Bale Grist MillBrochure |
Brochure of Bale Grist Mill State Historic Park (SHP) in California. Published by California Department of Parks and Recreation.
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Our Mission
Bale Grist Mill
State Historic Park
The mission of California State Parks is
to provide for the health, inspiration and
education of the people of California by helping
to preserve the state’s extraordinary biological
diversity, protecting its most valued natural and
cultural resources, and creating opportunities
for high-quality outdoor recreation.
Families gathered at
the mill to have their
grain ground into flour
while they socialized
and caught up on the
news from around
California State Parks supports equal access.
Prior to arrival, visitors with disabilities who
need assistance should contact the park at
(707) 963-2236. If you need this publication in an
alternate format, contact interp@parks.ca.gov.
CALIFORNIA STATE PARKS
P.O. Box 942896
Sacramento, CA 94296-0001
For information call: (800) 777-0369.
(916) 653-6995, outside the U.S.
711, TTY relay service
www.parks.ca.gov
Discover the many states of California.™
Bale Grist Mill State Historic Park
3315 St. Helena Highway
St. Helena, CA 94574
Mail to: 3801 St. Helena Hwy.
Calistoga 94515 • (707) 963-2236
© 2015 California State Parks
the valley.
T
he Bale Grist Mill played an important
role in the settlement of the Napa Valley
in the mid- to late 1800s. The mill is a
significant part of California history.
Wheat, corn, oats, and barley were the
main cash crops for farmers in the Napa
Valley. Farmers brought their grain to the
mill to be ground and bagged. Today, the
mill is still operational, milling grains into
flour and meal. The mill demonstrates its
pioneering role in industrialization during
the 19th century.
PARK HISTORY
Native People
From about 6,000 BCE, the Koliholmanok
(“woods people”) lived within the area
now known as Bale Grist Mill State Historic
Park and Bothe-Napa Valley State Park.
Their tribe’s central area, now the upper
Corn grinding demonstration
Napa Valley, was called Mutistul. These
hunter-gatherers made fine obsidian
tools — knives, scrapers, arrow and spear
points — as well as intricate baskets and
ceremonial objects.
When Spanish settlers arrived in this area
of Alta California, it is believed that they
called the native people guapo for their
bravery, daring, and good looks; the native
people eventually became known as the
Wappo. Mexican land grantees and gold
seekers upset the Wappo balance of life,
introducing such diseases as smallpox that
devastated the Wappo population.
By 1855, nearly 20 years after Missouri fur
trapper George C. Yount planted the area’s
first grapevines, only a fraction of the Wappo
people remained. Wappo descendants in
Napa and Sonoma counties continue to
practice and honor their ancestral traditions.
Early Pioneers
Edward Turner Bale was an English citizen
who came to Monterey, the capital of Alta
California in the 1830s. On March 21, 1839,
Bale married into the prominent family of
General Mariano G. Vallejo, commandant
of the Mexican army. His bride, Maria
Soberanes, was the niece of brothers
Mariano and Salvador Vallejo.
General Vallejo appointed Bale as
surgeon-in-chief of the Northern Mexican
army in 1840, and Bale applied for Mexican
citizenship. The following year, Governor
Juan B. Alvarado granted Edward Bale
four leagues of land in upper Napa Valley.
More than 17,000 acres in Wappo territory
were given to Bale; they encompass today’s
Calistoga and St. Helena.
Bale’s land grant, issued in 1841, was
known by various spellings and names.
Perhaps referring to the Koliholmanok
Dr. Edward T. Bale, ca. 1845
native people, Bale called his rancho
Colofolmana; others referred to it as
Caligolmana and Huilac Nama. The
grant’s official recorded name (ratified
in 1845) was Rancho Carne Humana, a
Spanish term translating to “human flesh.”
The reason for the name has been lost.
The Bales built an adobe home off
what is now known as Whitehall Lane in
St. Helena. Edward Bale commissioned
Ralph Kilburn to build a sawmill near the
Napa River. Bale also had a small, animalpowered grist mill built for neighbors to
grind the grains they grew.
