I'm starting to photograph some old barns while out on other adventures. Some years ago I saw a PBS special on barns in MN and I got to thinking about life in general.
My Great Grandfather grew up as a farmer, served in the Civil War, was able to get a section of land in MN during the worst weather conditions the area had ever seen. They tried but failed, by the mid 1890 our branch of the family was out of farming.
On my Mothers side the farming made it all the way in to the 1940's. While two of my uncles still had livestock into the 1960's and the other in to the 1970's that has been it for that branch of the family too.
So today while out I came upon this barn. I was looking at the picture and noticed that it has a number on it. The number looks like it could be a date, 1873. It also could be something else, fire number, address, something else???.
So some of you barn experts, does this look like a barn that could date back to 1873?
[ATTACH]17141[/ATTACH]
It looks like a wind driven pump was used at some point, looks like the metal structure go through the roof of the pump house below, that can't be to new either.
Ed
Old barns?
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Old barns?
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brad_nalor
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I am glad I am not the only one who loves old barns. Our old barn collapsed in the mid 60's from a very bad windstorm. It was in poor shape. We were about to shore it up, but never got the chance. I was farm raised. On my dad's side we were farmers all the way back into the old country which for us was Switzerland. On my mom's side we had been farmers in the US since pre-revolutionary times, and also in England, etc. I broke the mold and left the farm, although I was a grain manager at an elevator for 10 years. The farm population is dying off. Around here, the average age of a farmer is in the mid 60's. Like me, not a lot of kids are staying home to farm.
Bill
Bill
Ed,
My great grandfather built several barns for people in SE Kansas in the late 1800s/early 1900s. One of the last ones that the family was aware of to survive made it to the late 1990s or early 2000s before falling or being torn down and it was not at all well cared for. It was still being used for hay storage in the 1980s. As an aside, the house that he built looked much like...a small barn; I guess he liked the design he used.
The design here looks pretty simple yet sturdy, also fairly well kept, so I'd guess that it certainly could be 140 years old.
Roy (not a barn expert nor play one on TV)
My great grandfather built several barns for people in SE Kansas in the late 1800s/early 1900s. One of the last ones that the family was aware of to survive made it to the late 1990s or early 2000s before falling or being torn down and it was not at all well cared for. It was still being used for hay storage in the 1980s. As an aside, the house that he built looked much like...a small barn; I guess he liked the design he used.
The design here looks pretty simple yet sturdy, also fairly well kept, so I'd guess that it certainly could be 140 years old.
Roy (not a barn expert nor play one on TV)
For many years I traveled Wyoming and Montana and always felt saddened when another ancient barn blew down in the ever present Wyoming winds. In the Mid 1970's I noted a barn south of Sheridan Wyoming had become a pile a weathered wood. A few weeks later a good friend in Denver offered me an opportunity to finish a new home office in his basement. The wainscoting was to be made from remnants of an old barn. Only after it was completed was I was honored to meet my friend one night in Sheridan Wyoming and introduced to his rancher friend who had sold him the wood for our project. I loved putting that old wood to a good use but still felt sad to make the connection to a barn I had enjoyed looking at so many times. Thanks for the great picture and the historical notes. Jim
F. Jim Parks
Lakewood, Colorado:)
When the love of power is replaced by the power of love the world will have a chance for survival.
Lakewood, Colorado:)
When the love of power is replaced by the power of love the world will have a chance for survival.
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cincinnati
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- Location: Cincinnati, Ohio
Ohio had an old barn painted in each county for the Bicentennial. Great way to see Ohio. Each barn is visible from a highway so photo's are easy to take.
http://www.ohiobarns.com/ohbarns/index.html
http://www.ohiobarns.com/ohbarns/index.html
"Prove to all the world Metal rules the land"
-Judas Priest, Heavy Duty.
-Judas Priest, Heavy Duty.
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robinson46176
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- Location: Central Indiana (Shelbyville)
Long...
Diana and I try to keep a camera handy and we go for "Sunday Drives" at the drop of a hat any day of the week.
