Old Brandon Mill

Two accounts exist of Brandon's mill. The marker says Dr. Jas. T. Harrington built it in 1868. The Handbook of Texas says Joseph M. Martin built White Rock Mill on the creek before 1855, and credits Dr. J. R. Harrington, a dentist, with naming the settlement and serving as postmaster in 1873. A voting box stood in a grove near Wyman Spring in 1851, and the Woods home was a stagecoach stop. When the Cotton Belt missed the town in 1888, residents moved one mile northeast to the tracks and kept the name.

What the plaque says

Old Brandon Mill One of earliest grist mills in Hill County. Built (1868) by Dr. Jas. T. Harrington, who also founded town of Brandon. Corn meal, basic to settlers' diet, was ground here. Dr. Harrington built a dam on White Rock Creek near here as a water source for power in the millhouse. His grist mill served a wide area for nearly 50 years. A grist mill was a primary need in every early community. Where bread could be made, settlements thrived. A good water supply and a grist mill were essential to a successful town. Today only stone foundations of Old Brandon Mill remain. (1967)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Hill County Courthouse — 10 mi
  Wesley C. Dodson's limestone Second Empire courthouse of 1890 on the Hillsboro square, gutted by fire on New Year's Day 1993 and rededicated in 1999 after a rebuilding that two Willie Nelson concerts helped pay for.
• Ellis County Courthouse — 24 mi
  J. Riely Gordon's courthouse of 1897 in Pecos red sandstone and pink granite, with twenty-one carved stone faces and two cornerstones left by a quarrel over its building.

More markers nearby

• Hammel's Branch — 2.8 mi
• Mertens Baptist Church — 3.9 mi
• Milford Presbyterian Church — 5.4 mi
• First Baptist Church of Milford — 5.5 mi