Who Was Oliver Evans?
Born September 13, 1755 Oliver Evans was born in Newport, Delaware, and had a strong impact on the development of technology and industrialization. The importance of his inventions became well known throughout the young United States, both during and after his lifetime. Oliver is best known at Greenbank because of the milling process he invented in 1787. In 1782, he and two of his brothers purchased part of their father’s farm to build a mill, just upstream from the Philips mill at Greenbank, where he developed his process and equipment. The new United States government did not yet grant patents, so Evans patented the milling process in Delaware and several other states. As soon as the federal patent act was passed in 1790, he applied and received patent number three, signed by President George Washington and by Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson. Oliver’s process involved several pieces of machinery that allowed for continuous production and could be operated by only one man. The aut