We shoot a lot of barns. We do not make any attempt to keep track of where they are at or the date etc. We just do it for fun. I plan to set up a separate web site for free wallpaper pics and it will have a barn section.
The barn in Ed's picture could easily be that old especially in his area.
We have 3 old barns on this farm, all needing some work and one in pretty bad shape but still repairable if I can get it fixed before it goes down in a storm. That one is on a property that was added to the farm much later than the main farm. It had almost no maintenance for a long time and what it had was superficial when what it needed was underpinning work.
Of course the single most important thing to "holding" a barn is a good roof. They can survive a lot of problems as long as the roof is good.
The very term "barn" can be construed to include several different kinds of buildings. Merriam Webster says: "A usually large building for the storage of farm products or feed and usually for the housing of farm animals or farm equipment". Based on that definition I have four large barns and one small one. I tend to call some barns and some tool-sheds. That small barn is a story all by itself...
The biggest enemy of the old barns is the high cost of doing any kind of repair work on them and the high cost (especially of hired labor) to update them to modern uses. Other threats are lightning, vandals, arsonist and extreme age as well as periods of tough times in farming...
The newest "barn" I usually call "the tool shed" is about 30' X 64' and is a tall 1 story building. It went up in 1959. I am working on it now converting it into a stable which will start with 5 stalls and a fair sized common area. If boarding goes well we will add a 12' X 64' addition to the other side and add 5 more stalls.
The small barn came about in 1951 when my father had a rental fishing cottage that he and his uncle built on a previous farm moved to this farm when he bought it. He laid a concrete block foundation with the about 10' X 20' cottage up about 3' above ground level and with foundations on each side for an about 12' X 20' lean-to attached to each side. The total building now is about 20' X 34' and has a very small loading dock in front of the former cottage. It needs minor work and siding but has an excellent roof and is generally quite solid. We always called it the "seed house". Currently the north part is a small garage which still houses my deceased father's rock collections (he was an active and well known amateur geologist). We recently started clearing it out. The former cottage section is just odd storage these days. The south part is currently a horse stall suitable for 2 horses that get along well.
The next older barn we refer to by the highly sophisticated name of "the back barn" just because it sits the farthest from the road. I also call it the east barn. A long gone old family friend was on the crew that put it up and we believe that was about 1900. It is all pinned timber frame and everything but the yellow pine ship-lap siding was sawed from sycamore here on the farm. It is in good shape except for the siding and is currently the home of our own 4 horses. We are slowly adding stalls and it will end up with 6 stalls. It is a pretty typical medium barn about 36' X 36' with most of it with a tall loft. It was all built at one time. The two older barns were not.
The two older barns were built in at least 3 stages each.
One is now the farm-shop but was used as a dairy barn for many years then as a hog farrowing operation for a time before we made it into a shop complete with overhead doors etc. It is about 36' X 50'. It is not showy but in good general condition except needing siding work. I should note that all of these barns have steel roofs.
The other old one I call "the west barn" just because it is across the road and about a 1/4 mile west of the house. It is about 36' X 60'. It is the one at risk due to condition. It does have a decent metal roof but the roof needs a small area patched. It has suffered some from boring beetle damage but mostly from poor support. Like a lot of old barns the post were sat on big field rocks which tend to sink or shift. A renter (before we acquired it) ran a lot of beef cattle in it without bedding them and the resulting deep soupy muck allowed many of the rocks to shift out of place badly. It was still OK but then a year or so ago the barn was hit with a micro-burst during a severe storm that moved one end about a foot to the north and the other end a few inches to the south. I currently have several chains and cables running diagonally from upper to lower points connected to come-along's holding it all in position and slowly tightening them to pull everything partly back into place or at least close. It currently houses some tractors and machinery and two horse stalls. We are going to get a load of concrete blocks and mortar in early May. I hope it doesn't get hit by another violent storm before I get it in better shape. The storm that racked it blew two flat-bed hay wagons 80' from where they were sitting.
