Agenda 10-17-23; 5-a - Joint Public Hearing with the Historic Preservation Commission Regarding the Proposed Designation of the Davis Cotton Gin and Press as an Orange County Historic Landmark

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9 ORANGE COUNTY LOCAL LANDMARK APPLICATION DAVIS FARM COTTON GIN AND PRESS The gin is located in the frame section which forms the west end of the barn. While the machinery is on the same level as the upper floor of the log barn, there are support features on the lower level. An opening cut into the board-and-batten siding on the south wall allows for easier access to both levels of the gin operation (Photo 4). A small upper window is also on this wall (Photo 4). A regular-sized door opening on the north wall (Photo 5) provides additional access to the first level. In the northeast corner of the frame section, a ladder stair (Photo 11) rises to the upper level where the machinery is located. A double door at the west end of the upper level opens to a platform where the ginned cotton was pushed into the top of the cotton press (Photo 10). The purpose of a cotton gin is to separate the seeds from the cotton bolls so that the remaining lint can later be processed into cotton fabric. The gin at Davis farm is an iron and wood structure with a heavy timber frame and cast-iron pulley wheels for large leather belts (Photos 12-14)that ran through a slot in the floor and continued through slots in the lower west and east walls of the log section of the barn to the engine outside. During the early decades of the 20th century,the gin was operated by a"hit-and-miss" engine that was started with gasoline and, once started, continued to run on the more economical kerosene fuel. The engine also powered the grinding stones of the corn mill, but not at the same time as the gin. (According to Charles Davis Jr., after the gin and the mill ceased to operate, the hit-and-miss engine was sold to a man in Hillsborough in the 1940s. The corn mill is no longer in situ on the farm.) On the open ground at the west end of the overall building is a large industrial-duty electric motor fitted with a pulley for leather belts (Photos 4 and 7), suggesting that an electric motor may have replaced the hit-and-miss engine when electricity came to this area in 1935-36. Given that the Davis gin was established in the last decades of the 191h century, prior to the age of internal combustion engines, it is likely that it was initially powered by a small portable steam engine of the type often used to power farm machinery and small sawmill operations. In the upper level of the barn, raw cotton was fed from the east into the gin hopper (Photo 13). From there, the cotton bolls were pulled through the gin where nail-like teeth separated the seed from the fiber. Stencils on several part of the machine at the Davis Farm reveal the manufacturer. One cast-iron component of the machine is embossed with"Patented July 15, 1873." One wood part is stenciled with"Danl Pratt Gin Co, Patent .Tune 19, 1877" (Photo 14). The wood hopper bears the patent date of August 28, 1877. These dates, however, do not indicate when the gin was purchased by the Davis family. After the cotton exited the west end of the gin (Photo 12), it was fed from a platform (Photo 10) into the large vertical wood chamber of the cotton press in the adjacent, westernmost, section of the barn (Photos 7-9), where it was tightly compressed into bales. Supported at the corners of the west end by cedar posts, the upper half of the cotton press section of the barn is sheathed with circular-sawn vertical boards, while the lower half is open (Photos 4-5). The press, itself, is a tall, narrow structure of horizontal boards that now leans to the east (Photos 7-9). Corner timbers and iron rods running up the north and south sides (Photo 8), along with cross braces, helped to strengthened the press and hold the chamber together during the strong pressure exerted while the cotton was being pressed into bales. The cotton was pressed by a large iron screw mechanism (Photo 16) that pushed downward on the loose cotton as two bent wood poles attached to the 6