|The Cotton Gin Mill|
The Sorghum Mill, believed to be from the 1850's, was reassembled from an old sugar mill found in Louisiana near Harahan not far from New Orleans.
During the autumn, sorghum cane raised in fields was fed into the shredding and roller-press machinery to extract the juice.The juice would then be heated in pans over a fire to be made into syrup. However, when Greenfield Village would make it, the liquid was instead passed into shallow defecating tanks where it was heated by steam pipes.
It is estimated that 30 to 40 gallons of syrup could be made in one day.
|The Sorghum (Sugar) Mill|
As far as I can guess-timate, I think both buildings were removed from Greenfield Village in the early 1990's during one of the renovations.
I never quite understand why such important Americana is removed from the Village, for all help to show and teach of everyday life of a time long past, which was part of Henry Ford's original intent. I hope that we have seen the last of the removal of historic structures.