We do not know how old the oldest part of those two oldest barns are. Indiana became a state in 1816. Our county seat of Shelbyville (which we sit up against now) was founded in 1822. There were a lot of early small farmsteads that have been gone for a long time. This small farm (105 acres) has about 6 different deeds where properties were shuffled about. We do know that two rooms of this house were originally built at a different location on the farm (was another farm then) around 1840 and then moved here about 1900. I believe that it can be safely assumed that basic small barns went up pretty early... The smallish oldest part of the barn that is now the farm shop may have also been moved to this location.
You will note from the dimensions of the foot-print of these barns that they are not really all that big by today's standards but they look big largely because of their height. The height was needed for hay storage. They also looked big next to small cabins. Today my house foot-print is about 40' X 80' but it doesn't look that big. It doesn't have a 1 1/2 story hayloft on top of it.
We shoot a lot of barns. We do not make any attempt to keep track of where they are at or the date etc. We just do it for fun. I plan to set up a separate web site for free wallpaper pics and it will have a barn section.
The barn in Ed's picture could easily be that old especially in his area.
We have 3 old barns on this farm, all needing some work and one in pretty bad shape but still repairable if I can get it fixed before it goes down in a storm. That one is on a property that was added to the farm much later than the main farm. It had almost no maintenance for a long time and what it had was superficial when what it needed was underpinning work.
Of course the single most important thing to "holding" a barn is a good roof. They can survive a lot of problems as long as the roof is good.
The very term "barn" can be construed to include several different kinds of buildings. Merriam Webster says: "A usually large building for the storage of farm products or feed and usually for the housing of farm animals or farm equipment". Based on that definition I have four large barns and one small one. I tend to call some barns and some tool-sheds. That small barn is a story all by itself...
The biggest enemy of the old barns is the high cost of doing any kind of repair work on them and the high cost (especially of hired labor) to update them to modern uses. Other threats are lightning, vandals, arsonist and extreme age as well as periods of tough times in farming...
The newest "barn" I usually call "the tool shed" is about 30' X 64' and is a tall 1 story building. It went up in 1959. I am working on it now converting it into a stable which will start with 5 stalls and a fair sized common area. If boarding goes well we will add a 12' X 64' addition to the other side and add 5 more stalls.
The small barn came about in 1951 when my father had a rental fishing cottage that he and his uncle built on a previous farm moved to this farm when he bought it. He laid a concrete block foundation with the about 10' X 20' cottage up about 3' above ground level and with foundations on each side for an about 12' X 20' lean-to attached to each side. The total building now is about 20' X 34' and has a very small loading dock in front of the former cottage. It needs minor work and siding but has an excellent roof and is generally quite solid. We always called it the "seed house". Currently the north part is a small garage which still houses my deceased father's rock collections (he was an active and well known amateur geologist). We recently started clearing it out. The former cottage section is just odd storage these days. The south part is currently a horse stall suitable for 2 horses that get along well.
The next older barn we refer to by the highly sophisticated name of "the back barn" just because it sits the farthest from the road. I also call it the east barn. A long gone old family friend was on the crew that put it up and we believe that was about 1900. It is all pinned timber frame and everything but the yellow pine ship-lap siding was sawed from sycamore here on the farm. It is in good shape except for the siding and is currently the home of our own 4 horses. We are slowly adding stalls and it will end up with 6 stalls. It is a pretty typical medium barn about 36' X 36' with most of it with a tall loft. It was all built at one time. The two older barns were not.
The two older barns were built in at least 3 stages each.
One is now the farm-shop but was used as a dairy barn for many years then as a hog farrowing operation for a time before we made it into a shop complete with overhead doors etc. It is about 36' X 50'. It is not showy but in good general condition except needing siding work. I should note that all of these barns have steel roofs.
