Power

Long before petroleum. Long before electricity or coal power, our forebears learnt to harness water power. They were very ingenious.

This city - Sheffield - well-known for its metal trades -  became important because of water power. There was an industrial water wheel here in 1180 AD - down on The River Don.

In fact, this city was built on five rivers - The Don, The Rivelin, The Loxley, The Sheaf and The Porter. In history, these rivers drove dozens of water wheels that transferred power to grindstones and belts making metal industries and craftsmanship possible - often in little workshops  that were naturally sited close to the waterwheels.

Scythes and knives were sharpened. Blades of all descriptions. The first bowie knives were made here and then exported to North America. This city taught the world about steel way before Pittsburgh became America's  "Steel City".

Anyway this is all mere preamble before I tell you that I walked out of this house at eleven this morning and marched along Greystones Avenue to Greystones Road. Then down the hill into the wooded valley of The River Porter. Further along, I noticed that The Shepherd Wheel site was open and its waterwheel was turning just as it did in the seventeenth century.

You don't spend long at The Shepherd Wheel but enough time to recognise the ingenuity of those old craftsmen. They harnessed river power, created  dams and controlled flow into what were once churning  waterwheels made from hardwood like oak. Metal waterwheels came later.

Most waterwheel sites in and around this city were dismantled long ago and the archaeological evidence of their existence may be hard to find but The Shepherd Wheel remains as a worthwhile reminder of how industry used to be before it all became too easy  and the old ways were lost.

The millpond at Shepherd's Wheel - containing diverted water from The River Porter