Transcripts

EUAN KERR: To say that parts of the Washburn-Crosby Mill are in bad shape is an understatement. There's been a lot of decay since it closed in the mid '60s. However, as members of the Minneapolis City Council toured the mill complex just a few yards from the Saint Anthony Lock and Dam, it became very apparent that this was a place with a history intertwined with the city. The current A Mill building was built in 1879 after the previous mill exploded, killing 15 employees. Walt Langley, who used to work at the mill, took the visitors to the sixth floor, where, until 1959, power from a huge water wheel was harnessed to drive the milling machinery.

SPEAKER 1: I fully activated this shaft, which is called a line shaft, and turned the line shaft. And you could take power off wherever you wanted to on the line shaft to run this material. You can see one of the wheels there with a belt on it still.

EUAN KERR: The Washburn-Crosby Mill was one of the first mills on the banks of the Mississippi, near the Saint Anthony Falls, and has been given national landmark status. It was the original home of General Mills. A lot of the original machinery is still in place, including the grinders known as roll stands, which line up in rows on the fifth floor. Council Member Cathy O'Brien, who in her alter ego of a historian has studied the mills, says it was these grinders that revolutionized Minnesota milling.

CATHY O'BRIEN: De la Barre developed a roller that Washburn-Crosby and Pillsbury used that broke the hard grains that grew in this region. Before that, before that roller was produced, we couldn't produce grain here that produced fine wheat flour. And so in the 1870s, de La Barre came over from France and developed this roller that then really meant our milling industry took off because we could develop fine flour.

EUAN KERR: [INAUDIBLE] says it only took 15 men to run the entire mill, which for its time was an impressive feat of automation. In 1912, the mill was producing 12,500 barrels of flour a week.

SPEAKER 2: Normal procedure is to go by gravity. You take the grain and put it up what they call a leg. It's endless belts. You'll see something if I open that up. And then it's allowed to fall by gravity down through the various processes to, I guess, the bottom. Then it can-- put it back up to the top to go through another process.

EUAN KERR: Leading the tour through a maze of passages, stairways, and rooms, sometimes by flashlight, Langley took the group on to the utility building.

SPEAKER 2: It's the newest of the buildings. See, if you're at the fourth floor, you'd have a beautiful view of both the river and the downtown. You'll see that it's tiled. And the reason it's tiled is for cleanliness. Here is where they package the edible flour.

EUAN KERR: The utility building was also home to two other Midwestern institutions. Upstairs there was the original Betty Crocker kitchen. And right on the top, in the penthouse suite, were the original WCCO radio studios. In fact, the station got its call letters from the Washburn-Crosby Company. The city is negotiating with a developer to see if the Washburn-Crosby mill can be converted into offices and housing. Council Member Tony Scallon says it's vital that the mill be saved to be a centerpiece for the city's riverfront development.

TONY SCALLON: This is given the same status as the Washington Monument in Washington DC. This is an important historic building for the creation of our city.

EUAN KERR: Council Member Tony Scallon. The full Minneapolis City Council will take a final vote on whether to buy the Washburn-Crosby Mill, Friday. In Minneapolis, I'm Euan Kerr.