The other old one I call "the west barn" just because it is across the road and about a 1/4 mile west of the house. It is about 36' X 60'. It is the one at risk due to condition. It does have a decent metal roof but the roof needs a small area patched. It has suffered some from boring beetle damage but mostly from poor support. Like a lot of old barns the post were sat on big field rocks which tend to sink or shift. A renter (before we acquired it) ran a lot of beef cattle in it without bedding them and the resulting deep soupy muck allowed many of the rocks to shift out of place badly. It was still OK but then a year or so ago the barn was hit with a micro-burst during a severe storm that moved one end about a foot to the north and the other end a few inches to the south. I currently have several chains and cables running diagonally from upper to lower points connected to come-along's holding it all in position and slowly tightening them to pull everything partly back into place or at least close. It currently houses some tractors and machinery and two horse stalls. We are going to get a load of concrete blocks and mortar in early May. I hope it doesn't get hit by another violent storm before I get it in better shape. The storm that racked it blew two flat-bed hay wagons 80' from where they were sitting.
We do not know how old the oldest part of those two oldest barns are. Indiana became a state in 1816. Our county seat of Shelbyville (which we sit up against now) was founded in 1822. There were a lot of early small farmsteads that have been gone for a long time. This small farm (105 acres) has about 6 different deeds where properties were shuffled about. We do know that two rooms of this house were originally built at a different location on the farm (was another farm then) around 1840 and then moved here about 1900. I believe that it can be safely assumed that basic small barns went up pretty early... The smallish oldest part of the barn that is now the farm shop may have also been moved to this location.
You will note from the dimensions of the foot-print of these barns that they are not really all that big by today's standards but they look big largely because of their height. The height was needed for hay storage. They also looked big next to small cabins. Today my house foot-print is about 40' X 80' but it doesn't look that big. It doesn't have a 1 1/2 story hayloft on top of it.
--
farmer
Francis Robinson
I did not equip with Shopsmiths in spite of the setups but because of them.
1 1988 - Mark V 510 (bought new), 4 Poly vee 1 1/8th HP Mark V's, Mark VII, 1 Mark V Mini, 1 Frankensmith, 1 10-ER, 1 Mark V Push-me-Pull-me Drillpress, SS bandsaw, belt sander, jointer, jigsaw, shaper attach, mortising attach, TS-3650 Rigid tablesaw, RAS, 6" long bed jointer, Foley/Belsaw Planer/molder/ripsaw, 1" sander, oscillating spindle/belt sander, Scroll saw, Woodmizer sawmill
farmer
Francis Robinson
I did not equip with Shopsmiths in spite of the setups but because of them.
1 1988 - Mark V 510 (bought new), 4 Poly vee 1 1/8th HP Mark V's, Mark VII, 1 Mark V Mini, 1 Frankensmith, 1 10-ER, 1 Mark V Push-me-Pull-me Drillpress, SS bandsaw, belt sander, jointer, jigsaw, shaper attach, mortising attach, TS-3650 Rigid tablesaw, RAS, 6" long bed jointer, Foley/Belsaw Planer/molder/ripsaw, 1" sander, oscillating spindle/belt sander, Scroll saw, Woodmizer sawmill
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brad_nalor
- Gold Member
- Posts: 131
- Joined: Thu Oct 20, 2011 1:51 am
On another family property, ours is sadly going. Many, many stories from purpose, hay storage, cows in the lower barn to the little attached milk house to fun times (barn dance parties, roller skating, bands). Silo is also still up. (Would ignite and drop the big boomers in there when empty!)
For sometime, the trend was others buying up barns for the reclaimed timbers. I'm guessing a barn like your photo would go for $12k today.
Other barn talk: Twenty years ago, sis' and bro-in-law purchased a barn, moved it in whole to settle on a few acres just a mile from its original place! Then, they converted it to a home. Wonderful place, rustic but with modern touch and convenience. Fireplaces, neat lofts, big windows, split half front door (like in the Mr. Ed old TV show)... was neat but later sold it.
For sometime, the trend was others buying up barns for the reclaimed timbers. I'm guessing a barn like your photo would go for $12k today.
Other barn talk: Twenty years ago, sis' and bro-in-law purchased a barn, moved it in whole to settle on a few acres just a mile from its original place! Then, they converted it to a home. Wonderful place, rustic but with modern touch and convenience. Fireplaces, neat lofts, big windows, split half front door (like in the Mr. Ed old TV show)... was neat but later sold it.