The Winooski Falls Mill District is located along the Winooski River in the cities of Winooski and Burlington, Vermont, in the United States of America. It encompasses a major industrial area that developed around two sets of falls on the river in the 19th century.
Location
The Winooski River flows from the southeast into Burlington Bay, Lake Champlain. The city of Burlington in Chittenden County, Vermont is on the south bank and Winooski and Colchester on the north. It is from the Canada–US border. There are two sets of falls on the river; the settlement of Winooski is placed between the falls. The historic district refers to the mills built on both banks at the lower falls. The designated district stretches on the northern bank of the river to Center and Canal Streets, including 110 West Canal Street, and on the southern bank including Burlington addresses 485 to 497 Colchester Avenue, 5 to 21 Mill Street and 10 to 32 (even numbers only) Barrett Street. The Burlington addresses represent a 1993 enlargement of the district.
History
In 1789, Ira Allen, one of the towns founders built a dam across the upper falls, and used it to power two saw mills to provide cut timber for the British market in Québec. It was in 1835 that the water rights to the Colchester bank were secured and in 1835 the Burlington Woolen Mill was constructed beneath the lower falls. They followed the employment patterns used in Lowell, Massachusetts, and employed single girls to work in the mills. A series of tenement houses were built to house the operatives, on common land on the hill leading to Winooski Falls Village. The second mill, the Winooski Mill, a cotton mill, was built in 1846 by the Winooski Mill Company on the Burlington side of the river. This operated as such until 1888 when it was reorganised into the Burlington Cotton Mill.
Wool remained the less profitable fiber until the cotton famine of the 1860. This and improvements in wool cleaning techniques caused rapid expansion and the construction of new mills. Water power systems improved, and new steam powered system expanded capacity. This require more operatives and a large number of French Canadians and Irish workers were employed. The Colchester Merino Mill and the Winooski Worsted Mill were built in the 1880s.
In 1902, the American Woolen Company purchased all the mills from the Burlington Woolen Company and refurbished them with modern equipment. The Champlain Mill was built in 1912. By 1922, the American Woolen Company was the state's largest employer and Winooski Falls split from Colchester, incorporating itself as the City of Winooski.
In 1927, there was a major flood where the dams were destroyed and all mills suffered heavy damage, from which some never recovered. The mills closed in 1954.
Child labor
Lewis Hine
Lewis Hine (September 26, 1874, Oshkosh, Wisconsin – November 3, 1940) was an American sociologist and photographer. Hine used his camera as a tool for social reform. His photographs were instrumental in changing the child labor laws in the United States. In 1908, he became the photographer for the National Child Labor Committee (NCLC), leaving his former teaching position. Over the next decade, Hine documented child labor in American industry to aid the NCLC's lobbying efforts to end the practice. In 1909 he visited Burlington, and took photographs in Chace Mill. These demonstrate the employment practices where children with French Canadian names are seen to be working in responsible posts, and equally they provide images of the machines in use at the time. Mule spinning was relatively rare in the United States; where ring spinning predominated.
Buildings
Burlington Woolen Mill
This five-story mill was built of local stone over a canal that drove its centrally placed waterwheel. It was built in 1837 and destroyed by fire in 1961. A timber dam was constructed across the lower falls to provide a head for this wheel. The timber dam was destroyed in the floods of 1927. As of 1921 the Burlington Mills employed 1,500 workers who produced items such as Kerseys, Friezes, Meltons, Thibets and worsted dress goods.