Resurrecting the Kauffman Mill

Kauffman's Mill, 22x45, oil on linen

Kauffman’s Mill was built around 1775 on the banks of the Shenandoah River near Luray, Virginia by David Kauffman, son of one of the original settlers in the Shenandoah Valley. The original structure stood for nearly a century before being burned by Union forces during the Civil War. A second mill was built at the same site after the war in 1866, only to be destroyed four years later by the Great Flood of 1870 that washed away every mill from the headsprings of the Shenandoah River to Harper’s Ferry, Maryland. Undaunted, a third mill was erected in 1871 and stood until 1972 when the ravages of time required its removal. The eighth generation of Kauffmans still reside at the mill site. Earlier this year I connected with a descendant of the Kauffman's who commissioned me to do a painting of the mill and the surrounding area as it appeared around 1910. He had done extensive research and taken hundreds of photographs. In the family archives he located many photographs from that time period and before. We worked closely together to establish the parameters. He wanted the scene to depict the grist mill, saw mill, and milldam as they looked circa 1910. The mills, milldam, and even the mill pond no longer exist. Dozens of old photographs and recent aerial photography were used to recreate the scene. The people canoeing on the mill pond are his grandparents and are shown exactly as they appeared in a 1912 photograph. The reflection of the Massanutten Mountain on the mill pond creates an image resembling a bottle laying on its side. The Kauffman family always called this the “Massanutten Bottleneck.” Below are a some of the source materials I used. I thoroughly enjoyed this project. My collector was a stickler for detail and an absolute joy to work with.  I learned more about grist mills, lumber mills, mill dams, and mill ponds than I'll ever need to know again.     My collector took this photo from the site where the mill originally stood. It shows the blues of the Massanutten bottleneck contrasting with the warm gold fall colors along the Shenandoah River.  This picture shows the mill with the lumber mill to the right. Later an awning was added as you can see in the next photo. Over the years the mill went through various design changes...sometimes it had an awning, and earlier, around 1895, the sawmill stood on the right, as in the earlier photograph.  Here you can see the Shenandoah River in the background and the pylons that supported the lumber mill, until it was destroyed.  My collector rendered this scale drawing showing exactly how the mill facade should look with the sawmill. This was big help in understanding how all the different parts went together.   The flour was put into sacks and lowered through an opening, down through a trapdoor on the awning roof to the scale below where it was weighed.  These are my collector's grandparents enjoying an afternoon canoeing in the mill pond. In the far distance over their heads, the actual dam across the Shenandoah is just barely visible. This photo is circa 1895 and shows the mill without the awning but with the lumber mill attached.               In future newsletters, I will share plein air excursions, painting trips, commissions, and other events.