an essential ingredient of the business.  As the economic climate improved during the late thirties and the war years of the forties, the compass of the mill's trade expanded to include sales to Kansas state institutions and the Independent Grocers Association.  After World War II wound down, however, the mill's scale of operations appears to have started a decline that continued until the mid fifties.  In 1955 the Smoky Valley Roller Mill was closed for the last time and left to pay silent tribute to the milling, flour, and grain industry of this country which was, and still is, a great part of Americana.