Continuing on with our quest to find more mills in the Ozarks for another book, we ventured to Arkansas. While there, we found Johnson Mill, located in Johnson (near Springdale), which is now a boutique motel with 52 units called Inn at the Mill.
It sits on the corner of on a busy thoroughfare in Springdale. Fortunately, back in 1992 when it underwent its transformation from mill to motel, the owners decided to keep some of the mill’s original pieces, which you can see if you step into the lobby area and elsewhere.
According to Explore Southern History’s website, architect James Lambeth designed the accommodation’s suites to “reflect the interests and styles of such diverse individuals as Walt Disney, Frederic Remington and Frank Lloyd Wright.”
When you enter the lobby, you can see pieces of the mill and old beams associated with it. Outside, you can see a waterfall that flows from the source that once played a role and moved a waterwheel, and now has been channeled over rocks in a lovely garden area.
History of Johnson Mill
It is believed that the first mill at this site appeared around 1800. The earliest name recorded is “Truesdale’s Mill,” in 1836. Supposedly, it’s also been called the Sutton Mill and the Spring Mill.
According to the Washington County Historical Society, the mill operated before the Civil War, when the Union completely burned it down following the battle at Pea Ridge in 1862. After the war, two former Union soldiers, Jacob Q. Johnson and William Mayes, rebuilt it at two-and-a-half-stories, which housed a sawmill and a grist mill. Johnson bought out Mayes in 1880. He also is the town’s namesake.
An overshot water wheel powered the mill with water from Clear Creek, a spring-fed stream near the site. You can see a replica of an elevated, wooden mill race that transferred the water to the flume to the pitchback waterwheel. In the late 1800s, Johnson – as many millers did back then – decided to switch to a Leffel turbine, and steam power.
Later, the operation acquired roller mills; in fact, a Nordyke and Marmon roller mill stands on display on the front porch.
Around 1940, the mill switched to diesel power and ran until 1976 – producing corn meal, cattle meal and ultra-fine corn meal.
Interestingly, I found that the Library of Congress has several architectural drawings of Johnson Mill, originally created by students at the University of Arkansas for the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, probably sometime in the 1980s. It also states that the mill had “one of the longest periods of continuous operation of any mill in the state.” It speculates that the mill was more than likely the local area’s first industry.
The miller’s two-story brick house (the Johnson House) built in 1882, sits to the east of the mill. Both the house and the mill were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in December 1976.
The Johnson Mill is located at the Johnson Exit, off I-540/US 62/US 71, north of Fayetteville. Take Greathouse Springs Road/Main Dr. at exit 69 east, about 1500 feet to the mill on the left.
