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Amish Crew Breathes New Life into Old Miami County Barn
Several years ago, my dad and his three brothers reached a crossroads in their farming business: they needed more room to store their farm machinery.
As a history buff, I wasn’t too keen on their idea of putting up a prefabricated metal building on their farm on State Route 41 between Troy and Springfield where I live. I understood the need for more storage, but knew such a building would detract the appearance of the farmstead whose buildings date between the 1850s and the early 20th century.
So it was a relief when Dad decided instead to hire an Amish crew from Indiana to renovate the oldest and largest of the barns on the farm into a free-span building capable of holding modern farm equipment. The Amish, which made the two-hour trip one way every day by van, removed the old hay loft, fitted the barn with trusses, then cut off the lower portion of the old hand-hewn posts so that far more equipment could be stored in the barn.
Note the new trusses attached to the older (darker) beams; you can see where a vertical beam was lopped off so that the barn could house larger pieces of equipment, including the “bean header” in the foreground (a “bean header” is an implement mounted on the front of a combine that’s used to harvest soybeans).
Now the barn from that outside appears unchanged, and Dad and the uncles didn’t add to their property taxes by putting up a modern pole building.
Admittedly, from a historic preservation perspective, this solution was less than ideal, as it did compromise the barn’s integrity. Yet much of the workmanship that went into this barn, which dates back to at least 1858, can still be seen. And adaptation and resourcefulness are certainly virtues that have a long history on the American farm. Besides, when you consider how many old barns fall victim to neglect and development each year, it seems to me that one has to find some measure of satisfaction in seeing an old barn being put to good use again.
In today’s Dayton Daily News, I wrote about an old barn near Wapakoneta that was moved to Colorado to be used as a $720,000 home. I’m interested in your feedback on that article, and what your thoughts are on reusing what old barns remain here in the Miami Valley.
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Comments
By Riverdale Ghost
May 4, 2008 12:26 AM | Link to this
Some pictures would have helped. Other than that, for some city people you have distinguish between barn and something like “large shed.” See, we don’t exactly know what a barn is….By Ben Sutherly
May 4, 2008 2:33 PM | Link to this
Thanks for the suggestion. I’ve posted a photograph of the inside of the renovated barn here.By Riverdale Ghost
May 4, 2008 11:43 PM | Link to this
Well, now, see, I for one never really realized there was that much lumber in a barn….