Antique Enterprise No. 2 Cast Iron Coffee Mill
Description: Offered is an antique Enterprise No. 2 coffee mill or grinder. Originally patented in 1873, this is an early version of the mill and highly collectible. Later versions of the same No. 2 design have a much wider neck as opposed to the thin one shown here. This cast iron coffee mill has one handle crank and two wheels that would grind the coffee inside. The mill includes the original small metal drawer at the bottom and was originally designed to sit on a countertop rather than being mounted on a wall. The item retains its original colorful paint.History: Coffee grinders have been used for hundreds of years and can be traced back to Ethiopia, however, the first US patented coffee mill (also called a coffee grinder) was issued to Thomas Bruff in 1798. A well-known dentist, Bruff even wrote to his dental patient, Thomas Jefferson, of his mill that could grind a pound of coffee in 4 ½ minutes. By the 1870s, large floor and counter coffee mills were introduced to general stores