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NPR’s Weekend Edition to Feature Saint Vincent Gristmill

Link to NPR piece on the Gristmill

Saint Vincent Gristmill On Sunday, August 2, 2009, Weekend Edition host Liane Hansen of National Public Radio will profile the first Benedictine monastery in America.

Weekend Edition: Sunday Morning is carried locally on WDUQ, 90.5 FM, and airs from 8 to 10 a.m. The segement on the Gristmill is scheduled for 9:40 a.m. It will be available online after 2 p.m. on Sunday on National Public Radio.

In the mid 1800s, a Bavarian Benedictine monk, Boniface Wimmer, came to this country to serve the German immigrants and in the process built a church, seminary and college on land in Latrobe.

The monastery and campus was to be self-sustaining. The brothers had livestock, a vegetable farm, and fields of grain. A gristmill was also built to grind that grain into flour, which provided bread for the monks.

The Gristmill is now on the National Register of Historic Places and is still in operation, providing flour for the Benedictines’ daily bread.