Sarehole Mill and Tolkien Trail: Things to do in Birmingham
SAREHOLE MILL in Birmingham is part of the Tolkien Trail, which retraces the childhood influences of the famous author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
Sarehole Mill
The 200-year-old Sarehill Mill, on the River Cole in Hall Green, is one of the two water mills still standing in Birmingham, the other being New Hall Mill in Sutton Coldfield. There were once more than 70 such buildings along the city's river banks.
Renovation plans were announced in the Birmingham Mail in January 2012.
The aim is to replace broken sluice gates and remove a build-up of silt that has left the millpond only six inches deep.
De-silting would attract more wildlife and allow the wheel to spin faster so the site could be used as a hydroelectric generator to provide power to local houses.
Tolkien lived within 300 yards of the mill between the ages of four and eight and said he used it in his books. In The Hobbit, he writes of Bilbo Baggins "running as fast as his furry feet could carry him down the lane, past the great Mill, across The Water and then on for a mile or more."
As children, the author and his brother spent many hours playing in the mill and being chased away by the miller's son, whom they nicknamed the White Ogre.
In the 1960s, Tolkien contributed to a public appeal to restore the mill and in an interview in 1966, he recalled: "It was a kind of lost paradise. There was an old mill that really did grind corn with two millers, a great big pond with swans on it, a sandpit, a wonderful dell with flowers, a few old-fashioned village houses and, further away, a stream with another mill."
The Grade II listed building was initially built to grind corn but has also been used to roll sheet metal, grind blades and roll wire.
It was once rented to the famous entrepreneur and industrialist Matthew Boulton, before he moved to Handsworth and built the now-demolished Soho Manufactory and its adjacent, still-surviving Soho House.
>>>Also see Soho House: Things to do in Birmingham
Sarehole Mill has a northwheel, mill gears and grinding stones, all of which can be seen working on demonstration days; a bakehouse with the original 1940s bread oven; and a secluded mill pool that has in the past been a haven for moorhens, mallard, herons and kingfishers.
Visitors can follow the footsteps of JRR Tolkien on the Origins of Middle Earth walks held at Sarehole Mill during the year.
The Tolkien Trail goes on to include 264 Wake Green Road, a private residence where the family had lived for four years, and Moseley Bog, which may once have been a storage pool for Sarehole Mill.
The bog (pictured below), which has evidence of Bronze Age habitation and is now a nature reserve, inspired Tolkien's Old Forest where Tom Bombadil lived in The Fellowship of the Ring.
Next on the trail is St Anne's Church, where the Tolkien family worshipped, and a house connected to Dr Joseph Sampson Gamgee, inventor of cotton wool which is known locally as Gamgee tissue. Tolkien used the name Sam Gamgee for Frodo's friend in The Lord of the Rings.
You will then come to 4, Highfield Road, which was Tolkien's last address in Birmingham. It was there he learned he had gained a place at Exeter College, Oxford.
After that is The Oratory, which established nearby St Philip's RC Grammar School where Tolkien studed, and Perrott's Folly, a 30m tower built by John Perrott in 1758.
Later, a Victorian tower was built nearby as part of Edgbaston Waterworks. The structures are said to have inspired the Two Towers that gave their name to the second book in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Sarehole Mill opening times are from April 1, 2012. The attraction is closed for the winter. A cafe and shop are in the Miller's House.
Sarehole Mill ticket prices are: Adults £3, concessions £2, children under 16 free, annual multi-pass site £16. Charges apply to the mill only, the grounds are free to all visitors.
Details were correct at time of publishing, please check before travel.
Address: Cole Bank Road, Hall Green, Birmingham, B13 0BD
Web: www.bmag.org.uk/sarehole-mill