Down By That Old Mill Stream

Graue Mill in 2024

When the first European American frontier families established homesteads west of Chicago in the 1830s there were no Home Depot stores selling lumber, nor supermarkets selling wheat and corn flour.   Lumber was had by cutting down trees and hand sawing boards.  Flour was obtained by hand grinding corn or wheat.  It took an hour to grind a pound of grain at home, and three to six hours daily to grind sufficient grain for household consumption. 

Settlers, initially housed in log cabins, sought to replicate the wood-frame houses they’d had back in New England or Upstate New York.   To meet the settlers’ construction and food needs, entrepreneurs established commercial mills along rivers and creeks to mechanically cut lumber and grind grain.  Fast running water turned water wheels that propelled the sawing and grinding process.  During the 1830s, thirteen water-powered mills were established along the Des Plaines River or along tributaries such as Salt Creek.

Mill Site in 1851

In 1832, U.S. Army Lt. Sherman King took favorable note of the land along Salt Creek, seventeen miles west of Chicago, as his unit was headed west to fight in the Black Hawk War.   Following the war, King filed a claim for eight acres of land along Salt Creek.   Several miles to the north, the family of Nicholas Torode, newly arrived from Europe, established a homestead.   In 1837, King and Torode erected a wooden sawmill along Salt Creek near the present-day intersection of Ogden Avenue and York Road.  The men established a dam and spillway to direct the rushing water toward the water-wheel to power the sawing mechanism.  The mill provided cut lumber for neighboring residences, commercial buildings, churches, and schools.

The wooden mill was destroyed by fire in 1848.   The market for locally milled lumber had declined by 1848.  Lumber could be shipped from Michigan and Northern Wisconsin and milled in Chicago at less cost than local milling. Rebuilding as a saw mill would therefore not be economically viable.   Meanwhile, in 1838, German immigrant Frederick Graue had established a homestead in the vicinity and taken a job in the Torode Mill.  Following the destruction of the mill, Graue bought the sawmill site, and in 1852, erected a gristmill constructed of brick.  That is the structure we know today as the Graue Mill.   

According to legend, the mill and nearby buildings during the 1840s and 1850s were a stop on the Underground Railroad, aiding freedom seekers (escaped slaves) find their way to safety in Canada.  There is, however, no direct connection found in the historical record connecting Graue Mill to the Underground Railroad.

Frederick Graue and his son, F. W. Graue operated the mill at that site for seventy years.  By the early 1900s, new grinding technology had rendered rural gristmills obsolete.  In August 1922, F. W. Graue sold the mill and property to F. O. Butler, industrialist and owner of extensive lands in the vicinity.   Butler bought the mill recognizing its historic significance with the intention of donating it, along with the 40-acres of former Graue land, to the DuPage Forest Preserve District.   He did that in 1931.  Butler leased the property out during the 1920s.   A 1928 raid on the mill revealed that Stephen Abel, Butler’s tenant at the mill was running a thriving moonshine operation.

The Abandoned Mill in 1934

DuPage Forest Preserve district added the mill to its existing Fullersburg Woods property, intending to restore the mill as an historical interpretive site.  Beginning in 1933, the Forest Preserve District worked cooperatively with the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), New Deal agencies established to provide employment and stimulate the economy during the Great Depression, to refurbish the mill and to repurpose it as an historic interpretive site.

Restoration of the mill was competed in 1943.  In 1951, the Forest Preserve District leased the property to the DuPage Graue Mill Corporation, and the mill was opened for public tours. In 1975, the Graue Mill property was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and in 1981 was recognized as an Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmark.

The twenty-first century brought increased awareness of environmental concerns.  A growing realization that dams such as the Graue Mill dam, while they had served a useful power generation purpose in the 1800s, contributed to degradation of local ecosystems.   Thousands of such dams have been removed throughout the nation since 1912.   Recognizing the negative environmental impact, the DuPage County Forest Preserve district set in motion plans to remove the historic dam.  

The Dam Before Its 2024 Removal

Historic preservation advocates in conjunction with the DuPage County Graue Mill Corporation bitterly opposed removal of the dam.   In 2024 the dam was indeed removed, but the antagonism between Forest Preserve District and Graue Mill Corporation led to the non-renewal of Graue Mill Corporation’s license to operate the facility.  Since that time the Forest Preserve District has operated the historic mill as an interpretive site describing mid-19th century technology.