Our Great Old Barn

I still miss our great old barn on Kansas Road.  It was a stately, gambrel-roofed structure over one-hundred-years old.  Hand hewn beams formed the main frame and supported the loft floor, and the construction style was typical for the era, with mortise and tenon joinery and wooden pins.   In our area, the Amish still use this type of construction for new barns.  Most modern farmers have gone to pole-barn construction, as this better suits today’s style of farming.

Forty by ninety feet.  She stood proudly for over a hundred years.

I used to wander about the pulleys that hung at various places in the old loft, and the large metal hooks that were embedded deeply into the beams about one foot up in the doorway at the top of the barn bank.  What had they been used for?  One of my old Amish neighbors stopped in one time and described how he used to help put loose hay into that loft.  He said the horses had a hard time pulling the loads up the steep barn bank into the loft area, and would sometimes slip.  I’d like to have seen how that all worked—unloading the hay, using the slings and pulleys that were still there in the loft.  Well, now I have.

As I walked south on Zuercher road two weeks ago, Jacob and his sons were loading hay into a wagon.  It’s a beautiful sight to see father and sons working together like that, and I took some photos from a distance.  I won’t post another picture of that today,  since one was included with the writing two weeks ago—the one titled, “Melvin and His Horse.”  

I continued walking south, passing them and their farm buildings as they labored in the sun, and at the two-mile mark from my home, turned around and headed back.  This was the moment that Jacob and the boys were pulling the full hay wagon out of the field.  I wondered if they might let me watch them unload it.  So, following the wagon up the barn bank and into the loft, I asked. “Sure,” they said, smiling.  I knew better than to get the camera out.  Much too close for photos, and they wouldn’t want that.  This time, the action would be locked in my memory, and not on a camera chip.

What a treat to see the process!  Suddenly all the pieces came together when I thought of all the hooks and pulleys that had been in my own old barn on Kansas Road.  

Once the wagon was pulled up into the loft, the horses were unhooked and brought back to the top of the barn bank, facing down hill.  There they stood, waiting patiently.  Then, as Jacob went into the loft on top of the loose hay that was already distributed there, his son Henry climbed onto the wagon load of hay, reached up and got hold of a rope that hung down from the hay carrier trolley that was attached to the rail up in the peak of the barn—a rail that runs full length from one end to the other.  Under the top layer of hay in the wagon, there was a sling that ran the full length of the wagon.  I hadn’t noticed that before. The sling reminded me of a giant rope ladder with each wooden “step” about four feet wide.  The ends of the sling had loops that Henry hooked to the rope that hung down from the peak of the barn.  Now it was all coming together in my mind.  From the hay trolley up at the peak, the other end of the long rope came down to a pulley hooked onto the beam of the barn doorway.  The rope went through that pulley, and was then hooked to the horse’s harness.  Henry slapped the reins a little, and the team walked down the bank, and up went the load of hay.  He stopped them when Jacob shouted, just as the load reached the top of the barn.  A locking device on the hay carrier trolley locked the load from coming back down.  Henry then unhooked the team, and hooked them to another rope and walked the team back up the hill.  This rope moved the sling-full-of-hay along the rail to a place where Jacob wanted to drop it.  When the load was where he wanted it, Jacob shouted, and the team stopped.  Yet another rope was hanging down from the sling, and when Jacob pulled it, the load dropped into the loft, with a huge cloud of dust and chaff.  So that’s how it is done!  Two more slings full of hay were layered on the wagon, and I watched them do the same things twice more.  Now I could see it all in my head.  I could see my Grandpa, my uncles, and my Dad unloading hay.  I could see how the process had been done in my own great old barn.  This little “field trip” made me happy.  I thanked Jacob and the boys, and headed north on Zuercher Road, with a satisfied smile on my face, and many thoughts about the old barn that used to grace our six-acre mini-farm on Kansas Road—a spot that is now a level area of lawn, and belongs to a nice Amish family.

Join me as I reminisce a little.

Our huge old barn was gone.  After more than one hundred years of use that included uncounted animal inhabitants, mountains of hay and straw, volumes of reeking manure to pitch out every spring, cobwebs galore, and a one-hundred-year-old combination of odors related to all the above, it had finally succumbed to old age, neglect, and some tough weather.  No longer would it be home to many varieties of animals, and the people who lived there.  The old barn was like a second home to me—and to many others before me.  Old barns are like that.  As the farmers spend untold hours there milking cows, feeding livestock, pitching manure, and long nights with animals in labor, the barn becomes like home.  I loved it, too.  I loved everything about it.  And I loved having a place to keep some animals.  

