Page 14 - Augusta VG 2015

Augusta’s
Powerful Past
Billy Power’s footsteps echo through
the cavernous, empty rooms of
Augusta’s Sibley Mill, where he
tends the hydro turbines that feed
electricity into the local grid. But
Billy Power remembers how the
Sibley Mill sounded otherwise;
when the deafening clack of
hundreds of textile looms drowned
out all conversation as it produced
high quality denim.
The mill hands, doffers and carders
he worked with seem to linger in
the shadows.
The mill, and the canal that flows
alongside it, reflect the days of
King Cotton, when the Augusta
Cotton Exchange was second only
to Memphis.
Rather than shipping local cotton
away for manufacture, an Augusta
entrepreneur and others built the
Augusta Canal in 1845 to provide
power, water and transportation
for the fabric mills they envisioned. pressure from foreign manufacturers,
In a few years, Augusta was known
as the “Lowell of the South,” after
Lowell, Mass., the birthplace of the
Industrial Revolution.
The Augusta Canal Discovery Center
1450 Greene St #400 706.823.0440 AugustaCanal.com
Sibley Mill was the most striking
local mill. Completed in 1882,
the four-story structure, with its
crenellated facade, corner towers
and the Sibley family coat of arms,
looks more like a medieval castle
than a mill.
It occupies the site of the old
Confederate States of America
Powderworks, a gunpowder factory
that stretched two miles along the
canal. The tall chimney that stands
in front of the mill is a relic of the
Powderworks and can be viewed
by visitors.
For years, the mill ran on hydropower
transmitted from the water turbines
Power now oversees. Its workers
lived in the surrounding mill village
of Harrisburg.
The mill closed in 1990 under
and is not open to the public.
Visitors who would like to get a taste
of what it was like living in Augusta
during its industrial boom can visit
the Augusta Canal Discovery Center.