Amasa Blush, about 1799 or 1800 bought the fulling mill of Mr. Herrick and ran it for several years. About 1805 he added to his plant a new clothing mill for finishing custom work which took the place of Herrick’s mill and occupied the same site. This building was destroyed by the flood of 1874. Some time between 1815 and 1818 he built a woolen mill, which he later enlarged and improved until at last it was a building 36 x 80 ft. and three stories in height. It stood a short distance south of the clothing mill, west of the road near where Mr. Boyer’s sawmill now stands. To this industry Oliver and William D. Blush succeeded their father in 1830. In the late 1840’s the mill was rented to Boise, Smith & Root who operated the store and custom tailor shop at the Center. Cotton warp broadcloth and satinet were their products. The mill was destroyed by fire in 1861 together with several tenements. The building was rebuilt and the business carried on by Oliver Blush under the style of O. Blush & Co. In the ’70s it was known as Jerome Blush’s Satinet Factory. A grist mill was also located in a part of this building at this time. In 1874 this whole plant was demolished and swept down stream by the flood, and was never rebuilt.

Middlefield Factory Village is tucked away in the valley of Factory Brook, coming down from the town center on Town Hill Road it has glorious views of the Hills as you descend into once the busiest most populated factory industry settlement making wool and the satinet to clothe fine gentlemen and military men. With the assistance of Doug Lyman lidar mapping genius, we set out to uncover all that the floods and forest have taken back. Contributed photos courtesy of DCR, History of Middlefield, Sternagle, mapping Doug Lyman. https://middlefieldma.net/

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