Travel: The Old (Hydroelectric) Mill
Three days before Thanksgiving, Brian Whisman slowly lifted the gates that were holding back the Muskingum River, and a rush of water began turning two 40-inch turbines deep below the Stockport Mill Country Inn, in southeastern Ohio. That day the 100-year old former gristmill became the only historic mill in the nation that is returning power to the local energy company—as well as offering paying guests a chance to experience history wrapped in luxury.
In 1906 two brothers named Dover built a towering gristmill on the banks of the Muskingum, replacing one from 1849 that had burned. They installed two big turbines in the river waters below the wood structure to run their grain operation. By 1998 the hulking old wooden building was in sad disrepair. An adventurous young couple bought it and spent bales of money turning it into a bed and breakfast. They sandblasted, scrubbed, hired the area’s best carpenters and woodworkers, and even installed a hot tub in the top floor crow’s-nest suite. By 2000 the last remaining mill on the Muskingum was back in business, though this time it was in the tourist business rather than grinding grain for flour.
The couple’s marriage did not survive, however, and one late Saturday afternoon two and a half years ago, Dottie Singer and her son-in-law Brian Whisman found themselves holding the winning bid in the public auction of the Stockport Mill Inn. Singer had been looking for a sleepy inn to run with help from daughter, Kelly, Kelly’s husband, Brian, and their two girls. That Saturday they stood there, surprised and a little overwhelmed, and completely unaware of how fully they had woven themselves into the fabric of Ohio’s Morgan County life.
Three weeks later, Brian and Dottie learned from state and federal energy officials and regulators that the previous owners had had the turbines in the belly of the mill rebuilt to power the building and return power to the grid—selling energy to the local power company. The system had been shut down when a piece of debris the size of a watermelon smashed into one of the two turbines. No matter, when Dottie bought the mill she had also bought herself a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission license.
“When we bid on the Inn,” she says, “we didn’t take the turbines or the restaurant into consideration. I knew the hotel business; I didn’t know the restaurant business. Brian was a machinist, but he didn’t know about hydropower. Three weeks after the auction, the yearly FERC inspection was due, and so we went to the meeting, and that was when we realized this was something big to contend with. That was also when Brian caught turbine fever.”
In the week before Thanksgiving, while Dottie planned the menu, Brian was double-checking sensors and working with local engineers to run the final few tests on the new computer system that will operate the turbines. Between helping to cook in the restaurant and managing a full-time job as a machinist in Columbus, he has channeled his turbine fever into rebuilding the two Leffel Sampson 40-inch machines. He has salvaged usable parts from them and made new parts where old ones had failed (he also has learned that buying just one new turbine would cost nearly a quarter of a million dollars).
He has “gone swimming,” as he says, to find weak spots in the dam and mill walls and has worked with local engineers to patch the leaks and holes. He hired a local man with a forklift to drive up the river and drop the rebuilt turbines into place. At last, when the gates were fully opened, in those days just before Thanksgiving, 2,000 gallons of water per second began pouring into the pit. The turbines, depending on river flow, are now pushing electricity into the lines that run from the belly of the mill to the town’s main lines, and Dottie and Brian can watch as their electric meters turn backward.
The mill is a family affair. At Thanksgiving this year, Dottie and her daughters, Michele and Kelly, and granddaughters, Sarah and Lindsay, served about 100 guests in the hotel dining room. Dotty does most of the cooking; her baby back ribs and “Morgan County caviar,” a blend of beans, corn, and fresh vegetable salsa served with chips, are now famous in that corner of Ohio. The Mill’s wide dining room, with its 180-degree views across and down the river, has become a holiday hub for the sleepy communities of Morgan County.
In summer, restaurant guests can enjoy brunch on the deck overlooking the river. The 14 rough-hewn guest rooms have tall beds piled high with pillows, and high ceilings, and views down the river, and flowery antiques. They also have Jacuzzi tubs and cable TV. The mill even offers massage in what was once a grain bin, and guests in the Captain Cook Suite can climb up to the crow’s nest and enjoy a drink at the summit of the building while watching the sun drop behind the rolling Ohio hills. Bald eagles nest in nearby trees, and the sound of the river water rolling over the low dam outside the windows lulls visitors in the guest rooms to sleep at night.
As Dottie was figuring out the shopping list for Thanksgiving dinner, she was on the phone with the local chapter of Habitat for Humanity, scheduling their Christmas-tree fundraising sale, which she hosts every year. “We’ve earned the goodwill of the community. We work with Habitat, and with the local Chamber of Commerce.”
The Stockport Mill will produce about 800,000 kilowatt-hours of power each year, or enough for about 80 homes. Whatever the four-story Inn doesn’t use will go back to American Electric Power. Brian adds, “Right now AEP runs a coal-powered steam generator. We are actually helping get away from a carbon-producing energy source.” He adds, “Our next project is to replace our natural gas–powered water heaters with electric ones that will run off the turbines. It will take a few years, but it is an obvious project.” He then adds, “One guy was telling me that he is completely off the power grid. He supplies all his own power through micro-turbines.
“An older gentleman from town was talking to me about the turbines while I worked, and out of the blue he said, ‘My god, you are making history.’”
The Stockport Mill Country Inn is at 1995 Broadway Avenue in Stockport, Ohio. For more information visit www.stockportmill.com or call (740) 559-2882.