The keystone over the entrance Archway, with the Roman lettering I. V. 1875 indicates that it was constructed on the instructions of John Dodd in 1875 as a facility for milling and storing grain and flour.
An impressive residence, complete with a gatehouse, was built on nearby Market Street for the use of the Dodd family, directors of the K.R.D. Salmon Fishery
Cade’s Mineral Water bottling plant — a Cork City firm — operated at the rear of the complex between the 1870s and 1920s.
“Mill House” at the frontage onto Mill Road was home to Tom O’Donnell (1871 – 1943) when he first came to Killorglin in 1892 to teach in Killorglin (Boys) National School. Elected MP for West Kerry in 1900, he lived over his wife’s family (Ryan’s) public house on Lower Bridge Street until 1905. The O’Donnell family moved to the Mill Road in 1906.
Tom O’Donnell was returned unopposed in all the elections between 1900 and 1918. He lost his West Kerry seat — uncontested — to Austin Stack of Sinn Fein in the December 1918 “Khaki” election. Finding the political environment unpalatable in the wake of the Anglo-Irish Truce, he left Killorglin in 1922.