In 1843, Bale contracted to build a
larger grist mill, paying the builders with
portions of his rancho land or selling
off parcels to pay debts. The new mill’s
water came from Mill Creek, through a
ditch system with a wooden flume. The
water powered a 20-foot waterwheel that
turned locally quarried milling stones.
In 1848, Bale left to find a lucky strike
in the gold fields. He returned ill the
following year, and died in October of
1849. His young wife was left with six
children and huge debts, liens, and
mortgages against Bale’s property.
In 1941 the Native Sons deeded the mill
to the Napa County Historical Society,
which hired caretakers to live in the
granary — converting the interior into a
Maria Soberanes Bale
house. In the 1970s, California State
The census of 1850 recorded
Parks acquired the property and
that 27-year-old widow Bale
began a major restoration project
had only 1,500 acres of
with funding from the California
unimproved land and 50
State Parks Foundation. The
improved acres left of
mill was registered in the
more than 17,000 acres
National Register of Historic
granted to her husband
Places in 1972. In 1974, it
less than a decade earlier.
became a California State
Maria Bale contracted for
Historic Park.
improvements to the sawmill
The mill was restored to
and the grist mill. She hired
operating condition and milled its
Leonard Lillie to expand the
first grain in 1988. Beginning in 2005,
grist mill, building and installing
Maria Soberanes volunteers and California State Parks
the larger 36-foot waterwheel in
joined forces to restore the grainBale, ca. 1870
place today.
cleaning and sifting machinery. The final
Resourceful Maria Bale managed to
phase was completed through a Proposition
pay off her husband’s debts and hold on
84 volunteer-enhancement grant.
to portions of Rancho Carne Humana as
bequests to her children. She remarried,
NATURAL HISTORY
and the mill was sold by her daughter,
The upper Napa Valley enjoys a mild
Isadora Bruck, in 1860.
Mediterranean climate. Average highs in
A succession of owners then ran the
July and August hover below 90° while
Hollyleaf
mill, installing a steam engine to power
winter lows can dip below 40°.
cherry
the mill in times of drought. The mill was
The layers of volcanic rocks under
purchased by Reverend Theodore Lyman
the mill have accumulated over the
in 1871. He installed a water-powered
last three to five million
turbine to replace the waterwheel. Mill
years. Near the path to
operations finally ceased in 1905.
the mill grows a venerable
Lyman’s family donated the mill to
hollyleaf cherry tree
the Native Sons of the Golden West in
(Prunus ilicifolia), a
1923. The Napa County parlor kept the
native species used by
mill grounds cleaned up and repaired
local Wappo for food and
portions of the buildings.
medicine. Coast redwoods, tan
oak, Douglas-fir, and madrone
grow nearby.
Wildlife
The pileated
woodpecker rat-a-tats
loudly on hardwood
trees. Watch out for
rattlesnakes and big
banana slugs on the
trail. Many creatures
are nocturnal, so bats,
mountain lions, coyotes,
raccoons, and bobcats are
rarely seen.
Pileated
THE AUTOMATED MILL
woodpecker
Inventor Oliver Evans
(1755-1819) was granted the United States’
third patent for his automated flour mill
in 1790. President George Washington
reviewed and signed Evans’ patent
application; the President later installed
the system in his own grist mill at Mount
Vernon. Evans’ invention was one of the
first to address an entire production
process, forerunner of the automated mill.
The Bale mill uses the Evans system of
cup elevators and screw conveyors that
require little human labor. The miller
controls the waterwheel and millstone
speeds, but little manual effort is needed
to transport product through the mill.
The Wheel’s Operation
This historic wooden overshot
waterwheel — one of the largest in North
Corn in the hopper
Millstones and first floor of mill
Weighing the milled flour
Organic milled grains
America — and its iron hub were installed
by Leonard Lillie in 1851. The flume has
about 500 to 600 gallons of water flow
through it and over the wheel every
minute. The miller controls the water flow
onto the wheel with a control arm that
raises or lowers a head gate on the end
of the flume. The water’s weight makes
the wheel turn about 2.5 revolutions per
minute, generating about 40 horsepower.
A series of four gears increases the speed
of the turning millstones.
