January 29, 2025 • 7 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, that old windmill on the side of the highway might be fun to look at, but without it, the great westward expansion would have been nearly impossible. Jessie Edwards shares the story.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
and we tell stories about everything here on this show.
And now it's time for a look back to a
device that helped win the West. He used Jesse with
the story of Windmill.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
You can drive just about anywhere in America and find
windmills if you're looking for the old metal ones you
see in paintings of Texas to the Midwest, from the
novelty lawn ornament variety for under one hundred bucks to
the towering vintage water pumps accenting skylines next to barns
or pastures and cornfields, fully restored or in beautiful decay,
(00:45):
working or not, these giant relics of Americana aren't just
for decoration, and the West couldn't have been won without them.
Out of the mid eighteen fifties, salesman John Burnham and
machinist Daniel Halliday came up with the basic design that
we would recognize today with the Holiday Windmill Company. It
was relatively lightweight, nimble, It could swivel so it was
(01:08):
always facing the wind, an angle its blades to just
for speed to avoid damage and strong winds. Automatically, families
and farms were able to pump water and store it
in tanks anytime the wind was blowing.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Right around the turn of the century. Between the eighteen
hundreds and the nineteen hundreds, there was over six hundred
windmill companies in the United States.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Tanya Meadow is with the American Windmill Museum in Lubbock, Texas.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
The American Windmill Museum was started in nineteen ninety three
by a lady who was a teacher at Texas Tech
University and mister Kroy Harris, who is still our executive director.
This building houses over one hundred and ten windmills. We've
got windmills in here from as big as six foot wide,
which is the diameter of the wheel. How we measure
a windmill up to twenty five feet wide in diameter.
(01:58):
The old steam engines could only go fifteen to thirty
miles before they had to stop for water, depending on
the terrain. You look at our little towns out here
in West Texas, fifteen to thirty miles down the road,
there's a little town probably sprung up there because that's
where the railroad had to stop in order for them
to be able to get water for the steam engine.
So there was a major relationship between the railroads and
(02:19):
the windmills.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
The windmill pumped the water to power the steam engines
on the trains of the first transcontinental railroad out west.
There's only one company that stood the test of time
and continues to build them right here in the good
old USA.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
And that would be the Air Motor Company. The Air
Motor Company started off in Chicago, Illinois, laid eighteen hundreds
and then in the nineteen fifties they were purchased by
a Texan and the plant was moved to San Angelo, Texas,
where it still is today. And they still make windmills today.
Your larger ranches still use windmills. It's so much easier
(03:02):
to put up a windmill for under twenty thousand dollars
than it is to try to run twenty miles of
electrical line in order to be able to pump water
for your large ranches. And the Four Sixes Ranches a
big one, they actually have a full time windmiller. One
of the reasons that the air Motor business is still
in business today is they were always thinking what can
(03:23):
we do to make life easier? What can we do
to make life better? They were one of the first
ones to create what was called the power mill, and
the power mill would have been a different gearing system
on a building outside the barn or one of your
other outbuildings, and inside underneath there would be a grinder
so that they could grind their corn and their wheats
in order to be able to have their flowers in
(03:44):
order to do their breads and grains. They also were
one of the first ones to enclose the gearbox. It
has an oil reservoir underneath it and a big bonnet
on top of it. And they said that you only
had to oil your windmill once a year. Now that's
a major time saving as opposed to having climb up
there three or four times a day and put oil
(04:04):
on the gears.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Many of the windmills that dotted the path out west
were rendered obsolete by the nineteen thirties as electric and
diesel powered trains took over the railways. Once electric pumps
became popular, windmills on farms went neglected and began to
break down over time without proper maintenance. But some people
like to get these old wind pumps working again, like
(04:27):
Rick Ritter Saint Jacob, Illinois. He restored his flint and
whaling brand windmill that's been standing on the family farm
as long as he can remember.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
I just thought it was so cool. I never got
to see it run till I was forty something when
I fixed it. It always stood out here on the
farm and never got used. It had weeds, vines, morning
glories climbed all the way up to the top.
Speaker 5 (05:00):
Probably nineteen ninety. I started cutting vines at the bottom,
and eventually, after all everything died on it, I was
able to pull it all off, all the vines that
were grown around it. I had an old guy tell me, said,
you need to get those vines off there, because what
will happen during a heavy windstorm with vines and stuff
on there blocking it.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
The wind will take the whole thing to the ground.
