Historic Millstone May Memorialize Plainfield’s Howard Zea

Plainfield — A millstone that once was part of a gristmill built in the late 1700s and partially buried under silt for about 60 years has finally been pulled out of Blood’s Brook and likely will be used to honor the late Howard Zea, a former longtime town clerk.

“We have made no final decision, but the idea is to honor Howard,” Town Administrator Steve Halleran said Monday.

Zea served as town clerk in Plainfield for a New Hampshire record of 58 years, retiring in 2001. He died in 2012 at the age of 95.

Halleran said his suggestion to display the stone at the Meriden Town Hall in Zea’s honor appeared on the town’s Facebook page and the “response has been nothing but positive.”

The stone, which is about 45 inches in diameter and weighs at least a ton and possibly more, was retrieved last week by highway department employees doing some minor repairs on Brook Road, Halleran said.

“They just happen to have the right piece of equipment to pull it out. It was too good of a chance not to try.”

Halleran was a little surprised, but nonetheless pleased, when he looked out his office window to see the stone on the back of a truck.

Mill stones were used in pairs in gristmills to grind wheat into floor. Halleran believes the one pulled from the brook was the “wear” or stationary piece that sat on the ground while the one on top rotated and did the grinding.

The mill was powered by water from the nearby mill pond and Zea and his wife, Connie, lived next to the mill. Halleran said that in the early 1950s, the pond’s dam broke and probably washed the millstones down the brook about 200 yards, to just below the covered bridge.

Zea had one of the stones pulled out years ago and he used it as a lawn ornament at his home. It later was bought by neighbors at the auction of the Zea estate in 2015 and now adorns the front yard in the home across the street from Zea’s. The other stone, meanwhile, was stuck in the brook.

Over the years, silt and debris slowly covered it but Tropical Storm Irene had the opposite effect.

“It had been buried but became more visible after Irene,” Halleran said.

In recent years, the Selectboard has had some informal discussions about retrieving it and what to do with it once they got it out of the brook, Halleran said. The plan all along was find a way to honor Zea, he added.

One idea Halleran had was to perhaps lay the stone on its side to be used as a bench. Standing it on its edge and getting it deep enough to ensure it does not fall over would be tough because the land around the town hall has a lot of ledge, he said.

Patrick O’Grady can be reached at pogclmt@gmail.com.