Whited Grist Mill

Elk City was described recently as a community of "soul," with reverence for the building efforts of its citizens. This is currently being demonstrated by the development of an Old Town Museum Complex . . . and the preservation of the Whited Grist Mill, Significantly, this appreciation of the past is being expressed while the past itself goes back little farther than the day before yesterday.

This section of west-central Oklahoma was not opened for settlement until the land "run" of April 19, 1892. It took arrival of the Choctaw, Oklahoma and Gulf railroad (the present Rock Island) in 1901 to get a town-site laid out and a town started. Then in short order Elk City (although it was not called that until 1907) acquired the customary number of stores, eating houses, saloons ... and the Whited Grist Mill, two blocks east of Main Street, hat it may have lacked in size, it made up for in dependability. Over the years it served the growing community until the wartime unavailability of replacement parts for ancient machinery finally caused it to close... this in 1944.

Ruben Whited built his mill between the Rock Island tracks and Elk Creek, just southeast of the business district, in 1903-1904. The Whited family owned and operated it until it closed. It was the town's first and only mill. A long-time worker recently recalled its operation.

At the Whited Mill corn would be shelled for the cobs, The corn was ground for less than 25€ per hundred, or for toll, which was a certain per cent of the meal. This toll was sold to those customers who did not have their own corn, along with that made from a reserve stack kept in the crib. Thus customers were always assured of freshly ground corn meal. There was also a fanning mill in the sheller room to remove all chaff and dirt from corn before it was ground.

A sign painted across the front of the wooden building proclaimed proudly: CORN GROUND INTO MEAL OR CHOPS AT ANY TIME. The mill attempted to keep up with the times. In the winter of 1928-1929 a new building was erected to the west of the original one, to provide extra sales and storage space and house flour milling equipment. Earlier remodeling involved installation of a hammer-mill to accommodate bundle feet. An electric motor eventually replaced the original kerosene-fueled engine to run the machinery. Most of the old milling machinery itself, with the French buhrs, remains in the restored building, though not yet in operating condition,