I thought it fitting considering our return to the Champion Mine to take a another look at the Champion Mill as well. The Champion Mill site is one of our favorite – a place we like to return to as often as possible. It was a beautiful sunny spring day when we made our return trip last year. Out on the big lake the ice pack was breaking up, and up on the ruins sheets of ice cascading down the various levels of the mill. We took some time to slide down these ice slides (very fun actually) before turning to the more serious job of taking pictures.

With the winter months killing off most of the vegetation around the ruins we were able to get much better shots of a few highlights from our last trip. First is this panoramic look at the pump house ruins, which were hiding behind a veil of brush last time. This building housed the steam pump used to bring water up from the lake to the top of the stamp mill. The angled concrete platform on the right (barely visible below the snow) houses the feeder pipe from the lake.

The steam pump itself was fed steam from the boiler house next door – which we were never able to get a good look at before because of brush and trees. This is unfortunately as close as we could get. A small stream flows down to the lake between the mill and the pump house – flooding the surrounding land making it impossible to approach without getting wet.

Turning around after taking the last photo, I found this interesting feature we completely missed last time. It looks to be a doorway leading under the mill – probably part of a maintenance corridor but it could have housed a steam or water pipe.

Sitting along the center of the ruins are parallel concrete pillars. They sit in sets of two, and I’m sure held some type of milling machine. Each set consists of three parts: a short concrete ledge which you can see at the bottom of the photo; a pair of “cones” sitting in the middle; and a set of longer pillars with notches cut along their tops (the top-most set seen in the photo). My guess is that these pillars supported the jigs used to separate out the smaller rock pieces. But I’m not sure. We’ll take a closer look to see if someone else out there might have a clue.

Here’s a closer look at the first concrete pedestal. It has a hallow in the middle (now filled in with sand and rock) and a hole on its underside. On its front lip – facing the other pillars – is a set of three small holes placed in the shape of a triangle.

Along the edge of this pedestal are a pair of these iron plates. I assume they were used to hold down a machine of some type, but the groove down its middle seems to suggest that whatever it was it slid back and forth across it.

We found similar brackets here on the second set of “cones” as well. The large rod looks to have been cut off at its tip – no doubt to remove the machine that was once attached to it.

And heres a closer look at the third pillar type – the narrow one with the notched top. Here you can see more of those similar brackets, as well as a gear of some type. This gear did not move, although over the years it could have simply become frozen without lubricant. The presence of the gear further suggests whatever was attached here moved laterally along the line of pillars. Unfortunately, jigs did not move in this manner. So what was here I’m not sure.