The Old Mill
50 Prospect Street
Built in 1746 by Nathan Wilbur, a Nantucket sailor who had spent time in
Holland, the "Old Mill" is the oldest functioning mill in the country.
It
is the only surviving mill of the four "smock mills" that once stood
overlooking Nantucket town. There was a fifth Nantucket mill called "Round-Top
Mill" on the site of the present New North Cemetery.
Smock mills
have a fixed body containing machinery and a cap that turns to face the sails
into the wind. The Old Mill was sold for twenty dollars in 1828 to Jared Gardner
in deplorable condition for use as "firewood."
Instead of
dismantling it, Gardner, a carpenter by trade, restored the mill to working condition
capable of grinding corn.
The mill was sold once again in 1866 to John
Francis Sylvia, a Portuguese miller of Azorean descent, who operated it for many
years with his assistant Peter Hoy until it fell into disuse in 1892. In 1897
Miss Caroline French purchased the mill at an auction for $850 and donated it
to the Nantucket Historical Association.
