THIS was Sunnydale Mill, above East Morton, when still impressively derelict.
During the Victorian era it had manufactured paper for bank notes and better-class stationery.
It had been the first in this district to install a Fourdrinier paper making machine, worked by an elaborate system of dams, channels and waterwheels, one of which was claimed to be the largest in the British Isles after that at Laxy in the Isle of Man.
By 1878, however, the business was in financial straits and closed down. The mill was not demolished until 1936.
A community of cottages, originally built for paper-making employees, remained occupied until the Second World War. Sunnydale residents in the 1891 census comprised worsted workers, a millwright and a caretaker of the mill reservoir, which had been incorporated into the local authority waterwork system. Their site was long identifiable through plants that used to grow in their gardens.
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