Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 118, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 May 1919 — ANCIENT SUGAR MILL [ARTICLE]

ANCIENT SUGAR MILL

Most Interesting Industrial Relic on American Continent. Spanish Conqueror of Mexico Not Only Set It Up, but Operated it Monterey, Mex. —What is said to be the oldest and most interesting relic on the American continent has come unscathed through the long revolutionary period in Mexico, according to Martin Sergus, who has arrived here from the southern part of the country. He says he recently visited Cuernavaca and went out to an ancient sugar mill constructed in 1535 by Hernando Cortez, the Spanish conqueror Qf Mexico, who personally superintended the mill and the adjacent sugar plantation. This was the beginning of the gltgar industry on this continent. , r “That this sugar'mill was built and run by Cortez there is not the slightest doubt,” Mr, Sergus said. “Its history is set forth in the early records of Spanish occupation of Mexico, and the traditions of the natives confirm it. The mill is in good condition, and had recently finished a ‘run’ of several weeks on last season’s crop of sugar cane. “In the pre-revolutionary days’ many tourists visited die little pueblo of Atlacomulco, where the mill is located. The village is primitive

and full of interest. The mill building is of stone and sun-dried bricks. When one thinks that it was built nearly a century before the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Plymouth Rock the antiquity of the structure may be comprehended. “At one end of the low building is an altar where Cortez, on occasions, is said to have paid his religious devotions. It is still a sacred spot in the minds of the natives' who live in huts around the mill. “It was at Cuernavaca that the illfated Emperor Maximilian made his summer home. Upon his table, according to tradition, was served sugar from the old Cortez mill.”