Les Jones

Word of the Day > Word of the Day: Undershot Mill or Undershot Waterwheel

So while re-reading Blount County Remembered I came across a picture of two boys around the turn of the century playing in the water around a small dam and mill in the Smokey Mountains. The caption reads "Two youngsters play alongside an undershot mill. Dr. Randoplh Shields, author of several books about the Cades Cove area, says no such mill ever operated in Cades Cove, and he surmises that this one was probably located along Tab Cat Creek, whose waters eventually empty into the Little Tennessee River.

I had never heard of an undershot mill, but from the word itself and the picture it's obvious it refers to a mill where the waterwheel is driven from below by the flowing water, as opposed to an overshot design driven from above by water falling from a flume.

This page discusses different waterwheel designs and their relative advantages. The undershot is the simplest since it doesn't use a flume, but it requires a fast-flowing stream.

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