Harrisville Mill #4 - Burrillville RI - Converted Factories on Waymarking.com

Harrisville Mill (mid 19th?- early 20th century): A complex of 13 independent and interconnected buildings located east of Main Street and south of East Avenue on a tract bordering the Clear River. It comprises 1 and 2 story structures with flat or low pitch gable roofs and large multi-pane industrial windows with flat or segmental tops. Approximately half of the buildings are fully or partly of clapboard construction, unusual for Rhode Island mills of the period, while the remainder are built of brick or concrete. Three components of the group are distinctive in character. The Office and Store House (mid-19th?- early 20th century) is a rambling 1 1/2 story clapboard structure with end and flank gable roof wings and deep eaves with gable returns. The central portion, with its gable end facing East Avenue, may date from the 1870s or possibly earlier, making this the oldest surviving element of the mill complex. Mill #3 (1905) is a long 3story brick structure with a low-pitch gable roof, a 3 story, flat-roof tower on the northeast side, and projecting roof beams trimming the eaves. Mill #4 (1911; Adolf Siick of Boston, architect ) dominates the assemblage. It is a 3-story, flat-roof building of reinforced concrete frame construction, fronted by a 5-story tower with corner pilaster articulation, asymmetrical stepped fenestration, false balconies supporting groups of square piers , and a pyramidal roof. The concrete frame was originally in filled with large multi-pane windows so that the exterior walls were almost entirely of glass, but many of the windows have since been closed up with concrete blocks. Mill #4, one of the earliest reinforced concrete buildings in Rhode Island and reputedly "the largest fire proof concrete mill of its kind in New England" at the time of its construction , is notable for its unique tower and unusual concrete and glass construction.

The current Harrisville Mill, though less than a century old, occupies a water power site first utilized circa 1800. At that time a saw and grist mill was built, probably on the north side of East Avenue, followed by a spindle and flyer manufactory erected on the opposite side of the road by Andrew Harris, for whom the village is named. By 1832 a cotton mill had been built next to the spindle factory. It was replaced in 1853 by a new mill constructed for Jason Emerson. Three years later Job Steere and William Tinkham purchased the property. They erected the existing mill dam and made additions to Emerson's factory in 1857 and 1888. A fire destroyed the mill in 1894 and the present complex, with the possible exception of part of the office, postdates
this fire .


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Address:: 200 Tinkham Ln Burrillville, RI Year built: 1911 Year converted: 2008 Web page: [Web Link]

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