Preserved by the Surry County Historical Society

The Granite Arch Bridge that served the Brower Mills on Hamburg Street History

This stone arch once carried horses, wagons, and pedestrians over the millstream that powered the mills of Jacob Brower and his sons. Built before 1870, the bridge is the oldest known structure still standing made of Mount Airy granite. The Browers eventually had four mills here grinding grains, spinning cotton, and wool, and making shoes and boxes. An old photograph shows the mills structures, and an 1896 insurance map locates them beside the Ararat River.

In 1841 Jacob Brower moved to Surry County from Guilford County and built his first mill on the Ararat River just south of the bridge. To power the mill he dammed up the river a half mill to the north and dug a ditch that carried a stream of water to the mill. Coming from higher elevation, the water passed through turbines that harnessed the energy and drove the mill machinery.

Hamburg Mills included a general store, where sugar, coffee, and household items were sold and where community news and views were exchanged. Here in 1867, Jacob Brower (1812-1868) and his son, John Morehead Brower (1845-1913), organized the Hamburg Lodge Chapter of the Union League for the purpose of encouraging freed slaves to register and vote. Freedmen gained the right to vote under the Military Reconstruction Act passed by Congress after the Civil War. The U.S Constitution now guarantees this right. John Brower was elected Representative in the United States Congress for two terms (1887-1891) and served two terms in the North Carolina General Assembly.

The Surry County Historical Society acquired the granite arch as a gift from the estate of W.E. Merritt. The Mount Airy Board of Education donated additional land around the bridge. The Society's Brower Bridge Committee is responsible for the landscaping and the information sign, with help from Martha Rowe Vaughn, Eagle Scout Anderson Rowe and his parents, David and Englis Rowe, the North Carolina Granite Company, and the City of Mount Airy.