The Millstones in Queens Plaza

The Millstones in Queens Plaza. . , These two 19th-century millstones were removed from the sidewalk during the 2011 reconstruction of Queens Plaza and set within this landscape as a reminder of Queens' agrarian past. Millstones like these were used to grind corn and grain into flour in tidal gristmills, which were built along tidal inlets and powered by water channeled through canal-like sluices. The movement of the tides turned the millstones for about five hours twice a day., In the mid-1600s, Silesian immigrant Burger Jorissen built a tidal gristmill not far from this site. By the late 1700s, several tidal gristmills were active on the western coast of Queens, providing an essential service to the developing municipalities of Dutch Kills, Ravenswood, and Astoria, which later joined to form Long Island City., In 1860, Jorissen's mill was demolished to make way for a new railroad connection, but the mill's sluice, known locally as "Burger's Sluice," survived for several decades after. The historic sluice is echoed in the drainage corridor that runs beneath the elevated walkways and through the planted landscape of the park, capturing rainwater and surface runoff., To find out more information, please visit www.nyc.gov/parks.