Glade Creek Grist Mill ~ West Virginia

Oil painting of mill surrounded by autumn foliage

One is impressed with the marriage of beauty and utility when viewing the boulder strewn stream which powers the mill in this oil painting. Adorned on every side by colourful fall foliage, the wooden sides of the old mill looked mellow and strong.

Although my husband and I could not see the mill in operation the day we visited because its massive mill stone was being cleaned by the miller, we climbed upstairs to look down at the wheel and sluice from its topmost window, and to photograph the fall foliage from another vantage point. Once downstairs again, we sat for a few moments on the old benches at the back of the mill, and tried to reflect on what the farmers who sat there many years ago might have conversed about.

As I sketched the mill for this oil painting, huge Virginian fishermen sat patiently on the bank, angling for trout. They had mounded earth across a mountain rivulet, which flowed just to the right of the oil painting, and kept their catch cool in the tiny "pond" until they were ready to go home.

Yellow swallowtail butterflies darted about us, unconscious of their loveliness against the backdrop of the autumn foliage. The swallowtails, not included in this oil painting, seemed as common and unheeded by the locals as white cabbage butterflies are in Ontario.