Construction of the Spocott Windmill

George L. Radcliffe always intended to rebuild his father’s mill. He spoke of it often, but few thought he would follow through because he had stayed so busy throughout his life. They didn’t know George. At 90, his talk of rebuilding grew more serious, and everyone knew the mill would now happen.

For most such projects, securing the funding would be the limiting factor, but this was George’s specialty. Since securing the funding to save the Baltimore Shot Tower in 1924, he had become a master in tracking down the needed funds for a project. For the windmill, he would turn to family. Walter Clay Hill, Jr., a cousin living in Atlanta, Georgia, immediately embraced the project. His mother, Rebecca Beckwith Travers (1886–1967), was the granddaughter of John Anthony LeCompte Radcliffe, the original windmill builder, and had spent considerable time at Spocott as a child. She and George had remained close throughout her life, and her son Walter was more than happy to fund the mill as a memorial to his mother and great-grandfather.

The more difficult task was finding a builder. In 1970, no one was building post mills anymore. There was limited literature on the subject and no blueprints. George’s father, a boat builder, had built the original mill, and George lived next door to probably the most talented boat builder on the East Coast, Jim Richardson. “Captain Jim,” as so many called him, was a boat builder from the old school and owner of Richardson Boat Yard. His family had built ships since the seventeenth century, and he was nationally known for boat restoration, having restored several historic vessels. George approached Jim with the task of rebuilding the windmill. We can only imagine Jim’s initial reaction, but George, in his legendary, low-keyed method of persuasion, did get Jim to agree to the project. Jim was likely the only person who could have constructed a post mill.

Jim began a frustrating nationwide search for plans and ended up building models until he found one that would suffice. From that point on, the project was one of trial and error. Few would have had the patience to follow through. The Richardson Boatyard became a windmill construction facility. Jim headed the project, but much of the construction fell to his son-in-law, Tom Howell. Jim utilized the boatyard staff, but many others assisted, including Walter Hill’s son Walter, and George’s grandson Bill.

All the timbers for the mill came from the nearby Spocott woodland, exactly where George’s father would have gotten the timber for the original mill, and considerable time was invested in finding just the right trees for the construction. The critical piece of timber was the central post around which the three-ton base was constructed. Jim, George, and others finally located the perfect four-foot diameter oak, and this was dressed down to the central post, two feet wide at the base. Oak was used for the rest of the framework, while pine was used for the building.

The original 700-pound stones were used, and the mill was assembled in pieces at the Richardson Boat Yard and gradually moved into place. George watched with the enthusiasm of that child, who had seen his father’s amazing mill years earlier. The four twenty-eight-foot blades had to be perfectly balanced along with the building. As Tom Howell would explain, if the mill building were even slightly off or the blades and weight not perfectly distributed, the vibration from the tremendous power generated would have ripped the entire structure apart. The mill was dedicated on George L. Radcliffe’s 95th birthday, August 22, 1972, and operated for the first time in 1973. Fifty years after its construction, the mill operates with virtually no vibration as the blades spin and that massive top stone rotates over the stationary bed stone.