1646: Are Treadmills Mills? Jun 17, 2019

Windmills and watermills create power, and even peppermills create something, but treadmills generally draw power in order to run. In spite of the current discrepancy, they too started as a power-creating mill. In 19th century prisons, treadmills of the time looked more like elliptical machines, with steps on a wheel to be rotated, and these were very effective power-creation tools. Industrial Britain and to a lesser extent America relied on them to generate power with free labor. In those days, they really were mills as we might think of a mill now, both in shape and in function, but they were later outlawed as a cruel form of punishment, and were later remodelled for exercise in the mid-20th century.
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