Immediately upon the completion of the G. R. & I. railroad in 1872, The firm of LaBar & Cornwell, composed of Chas. H. LaBar and Jacob Cornwell, established a flour and feed mill in an abandoned railroad camp, bringing one of the earliest businesses to the town of Cadillac. More recently, gardeners came here to buy plants, grass seed, lawn gnomes, or supplies until it was abandoned in the mid 1990s. It was demolished in 2008.

For a century, it served Cadillac area farmers’ needs, providing 19 varieties of feed in all. The mill had customers from as far as 50 miles.

The trains stopped delivering grain to the mill in the 1980s, which was hard on area farms, many of which then had to go to McBain, Falmouth, Reed City, or Kingsley for supplies.

Days at the mill were long and laborious. Work sometimes had to start at 5 AM and continue on into the night just to unload all of the trucks that would arrive. It was hot, dusty, poorly ventilated, and often a dangerous environment to work in. John V Sluiter, owner and operator of the mill from 1968 to 1996, lost his hand in a corn auger in 1974. Despite his injury, he continued his work, even tying bags with his teeth.

The beautiful, solid, 8×8-inch beam construction has held the structure together, even as moisture from the nearby lake has threatened it since the beginning.

Not sure what this machine was for exactly, but it looks like its bin was loaded from the street above and it poured out here.

Over the years, rotten grain and pigeon feces had rained down from the upper floors as water seeped in from the roof.

Here you can see where grain from the bins could be separated into about twenty different shafts, depending on where it was going. The bins were more forty feet deep, and there were some cool photo opportunities there, but there was also the opportunity to fall to my death.

Next time you think your job sucks, think of “HO”, who worked here as a 16-year-old.