Northwestern Consolidated Milling Company

[1] Formed as a business entity, Northwestern produced flour for the half-century between 1891 and 1953, when its A Mill was converted to storage and light manufacturing.

[2] Northwestern and their new Ceresota[6] flour brand name were established in July 1891 by a group of businessmen led by former lumberman John Martin at six independent existing mills—the Crown Roller (2,500 barrels/day), Columbia (2,000), Northwestern (1,600), Pettit (1,600, to be an elevator), Galaxy (1,500) and Zenith (1,100).

[5] Northwestern's first decade was marked by financial instability because its founders paid too much for its properties and suffered from lack of capital.

[2] By combining six mills, Northwestern's capacity was the second largest in the world at the time of its founding, after the giant Pillsbury-Washburn, and slightly more than Washburn, Crosby.

An Egyptian king provided his trousers; from Italy, he got his blue blanket; the Amazon contributed his bench, boots, suspenders, and shirt; Japan gave him a gold shield; and a miller gifted him with the brown sombrero.

Each Ceresota Flour sack displayed a picture of Ceres Ota slicing a giant loaf of bread.

[12][13][14] The plan was defeated and the Park Board redeveloped the site into Water Works Pavilion and Restaurant (2021).