When our family moved to this property on Kansas Road, I looked at the barn and recognized the obvious signs.  At first glance, it looked good, but a closer inspection revealed that the tin roof was leaking in many places.  Some beams showed signs of termites and carpenter ants.  The hayloft floor was rotting in some places.  The siding was weathering and taking on a lovely character.  All in all, it was clear that the great old barn would not stand the test of too much more time.  I guesstimated ten years.  It seemed like a long time.  I’ve learned differently.  Ten years is almost nothing.

In those ten years, we made a home for quite a number of critters – “our menagerie” we called it.  My love for animals, and my desire to share that interest with my growing children, caused me to make a home in the old barn for horses, ponies, donkeys, goats, calves, turkeys, chickens, rabbits, and of course, too many cats.  Not all at the same time though.  We spread the fun out over the years, and at any given time had two or more groups of the above-named animals.

And time moved on—and children grew up—and the old barn faced some fierce weather that took off some of the tin roof.  We were at the ten-year mark now, and it was difficult to admit it.  It was with sadness that I had to face the facts.  Six acres of land cannot support or justify the cost of repairing and re-roofing a huge old barn.  Forty feet wide, and ninety feet long—she stood proudly for over a century, but this was quickly coming to an end.  I called a couple barn salvagers, and collected a couple offers.  One guy would give me twelve-hundred dollars.   Another one thought he might be able to give fifteen-hundred.

Both men were planning to harvest the timbers, and sell them for lumber.

So that’s the going rate, I guessed.  Maybe it would be enough to clean up the debris and put in a lawn.

Then out of the blue, a man from a distant state called me.  He had been in our area several years earlier, and said he had his eye on my barn.  He wondered if I might be interested in selling it.  Yes, of course I was.  “In fact,” I told him, “I was in the process of collecting offers.  How much would he offer?”

“Two thousand dollars,” he said.  That was better than the others.  Then he went on to explain what my barn might become if I accepted his offer.  The dream was for the upper level to become a Christian bookstore, and the lower level, a restaurant.  As much as I hated to see the barn go, it would do my heart good to see it resurrected.  Born again, in a sense—or as some say in these circumstances—barn again.

Coming down.  An Amish crew was hired to dismantle it.

So we agreed.  It was an experience I will never forget; to see my barn dismantled board by board, and beam by beam.  Three full semi-truck loads hauled it all away.  All that is, except for several large piles of “scrap” wood that was formerly the siding, and hayloft floor.  Those parts were unsalvageable in the man’s eyes, so he left them.  I looked at the piles, and knew immediately what I was going to do with them.  I would sort out the best boards, and use them for my other hobby—building furniture.  You sure wouldn’t think it, to look at those ugly, weathered, dirty boards.  You wouldn’t think that something beautiful lay there in those random stacks of ancient wood.

As I began sorting, I soon found a fairly large quantity of wormy chestnut, white oak, red oak, ash, and poplar—all useful for making the things I like to build—things like book-shelves, dry-sinks, wall-shelves, and coffee tables.  I was particularly thrilled for the wormy chestnut.  It is difficult to find, since the tree is extinct.

Wormy Chestnut salvaged from the old barn.  My favorite piece.  

And looking back, it was a good decision.  As much as we love old barns, one can go driving through the country and see what happens when they are no longer needed.  Many are left to slowly fall to the ground, into mounds of forgotten lumber, no longer home to anything but rats and mice, groundhogs and rabbits.  It’s sad to see, and to think about all the wonderful times and hard work that took place inside those old structures.  It’s a different day today, with large farms, large equipment, and not much need for the standard old barns of yesteryear.  But it is still enjoyable to drive around and view the Amish families and some hobby farmers using them just like our ancestors did.   

From Kidron, Ohio, where the men are homely, but they can still turn their lovely wife’s head as they work outside under the July sun, muscles rippling and glistening with sweat.  It’s a good life here in the country, where children grow strong and healthy eating things that were grown in the family garden; where they go to the barn or shed to help with the animals; and before long, they grow up to be like Mom and Dad—eventually to repeat this wonderful cycle of life.  Let’s enjoy each day with our families, and be thankful for the many blessings.