So he said, basically, even need to get the vines
off of it, or else you're going to be out
there with a cutting torch cutting it up. And I
just a whole I just didn't want to lose it.
I thought it was just a neat piece of history
to have standing here, So I cut the vines, pulled
it off. Took me years to get that done until
we got it all taken down, which I had a
cherry picker come in and take it down, and it
(05:41):
stayed on the ground for a year while everything got
repainted and refinished on it. I think they bought it used.
Nineteen twenty six is the year on this one. It's
been standing here since I was a kid. I never
got to see it.
Speaker 5 (05:55):
Run at all till I was still.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
Actually I restored it. I must have shot pickup truck
load of twenty two caliber bullets out here and whatever,
And for some good reason, I just never shot holes
in the windmill. Most windmills you see, if they aren't
destroyed from wind damage or whatever, somebody's blowed holes in them,
and especially in that crown that's on top of here.
(06:19):
And once you blow holes in that from the bottom
up especially, water gets in the top, gets into the
gears and bearings, rusts, its solid, and it's pretty well junked.
That's the way a lot of these got ruined was
bullet holes. Basically. The other way is you would run
them completely out of oil and let them spin, because
what will happen. You'll get a big windstorm come up,
it'll spin all the bearings in narrowill get really hot,
(06:41):
and all of a sudden it will lock up in
the inertia of that spinning windmill, will wide this thing
up like a ball. Put it on the ground once again.
A torch comes out and you're gonna end up hauling
it away a scrap iron. So I always liked it
standing here and just didn't shoot at it. And when
the weeds grew up, I pulled the weeds off of it,
and then eventually I fix it.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And great job as always to Jesse and my goodness.
There's an American Windmill Museum in Lubbock, Texas. And a
special thanks if you're ever driving through, stop eye the
windmill story an important part of American history. Here on
Our American Story, this is Lee Habib, host of Our
(07:31):
American Stories, the show where America is the star and
the American people, and we do it all from the
heart of the South Oxford, Mississippi. But we truly can't
do this show without you. Our shows will always be
free to listen to, but they're not free to make.
If you love what you hear, consider making a tax
deductible donation to our American Stories. Go to our American
(07:52):
Stories dot com. Give a little, give a lot. That's
our American stories dot com,
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
and we tell stories about everything here on this show.
And now it's time for a look back to a
device that helped win the West. He used Jesse with
the story of Windmill.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
You can drive just about anywhere in America and find
windmills if you're looking for the old metal ones you
see in paintings of Texas to the Midwest, from the
novelty lawn ornament variety for under one hundred bucks to
the towering vintage water pumps accenting skylines next to barns
or pastures and cornfields, fully restored or in beautiful decay,
(00:45):
working or not, these giant relics of Americana aren't just
for decoration, and the West couldn't have been won without them.
Out of the mid eighteen fifties, salesman John Burnham and
machinist Daniel Halliday came up with the basic design that
we would recognize today with the Holiday Windmill Company. It
was relatively lightweight, nimble, It could swivel so it was
(01:08):
always facing the wind, an angle its blades to just
for speed to avoid damage and strong winds. Automatically, families
and farms were able to pump water and store it
in tanks anytime the wind was blowing.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Right around the turn of the century. Between the eighteen
hundreds and the nineteen hundreds, there was over six hundred
windmill companies in the United States.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Tanya Meadow is with the American Windmill Museum in Lubbock, Texas.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
The American Windmill Museum was started in nineteen ninety three
by a lady who was a teacher at Texas Tech
University and mister Kroy Harris, who is still our executive director.
This building houses over one hundred and ten windmills. We've
got windmills in here from as big as six foot wide,
which is the diameter of the wheel. How we measure
a windmill up to twenty five feet wide in diameter.
(01:58):
The old steam engines could only go fifteen to thirty
miles before they had to stop for water, depending on
the terrain. You look at our little towns out here
in West Texas, fifteen to thirty miles down the road,
there's a little town probably sprung up there because that's
where the railroad had to stop in order for them
to be able to get water for the steam engine.
So there was a major relationship between the railroads and
(02:19):
the windmills.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
The windmill pumped the water to power the steam engines
on the trains of the first transcontinental railroad out west.
There's only one company that stood the test of time
and continues to build them right here in the good
old USA.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
And that would be the Air Motor Company. The Air
Motor Company started off in Chicago, Illinois, laid eighteen hundreds
and then in the nineteen fifties they were purchased by
a Texan and the plant was moved to San Angelo, Texas,
where it still is today. And they still make windmills today.