Millstones
The actual milling of the grain takes place
between two heavy horizontal quartzite
French Buhr millstones. As the top stone
turns, powered by the waterwheel and
gearing, grain feeds from the hopper
and shoe above the millstones into the
center (eye) of the top millstone. Grain
flows between the runner stone and the
stationary bottom bedstone; the grain is
then ground into meal or flour.
Millstone dressers periodically handsharpen the cuts and grooves on the faces
of the 42" stones.
Interpretive Exhibits
Displays in the mill and granary interpret
the mill’s heyday period with historic
millstones, tools, and implements used in
the late 1800s. The park is open for day use
only, with a small admission fee.
To schedule school or other group tours
or for information on holding events at the
mill, email info@napavalleystateparks.org.
For park hours and information on such
events as Harvest Dinners or Old Mill Days,
visit the park website at
www.parks.ca.gov/balemill.
The granary has exhibits and interpretive
items for sale, supporting maintenance and
operation of the mill.
Two-pound souvenir bags of many types of
organic flour or cornmeal (bread flour, pastry
flour, cornmeal, polenta, spelt, oats, barley,
and rye) are available for a small donation.
RECREATION
The 1.1-mile History Trail leads from the Bale
Mill to the Pioneer Cemetery and into the
picnic area at adjoining Bothe-Napa Valley
State Park.
ACCESSIBLE FEATURES
The accessible paved path to the mill from the
parking lot is inclined. Call (707) 963-2236 on
weekends for gate access to accessible parking
at the mill. The granary and first floor of the mill
are accessible.
The second floor mill exhibits are reached
by steps. An assistive listening device and an
illustrated booklet are available to those who
cannot climb the stairs.
Accessibility is continually improving. For
updates, visit http://access.parks.ca.gov or call
the park.
NEARBY STATE PARKS
• Bothe-Napa Valley State Park
3801 St. Helena Highway
Calistoga 94515
(707) 942-4575
• Robert Louis Stevenson State Park
(day-use hiking only; no dogs)
12 miles north on Highway 29
(707) 942-4575
0'
40
to Pioneer
Cemetery
Cree
k
T
G R IS
BALE L SHP
M IL
Ac
ces
Mill
r y Tr
ail
sT
rail
Hi s t o
Mill Pond
Trail
P R I V AT E
P R O P E RT Y
B ot
h e -Nap
29
P R I V AT E P R O P E R T Y
a Da
y -U
PLEASE REMEMBER
• All natural and cultural
features, including down
wood, are protected by law
and may not be removed
or disturbed.
• Except for service animals,
dogs are not allowed on
trails or in the mill.
• Watch out for poison
oak. Contact (even when
dormant) can cause a
severe rash. “Leaves of
three — let them be!”
Bale Grist Mill
State Historic Park
BALE GRIST MILL
se E
nt r a
0
n ce
R
oa
0
BOTHE-NAPA
VALLEY
STATE PARK
d
200
100
50
25
to
Robert Louis
Stevenson
State Park
S TAT E H I S T O R I C PA R K
400 Feet
100 Meters
B O T H E - N A PA
VA L L E Y
S TAT E PA R K
Park
Entrance
29
Legend
Major Road
Paved Road
Flume
to Mill Pond and
Bothe-Napa Valley
State Park
Trail: Hike
Paved Path
Bale Grist Mill
History Trail
Parking Area
16
29
Hollyleaf
Cherry Tree
Bridge
to Middletown
0
5
0
Locked Gate
10 Miles
10
Lake
Berryessa
20 Kilometers
Main
Entrance
Robert Louis Stevenson SP
128
29
Santa
Rosa
St. Helena
Bale Grist Mill
SHP
29
Picnic Area
© 2015 California State Parks
B O T H E - N A P A VA L L E Y
S TAT E PA R K
128
Mil l Cre ek
Sugarloaf Ridge SP
12
Park Building
State Park Service Road
Calistoga
Bothe-Napa Valley SP
Parking
Granary
Annadel SP
101
116
29
Jack London SHP
121
12
Sonoma SHP
Petaluma
Petaluma Adobe SHP
to Vallejo
Napa
221
0
0
40 Feet
20
5
10 Meters
This park is operated by and receives
support from the nonprofit
Napa Valley State Parks Association.
For more information, contact NVSPA at
www.napavalleystateparks.org.
to Napa