10/31/2026
We thank you, Built Along the Blackstone , for the post and sharing of the history of Manchaug Mills and Manchaug Village!
Manchaug’s mill company did more than provide a paycheck. It owned much of the village around the work.
The granite Mill No. 1 is the visible starting point, but the National Register nomination describes a much larger company landscape: employee housing, a store, a farm, a church and a school. Following the mill’s history means following homes and neighborhood institutions, too.
Cotton manufacturing began here in 1826. Under B. B. & R. Knight and its successors, Manchaug workers produced cloth carrying the Fruit of the Loom name.
Then the ownership that had held so much together began to break apart. The village was offered at auction in June 1922, with limited success, and the mills closed. The company’s 1926 insolvency led to the disposal of its remaining Manchaug property.
The buildings did not all share one ending. Different buyers acquired the three mill complexes. Hayward-Schuster eventually took over Mill No. 1 and continued limited wool manufacturing into the 1940s.
In this 2005 photograph, business signs share the stone frontage beneath the tower. Do you remember a business that occupied Mill No. 1, or someone in your family who worked there?
