Stone mill from Ohaba

• Stone mill from Ohaba – the oldest functional mill in Șara Făgăraşului

Tradition and customs handed down from generation to generation are our connection to the past, to all that is simple and natural. Before 1950, most bread factories worked in double shifts to cope with the high demand. In the rural areas, the ovens continuously baked brown bread, the smell of which spread throughout the village. How many of these still exist today? Very few.
Starting from the origins, from the place where the grains reach flour, to then become bread, it is found that the mills of the past are now ruins. The "bread road" is shorter today, with products reaching people's tables more quickly and often without them knowing the story of everyday bread.
Traditional grinding is an unknown practice, today, for some, but old for most. Ohaba Stone Mill is one of those places where magic happens.

Origins and development. The mill – a moral duty

Ohaba is a village located at the foot of the Făgăraș Mountains, where traditions have been preserved for hundreds of years. A good example is the water mill, built in 1873, which works without interruption regardless of the times that have passed over it. The "secret" of the uninterrupted activity for almost 150 years is that the water mill remained permanently in the possession of the family, being passed down from generation to generation. Thus, it became the oldest functional mill in Șara Făgărașului. There are only two water mills in the entire area, but the one at Ohaba is the oldest and the only functional one.
The authenticity of the mill is marked by the fact that it has kept all its original components, including the two millstones that produce the grindstone. Even the box in which the flour or milk flows today is original, being inscribed on it the year from which it dates - 1873. "The mill is a unique object, which once destroyed cannot be rebuilt," says Nicolae Popa, the current owner.

In 1962, when the cooperativeization of the area took place, Șerban Gheorghe - the pillar of the second generation of millers - did not give in to the communist pressure, he was imprisoned at the Făgăraş Fortress, but thus saved this family treasure. Brave and fearless, the miller from Ohaba "chose" to be imprisoned in the communist prisons, enduring everything to save the inherited mill.

Hard times for the miller from Șara Făgăraşului

Despite the repercussions suffered, the miller from Șara Făgăraşului could not be induced to abandon his most valuable asset. Even when his children were denied the right to go to school or when the grain quotas imposed by the state far exceeded their production possibilities, he did not give up.
"Grandfather often told us how the gendarmerie would come on horseback and confiscate everything they could find, to force him to sign that agreement by which the mill would be cooperative", recalls the miller.
Both before and after this crucial point, the stone mill at Ohaba was a veritable factory.

Bread for village weddings

The miller tells that "at the weddings that took place in the countryside, before '89, they had bread made from the flour ground at this mill. Not only the residents of Ohaba, but also those of the neighboring villages. Moreover, all villages in Șara Făgărașului had their own mills, with larger villages even having two mills each. I remember that in my native village, Şercaita, where I grew up, there were two mills. Unfortunately, even the ruins no longer exist today."
After the sacrifice endured by the second generation, each heir did more and more to keep the mill in the family. Thus, the maintenance and promotion of the mill became a moral duty, and based on this principle, the current owner very much wants the tradition to be carried forward.

The water mill – the place where the flour keeps its properties intact

The water mill works with two stones, each weighing about a ton. One stone is movable and the other is fixed, both made of natural flint rock, brought from Lyon in 1873. Their transportation from France to Ohaba remains a mystery. Nevertheless, the miller Nicolae Popa has a hypothesis, but not confirmed: "They were probably brought by a guild of millers from the area, as there were other guilds at that time, that of cobblers or shoemakers."
It is certain that the stones arrived at Ohaba and for about 150 years they have been cared for in such a way as to ensure the functionality of the mill. "Taking care of the stones" goes by the name of grinding millstones - it's a guild name - and it consists of manually making some ridges on the entire contact surface of the stones, with the help of very well-sharpened hammers. There are two kinds of such striations, some very fine, which crush the grain, and others in the shape of arcs of a circle, called in the miller's trade, rasps, which impress the centrifugal force.

Impressive grinding process

The role of these ricers is to capture the grain from inside the stone to the outside and to impress the centrifugal force so that the product is thrown outside and later collected. The miller explains: "This milling process is done after very large quantities of grain, tons of wheat or corn have been milled... or by mistake. Mistake means the basket is out of grain, the miller is not paying attention, the mill is running idle, and those rice are destroyed.”
Thanks to the hydraulic force, the mill runs continuously, through a system of wooden wheels driven by rollers and belts. The entire propulsion assembly is made of wood, and the power source is water flow. One belt is attached to the lower wooden roller, rotated by the outside wheel, and the other belt is fixed to the upper roller. There is also another tube, also made of wood, which has another very long strap on the inside. It circulates counter-clockwise and has cups attached from place to place, which have the role of transporting the flour.
Before reaching the bags, the flour is sifted through three types of sieves, to obtain different granulations: white flour (fine powder) – through the fine sieve, black flour – through the intermediate sieve and bran. In the past, this mill produced both types of flour, but now it only produces wholemeal flour without sifting – the whole grain of wheat is crushed without removing the bran. In addition to flour, customers - individuals - also request sorghum, traditionally ground and unsieved.
"Everyone takes their sorghum home and sifts it, then boils it for 25-30 minutes to make sorghum," says the miller with a smile on his face.

