09/06/2026
C.P. WASHBURN GRAIN MILL - A brief historical sketch
C.P. Washburn and his company erected a grain mill at the corner of Center Street and Cambridge Street in Middleboro, alongside the railroad early in the 20th century. As the name implies, the building served as a grain mill, producing and supplying the area with, among other things, a good supply of animal feed. Animal feed was a much bigger business in the early 20th century than it is today, and rural Middleboro was still dotted with a substantial number of poultry and dairy farms. To be sure, the building of the grain mill in Middleboro was not the beginning of the Washburn family business, which had operated since 1634.
The 45-feet-tall wooden, timber-crib-built structure that once lumbered dominantly over the intersection does not appear to have been built in 1899 as is often attributed, but rather in or after 1901, judging from insurance maps. The corner property where the towering building stood was shown as vacant in a 1901 map, but not in a map from 1903. The first time the property appears on a Sanborn insurance map was in 1906; we also glean from this particular map that power for the operations is provided by means of a gasoline engine, which is housed in a small north-facing ell extension from the main building. The mill’s lighting is provided by electricity and its heating comes from stoves. The map notes that there is neither a watchman, nor any fire apparatus. Next door is the O’Hara Bros. Coal Shed.
The "timber-crib" construction method employed to raise the grain building called for a succeeding series of wooden 2x4 planks being stacked one atop the other, for the extra strength and rigidity that were required to withstand the weight and pressure of so many tons of grain and feed.
Such was the business of supplying animal feed that a large addition and a new “main elevator” were added in 1906, with further additions to the mill and office building structure made in 1910, 1911 and 1912. In 1915, new Richardson self-registering scales were installed, and a three-story concrete addition was put on the elevator in March of 1918. Founding namesake Charles Parker Washburn died in November of 1917, at the age of 60, but the family business continued unabated into the roaring 20s under the next generation of Washburn stewardship. The last major addition to the long row of buildings served as storage for hay and animal feed. By the time the property appears on a map from 1925, it has expanded almost to its final dimensions.
During the 1940s, the C.P. Washburn company continued to run profitably, but it was not immune to problems. On March 22, 1940, an employee by the name of Yukelson suffered an industrial mishap and lost his right foot in a feed mixer. The following year, the mill workers voted to strike in February 1941, although an agreement was reached in March and business continued in town. By the 1950s, the family company holdings had certainly diversified considerably; the family then jointly operated a lumber yard across the tracks on Vine Street, as well as a gas station, and a number of other commercial properties in town. In 1960, the company also opened a garden center on Route 28.
The old timber grain mill was the target of vandalism many times over the decades, ranging from people breaking in to steal tools, slashing grain sacks, and even starting fires. Through all these trials, the business prevailed. In 1959, the company was recognized as the “oldest continually operating grain feed firm in the country,” although the family certainly did not always operate in Middleborough.
This building was so cool that it has its own Wikipedia page.
In April 1980, the mill building was added to the National Registry of Historic Buildings, and in 1984 the company marked its 350th year of operation. The old family business continued operating from the old grain mill site until 1998, when it closed. The town took the property at that time and entertained some plans to redevelop it. However, in 2003, the sturdy, beautiful and thoroughly historic mill was unceremoniously destroyed to make way for a wonderfully vacant lot for the next quarter century, only recently built over. I still do not understand why or how it was demolished despite being on the National Registry.
B.C.
(A very great thanks to Mike Maddigan, who supplied a number of these great pictures, and much information about the construction of this beautiful Middleborough icon!)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.P._Washburn_Grain_Mill
