CINCINNATI — For Edward S. (Ted) Nagel, the decision to participate in Whitewater L.L.C. offered an excellent solution to increasingly difficult challenges for H. Nagel & Son Co.

“Our mills are getting older, and it was becoming harder and harder to find parts for them,” Mr. Nagel said in an interview with Milling & Baking News. The 51-year-old Mr. Nagel became president of the 156-year-old milling company at the end of 2012. The fifth generation member of his family to lead the Ohio milling company, he succeeded his father, William Nagel, who has retired.

Plans to establish Whitewater Mill L.L.C. were announced Sept. 21. The new mill with 10,000 cwts of daily flour production capacity is expected to be operating in spring 2015. A new business to be located in Harrison, Ind., near Cincinnati, Whitewater is a joint venture of Siemer Milling Co., Teutopolis, Ill., and H. Nagel and Son Co. of Cincinnati.

Mr. Nagel said he and his father were approached with the idea in late 2011 by Richard C. Siemer, president of Siemer Milling. In an era when smaller mills such as those Nagel operates in Ohio are becoming the exception rather than the rule, Mr. Nagel said the proposal for a new mill as a partnership offered an attractive solution.

“He came to us with the idea of a joint venture,” Mr. Nagel said. “I actually thought it was quite brilliant.”

The Nagel mills in Cincinnati and Brookville have milling capacity of 2,700 cwts and 1,800 cwts, respectively. Mr. Nagel said the Brookville facility was one of the first pneumatic mills in the United States. He declined to disclose plans for the mills once the Whitewater mill begins operations, but he did say the dry mix plants at each of the mills will continue to operate for the foreseeable future.

“Our business interest is in the dry mix, which will continue to operate as a separate business,” Mr. Nagel said. “We’ll continue to focus our sales effort in that area. Dry mix plants will continue to operate, at least until a mix operation is established at the new mill.”