Green energy

The stone mill operates for most of the year with green energy, so there is no conventional energy consumption, except in the cold season. With a good water flow, a bag of wheat (about 50 kilograms) is ground in about 2 hours. Productivity is very low compared to today's technology, but the finished product is very good.
In winter, when the water freezes and the mill cannot operate with hydraulic power, the old electric motor is used, dating back to the communist period, when it worked in continuous flow.

Traditional ground flour – health for generations

Traditional grinding is one of the ways to obtain quality ingredients and implicitly healthy and nutritious products.
One of the undeniable advantages of traditional grinding is that the finished product retains all its qualities and properties. Being obtained cold, its temperature (flour or flour) never exceeds the temperature of the environment where the processing takes place.
In addition, the speed at which the grain of wheat or corn is crushed is reduced and thus nutrients, fiber and vitamins are preserved. Grinding being integral, it requires little labor and the source of energy is free – the water that flows continuously right in the yard of the house.

About the current generation of millers

Virginia and Nicolae Popa successfully represent fourth generation by owners. For about 40 years they have taken care of the well-being of the mill, periodically coming from Făgăraș, and 10 years ago they moved permanently to Ohaba.
Nicolae Popa is not a direct descendant of the family of millers. The third generation had only one daughter, namely the wife of Mr. Nicolae Popa. Not being part of the original family of millers, for Mr. Popa the mill means a moral duty.
"The mill represents a respect for the generations that are no more and also one for the children who come from behind. For me the mill means the obligation of our generation to preserve it. I remember that I was young when I got married and lived in the city, and when I came to the country my father-in-law would tell me: the belt broke, the bearing broke and so on. I had to help him, the repairs were slow, it wasn't pleasant, but it was a very well-planned strategy, because that's how I managed to assimilate all the maintenance work that needs to be done at this mill", says Nicolae Popa.

The secrets of milling handed down from generation to generation

The future of the mill lies in the generations to come. An extremely important asset underlying the inheritance of the mill from father to son is the fact that the mill has always been privately owned. Virginia and Nicolae Popa have two children and two grandchildren who often come to Ohaba and already know a large part of the secrets of milling.
"We have two more generations in front of us, who live in Făgăraș. I put myself in the situation I was in 35 years ago, I also lived in Făgăraş and I never thought that I would move to Ohaba and take care of this mill. I suspect that they will also have the intelligence to preserve it, because it is one thing to see it displayed pompously in a museum and another to see it functioning in a natural setting, 150 years old," says the miller.

The fourth generation of millers: Nicolae and Virginia Popa

The third generation: Ioan and Estera Şerban

Second generation: Gheorghe and Maria Şerban    

First generation: Nicolae and Zafira Şerban

Who still grinds at the stone mill today?

Although it is functional, few people go to the mill with sacks of grain anymore, compared to the pre-communist period. In the countryside, wheat and corn milling is almost non-existent.
With regret in his voice, the miller Nicolae Popa tells us: "The villages are aging, the peasants no longer make bread, but buy it. Instead, the "good world" in the urban environment is returning to us, with small steps, but more and more. People from the city come to us for flour, then they go home and make bread".

The Ohaba mill does not collaborate with bakeries, but only with private individuals, because production is not always constant, being influenced by the flow of water. In dry periods, productivity is very low. This is the main reason why the miller cannot undertake to deliver large, predetermined quantities at regular intervals of time - "I cannot undertake a responsibility to a firm that I can deliver a certain quantity at a certain time well planned".

Traditional grinding is labor intensive

Also, there may still be breakdowns in the mill that take time to fix. The miller also gives us an example of a situation he faced recently: the replacement of a wheel, which no longer coped due to long use.
"The current wheel is new, the work was completed in May this year after about two months of work. After many years of repairing it, I came to the conclusion that it needs to be replaced. It was a huge job with a lot of stress because we had to source the necessary material and make it. In addition, the tradesmen who helped us were very hard to find. Our advantage was that we used the old wheel as a model, from which we kept only the central axis. The axle is made of oak and is so good that it will last another wheel change. The new wheel is also made of oak wood and has a diameter of 3,1 meters. It took a very thick oak to get a long bow segment out and make the obada (circumference) we needed."

Included in the European Circuit of Mills, since 2016

In 2016, the water mill from Ohaba was included in the European Circuit of Mills, thanks to the support of the Ethnographic Museum in Brașov, which supported the European event entitled "European Days of Mills and Millinological Heritage".
The project initiated by the French Federation of Mills aims to protect and promote water mills as heritage assets, and in 2016 the Ohaba mill was one of Romania's proposals. Thanks to this action, the mill was visited by about 100 museographers and historians from all over Europe. However, the miller has not received any financial aid to use for the care and promotion of the mill, but he declares that it is not the material part that drives him to continue, but the moral part.
The result of dedication and passion can be seen, as the mill is visited year after year by tourists from all over the world, from Saudi Arabia to the United States of America. Many visitors also come from Israel. Even the miller confessed to us that "there are many Romanian families who emigrated to Israel and come with their grandchildren, with their children, to visit their country of origin, and one of the objectives in Transylvania, in the Land of Făgăraş, is our mill".

Read also the story of the mill from Intorsura Buzăului.