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Pictured above is the Venice Mill, run by the
Gallagher brothers, John R., Arthur P., and James S. Gallagher, dating back to
the 1930s or 1940s. The site is now occupied by the Margaritaville restaurant.
According to an article in the July 3, 1988 issue of the Sandusky Register, the Gallagher
brothers purchased the Venice Mill in 1897, which had formerly been run by
several generations of the Heywood family. Russell Heywood purchased the old
mill in Venice in 1831, at the southeast corner of what now is Fremont Street
and Venice Road, along with the rights to Cold Creek and five hundred acres of
land. A second mill was built by Mr. Heywood in 1841, but was destroyed by
fire. An early canal system transported the wheat and flour from the mills to
the bay, where it was shipped by boat. Later railroad cars transported the
grain. Members of the Gallagher family operated the mill until the late 1940s.
The family also owned a flour, feed, and coal business in Sandusky on East
Water Street. This building still stands and is known as the Granary. In 1955 Harold Coker bought
the old mill. He and his wife Gertrude built a restaurant and bar known as the
Old Mill on the site of the Venice Mill. Three of the original walls from the
mill were used in the new tavern. In the early 1980s John Kubicek and Nick
Porozynski remodeled the Old Mill tavern and re-named it Margaritaville. An
early history of water powered historic mills, found on the back of an old menu
from Margaritaville, is now housed at the
Sandusky Library Archives Research Center.
This old flour sack from the Venice
Mill, when it was run by the Gallagher family, is at the Follett House
Museum.
5 comments:
Thanks for sharing the history of the Venice Mill. I love reading about such wonderful history of an operation from our past time. Plus seeing the flour bag was a great photo. Have a great day.
Classic Body Worx
A friend who lives in LIma, told me that there are stories there about farmers in the 1800s taking their grain to the Venice Mill in the winter when the trip was easy due to frozen roads. The Mill must have operated most of the winter due to the unfrozen Cold Creek.
Thank you so much for this article.
My great grandfather was James Gallagher and my grandfather, Paul A. Gallagher.
While there are a few cherished stories and memories about the Gallagher clan, there's precious little documented fact.
One thing I do know for sure is that James Gallagher fed the elephants of Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey Circus when the train came through Sandusky on its way to Cleveland. My grandfather would wake my tiny mother in the middle of the night to go out and great the elephants. For her entire life, my mother elephants held a special spot her heart.
Thanks for sharing! You and I are distant cousins . James sister Sarah was my Great Grandma!
I remember The Old Mill from my youth. Harold Coker was my grandfather and I remember many days there while my mother was helping with various things. My cousin and I would eat hamburgers on the patio and we would play in the parking lot. I have an painting of the Old Mill on my wall and my father's Old Mill pool team jacket from the early sixties. It is really sad to see what they have done with the place. The Old Mill was a way better place.
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