DNRT worked with a dedicated group of volunteers to oversee the reconstruction of the grist mill building, development of a parking area and extensive historical research on the site. The earliest documented use of the Allen’s Mill site appears to date to 1711, although a 1926 New Bedford Standard Times newspaper article claims 📷that a mill operated in this location as early as 1676. According to
local historians, by 1784 the mill operated with an overshot wheel and this site had “the best power in the region because the water here had the highest fall.” In 1876, Elihu Howland sold the property to James Allen II, the individual whose name is associated with the mill. Allen ran the mill for 60 years until it was sold to John Sheehan in 1936. John Sheehan began working for James Allen around 1900 and by 1919 had assumed responsibility for the management of the mill. Sheehan also began operating a sawmill, which was located adjacent to the sluiceway and just off the southeastern corner of the gristmill building. A fire in 1939 destroyed the majority of the sawmill and damaged a portion of the building that housed the gristmill. Around 1946 a gasoline engine replaced the water flow. The mill appears to have ceased operation sometime in the late 1950s or early 1960s, although the specific dates when the grist and sawmills stopped operating are unknown and may have continued sporadically after day-to-day production ended.