Your larger ranches still use windmills. It's so much easier
(03:02):
to put up a windmill for under twenty thousand dollars
than it is to try to run twenty miles of
electrical line in order to be able to pump water
for your large ranches. And the Four Sixes Ranches a
big one, they actually have a full time windmiller. One
of the reasons that the air Motor business is still
in business today is they were always thinking what can
(03:23):
we do to make life easier? What can we do
to make life better? They were one of the first
ones to create what was called the power mill, and
the power mill would have been a different gearing system
on a building outside the barn or one of your
other outbuildings, and inside underneath there would be a grinder
so that they could grind their corn and their wheats
in order to be able to have their flowers in
(03:44):
order to do their breads and grains. They also were
one of the first ones to enclose the gearbox. It
has an oil reservoir underneath it and a big bonnet
on top of it. And they said that you only
had to oil your windmill once a year. Now that's
a major time saving as opposed to having climb up
there three or four times a day and put oil
(04:04):
on the gears.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Many of the windmills that dotted the path out west
were rendered obsolete by the nineteen thirties as electric and
diesel powered trains took over the railways. Once electric pumps
became popular, windmills on farms went neglected and began to
break down over time without proper maintenance. But some people
like to get these old wind pumps working again, like
(04:27):
Rick Ritter Saint Jacob, Illinois. He restored his flint and
whaling brand windmill that's been standing on the family farm
as long as he can remember.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
I just thought it was so cool. I never got
to see it run till I was forty something when
I fixed it. It always stood out here on the
farm and never got used. It had weeds, vines, morning
glories climbed all the way up to the top.
Speaker 5 (05:00):
Probably nineteen ninety. I started cutting vines at the bottom,
and eventually, after all everything died on it, I was
able to pull it all off, all the vines that
were grown around it. I had an old guy tell me, said,
you need to get those vines off there, because what
will happen during a heavy windstorm with vines and stuff
on there blocking it.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
The wind will take the whole thing to the ground.
So he said, basically, even need to get the vines
off of it, or else you're going to be out
there with a cutting torch cutting it up. And I
just a whole I just didn't want to lose it.
I thought it was just a neat piece of history
to have standing here, So I cut the vines, pulled
it off. Took me years to get that done until
we got it all taken down, which I had a
cherry picker come in and take it down, and it
(05:41):
stayed on the ground for a year while everything got
repainted and refinished on it. I think they bought it used.
Nineteen twenty six is the year on this one. It's
been standing here since I was a kid. I never
got to see it.
Speaker 5 (05:55):
Run at all till I was still.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
Actually I restored it. I must have shot pickup truck
load of twenty two caliber bullets out here and whatever,
And for some good reason, I just never shot holes
in the windmill. Most windmills you see, if they aren't
destroyed from wind damage or whatever, somebody's blowed holes in them,
and especially in that crown that's on top of here.
(06:19):
And once you blow holes in that from the bottom
up especially, water gets in the top, gets into the
gears and bearings, rusts, its solid, and it's pretty well junked.
That's the way a lot of these got ruined was
bullet holes. Basically. The other way is you would run
them completely out of oil and let them spin, because
what will happen. You'll get a big windstorm come up,
it'll spin all the bearings in narrowill get really hot,
(06:41):
and all of a sudden it will lock up in
the inertia of that spinning windmill, will wide this thing
up like a ball. Put it on the ground once again.
A torch comes out and you're gonna end up hauling
it away a scrap iron. So I always liked it
standing here and just didn't shoot at it. And when
the weeds grew up, I pulled the weeds off of it,
and then eventually I fix it.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And great job as always to Jesse and my goodness.
There's an American Windmill Museum in Lubbock, Texas. And a
special thanks if you're ever driving through, stop eye the
windmill story an important part of American history. Here on
Our American Story, this is Lee Habib, host of Our
(07:31):
American Stories, the show where America is the star and
the American people, and we do it all from the
heart of the South Oxford, Mississippi. But we truly can't
do this show without you. Our shows will always be
free to listen to, but they're not free to make.
If you love what you hear, consider making a tax
deductible donation to our American Stories. Go to our American
(07:52):
Stories dot com. Give a little, give a lot. That's
our American stories dot com,
Host
Lee Habeeb
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