“Millie’s Bakery” was a Mount Barker institution for more than forty years, but the building was not always a bakery, and “Millie” was not a baker. The shop was built in about 1873 as a residence for the Daniel family, who conducted a blacksmith business on the adjacent corner. The family owned the house until 1979 when it was sold to settle the estate of Amelia “Millie” May Daniel (née Watts, 1920-1979). “Millie’s Bakery” was named after her when it opened the following year. It operated until 2021, when the site was sold.  The building is now occupied by a branch of a different bakery.

Original owner Benjamin Daniel (1820-1892) was a blacksmith, and his wife Hannah (née Sorrill, 1826-1913) was the daughter of a blacksmith. They arrived in Adelaide in 1851 with their infant son, and four years later, with three young children in tow, they travelled by bullock cart to Mount Barker. There Daniel set up his business as a “General Smith and Farrier,” which survived for three generations, passing first to Richard Sorrell Daniel (1853-1927), and later to two of Richard’s sons, Frank Stanley Daniel (1885-1967) and “Dick” Harrison Daniel (1893-1974).  Dick, who was the youngest of Richard’s sons, was Millie’s husband.

In the nineteenth century, tradesmen and farmers were the backbone of Mount Barker’s social and political life.  Carpenters, saddlers, butchers, grocers, shopkeepers, blacksmiths and builders all sat on the District Council and made decisions about the governance and advancement of the town.  They also supported religious, community and service groups, donating both time and resources.

Richard Daniel was typical of the tradesmen who threw their heart and soul into the community.  He may have been a “local smithy” in the 1880s, but he came from a literate family and was educated at the school run by Victor Dumas in Mount Barker.  He served on the District Council (including as Chairman), was a Justice of the Peace, and was active in the Agricultural Society, the Town Improvement Committee, and a range of community, religious and Temperance organisations.  Meanwhile, he and his wife Susanhah (née Hamlyn, 1852-1947), produced nine children, eight of whom survived to adulthood.

The Daniel family made agricultural implements and carried out all sorts of metal repairs, but the bread and butter of their blacksmithing business was always shoeing horses. By the 1920s the era of the horse was fading. In 1921 a young man called Thomas O’Donnell (ex-A.I.F.) announced the opening of “an up-to-date MOTOR GARAGE in the newly-erected premises in Gawler Street, Mount Barker, opposite Mr. R. Daniel’s residence” (later to become Thomas Brown’s motor garage).  In 1927, shortly before Richard Daniel died, the Daniels’ blacksmithing yard was closed, and the property was leased to Mount Barker Motors (proprietors Wright, Prosser and Symond).  In 1936 the lease was transferred to Walter Gilbert, and Gilbert Motors – now Adelaide Hills Toyota – occupied the site for many years. Frank Daniel took up farming in Nairne, while Dick started up a local motor bus service.

The engraving below is by lithograper L. Henn & Co.  It shows the view from the top of Gawler Street c. 1881.  In the foreground on the left is the Daniels’ blacksmith yard and the adjacent cottage that would become “Millie’s Bakery.”  A farrier can be seen shoeing a horse in the yard.  On the right is “Harrowfield’s cottage.” (Click on photos to enlarge.)