In 1800, an Urban Asherbranner (or Asherbramer or Asherbrauner) settled on the upper portion of the Castor River, just where the river empties its waters into Mingo Bottom, and where the village of Zalma is now situated, built a log and brush dam and erected a water mill to grind corn. Philip Bollinger settled nearby. In
A History of Missouri (1908), Louis Houck states that the head rights to this mill were owned by Asherbranner himself, but were held instead by Philip Bollinger, a relative of Asherbranner's wife, Barbara. Philip Bollinger was a relative of
Major George Frederick Bollinger, who settled on
Whitewater and founded
Burfordville in
Cape Girardeau County. The mill was later transferred to the Davault Bollinger line. Davault's third son, Daniel, succeeded his father as miller. Daniel is thought to have come to Zalma about mid-century (1850) to assume operation of the mill. His sister, Catherine (Kate), came with him. They repaired the log and brush dam and operated the mill until the
Civil War. Daniel died about this time and his wife, Eleanora, operated the mill with hired help. This mill burned sometime between 1863 and 1873 perhaps by
Southern sympathizers, but actual cause of the fire cannot be authenticated.--> Zalma received its first post office in November 1876. W.A. acquired the property and built a new mill house and a new dam. He put in machinery to grind wheat and corn, as well as a carding mill to card and wash wool. According to the
Marble Hill Press (Oct. 28, 1897), the McMinn Mill burned in 1897. The dam remained intact for several years after the mill burned, before it suffered the same fate. On Dec. 21, 1880, Louis Houck completed a railroad between
Cape Girardeau and
Delta. A spur line eventually connected Zalma to the railroad. Sometime in the early 1930s the railroad was abandoned and removed. The town's economy remained sluggish until the
timber industry moved in. The Brown Cooperage Company bought thousands of acres of timber, mostly
white oak, for $1 per acre. In 1884, the Bell Messler Company placed a factory at Zalma to cut
veneer and box
laths. The Zalma factory was located just upstream from the mill dam. This factory provided work for women who stacked the box laths in long rows in the sun for drying. A second box factory was located on the north side of Green Street near the Railroad Street intersection, a short distance west of the present Highway 51. ==Historical communities near Zalma==