Barrel Packer, The Mill at Anselma, West Pikeland, PA, 2009.

Credit: Courtesy of Charles Hardy, III

The Mill at Anselma was a custom grist mill for local farmers. The presence of a "barrel packer," however, indicates that Anselma also dabbled in commercial milling. Quaker merchants in Pennsylvania were among the first to push for the standardization of food products, both to prevent fraud during sale and to ensure a healthy product. By the early 1700s, regulation on the commercial sale of flour demanded very specific dimensions for the barrels into which it was packed, and how much flour should be packed into each barrel.