Return of a gristmill

To paraphrase a well-known dictum, every era has its own mechanisms. The burgeoning industrial development of the early 20th century brought steam and later, internal combustion engines that gave way to electric motors in the second half of the last century. That period also saw the decline of gristmills. At the turn of the 20th century there were as many as 30 gristmills in some Ukrainian villages. Today there are areas in Ukraine where not a single piece of this monument of folk culture has survived as a result of the rapid progress of civilization and the gung-ho attitudes of bureaucrats and ordinary people.

We can still give boys their grandfathers’ sabers, visit churches or Cossack fortresses, grind flour in mills, ride on horseback to grandfather’s house, wash clothes in a tub, weave a piece of cloth on a loom, and make crockery in a potter’s workshop. Today’s children will undoubtedly get a positive impression from our past and Cossack-era Ukraine, which on the face of it has been swallowed by the past.

IN SEARCH OF SPONSORS

Guided by these considerations, an initiative group from the village of Ivkivtsi, in Chernihiv oblast, consisting of O. T. Zaichenko, O. H. Odynets, S. V. Kosiachenko, Y. I. Kitliar, and others, decided to try to save a hundred-year-old mill. It was high time to save it, as the only parts of it that were left were the basic wooden skeleton, the upper blade-moving mechanism, and the roof over the main structure. Every year the forces of nature - wind, rain, and snow - did their work. All our appeals to bureaucrats, political parties, bankers, and industrial managers ended in failure. We wrote letters in vain to various institutions until June 2007, when we received a notice from the Committee of Cherkasy Oblast Electors that our application for a mini-grant had been accepted. We got off to a good start and procured wooden boards and nails to repair the skeleton.

Then we turned to O. A. Diskant, chairman of the Medvedivka village council, who provided us with transport, roofing materials, and willow logs for boards. O. M. Kuryshko, chief executive Tiasmyn Company, gave us a truck to transport the boards, and the manager of the Mekhbud enterprise offered us a truck-mounted crane to transport millstones. The idea also aroused the interest of private entrepreneurs and farmers from some neighboring villages: O. M. Nahaiev, A. M. Panchenko, S. V. Kobylnyk, M. I. Koval from Medvedivka, farmers O. V. Vypyrailo, M. I. Bondarenko, and entrepreneur A. M. Poluden from Novoselytsia. Through the concerted efforts of these individuals, it was possible to finish the preparatory work for the reconstruction of the old mill.

RESTORING THE MILL

At last all the necessary materials were acquired, and an announcement was made that the restoration would begin on Aug. 1, 2007. The work attracted about 50 men, women, and children, which was a very good turnover because it was the middle of the harvest. The staff of the Medvedivka Ethnographic Museum, headed by its director B. V. Lehoniak, also joined in the work.

A considerable part of the labor was done on the first day: we repaired the skeleton and began to cover it with thin boards. It is hard to find words to describe the way 90-year-old men were working alongside schoolchildren. Meanwhile, the women organized a communal lunch, an integral part of the community work routine.

The next time the villagers came on a weekend. They finished installing the thin boards, laid the first- and second-story floors, repaired the blade-rotating mechanism, and installed a strong ladder to the second floor. On the evening of Sunday, Aug. 12, the villagers put the mill into operation. Everybody saw the “old man” come to life, creak, shake, and slowly turn, as though recalling his first school prom waltz.

But it is too early to say that the mill has been fully reconstructed. The blades have to be restored, the gears must be installed in the big pinion wheel, the small pinion wheel and a spindle have to be made, and the upper millstone has to be raised and installed. According to the most conservative estimate, it will take 7,000 hryvnias to complete the work. The initiative group is now looking for new sponsors and has contacted political parties and civic organizations. Villagers and visitors keep putting money, one or two hryvnias at a time, into a special box at the village shop. On behalf of the initiative group and all the villagers, we express our gratitude to all the sponsors and the people who took part in the community work for their contribution to this common cause. We believe that we will succeed in finding people who are not indifferent to our history and will help us raise the required funds.