Issues → January/February 2009 → Home & Garden →
Vermont: The Matter of an Old Barn
Is it your duty to repair it? Even if you don't need a barn?
by Castle Jr. Freeman
One of the neighbors has built himself a nice new barn. He did it between noon and quitting time last Tuesday. Well, not really: The work took a bit longer than that, and he had some help. But his barn did seem fairly to spring up. The slab was down in a day or two; the wall bays and roof trusses, preassembled, came in on a flatbed truck and were installed by a crane. The roof deck, siding, and clapboards went on with the help of a team of men wielding pneumatic nail guns. For a day the job site sounded like Antietam with air rifles. Now the nailers are finished, and the neighbor's barn is, practically, a done deal--not in an afternoon, to be sure, but not wasting any time, either.
Such, today, is our way of barn building in Vermont, it seems; and, really, to do the job in any other way makes little sense. A barn is a barn. It is not a monument, it is not an architectural creation. A barn is not a work of art or, if it is, it is so by accident, because of its age and because of its demonstration of antique skills, materials, tools, and labor. In their time, the Vermont barns of the 18th and 19th centuries didn't appear to grow up overnight. Their builders weren't heavy-equipment operators or technicians. The old barns were designed by farmer-architects and raised by farmer-artisans who possessed a level of skill--probably fairly common at the time--that today is neither enjoyed nor even aspired to by more than a very few.
Our Vermont ancestors, when they turned their hands to practical building, were clever old boys. They had a good eye, and the barns they made, if they aren't quite works of art, look today like something pretty close to it.
Which is exactly my predicament.
I, too, own a barn; indeed, mine is about the same size as my neighbor's: 30 by 40 feet, more or less. There the resemblance ends, however. The neighbor's barn is brand-new. Mine was built before 1800 (nobody knows the year). The neighbor's barn is bright and clean. Mine is a dank, dark cavern of decay. The neighbor's barn is straight and plumb. Mine is racked and buckled, barely hanging on to verticality, like an ill-pitched tent in a high wind. Geometrically a simple structure as built, it now leans in enough different directions to puzzle Euclid himself.
And yet, despite its wrecked condition, the barn still has a charm of its own, offering to the eye a plain, unfussy rightness, a modest perfection that we may as well call beauty. It is constructed of foot-thick timbers of a hard, heavy wood--chestnut, I think. These timbers look to have been cut clean and sharp as though by a sawmill, but in fact they were squared by hand with a broadaxe. They're put together by mortise-and-tenon joints, secured with long wooden pegs and braced near their tops by smaller diagonal members. This arrangement produces a series of lofty triangles; repeated by the hewn-timber rafters of the roof, they give the barn's interior a cathedral-like perspective. They also give the entire structure great strength.
How great is evident in the barn's durability. As far as I know, it hasn't been used for any real agricultural purpose since the 1920s, when this place was last farmed. Since then it has had only the repair and maintenance that I've been able to give it--precious little. The barn's sills are ripp led or rotted away altogether. Its roof is gapped. Parts of its board siding have fallen away. Some of its timbers are separating at their joints, wrenching free of their braces. In short, the building is collapsing.
Reader Comments
Comment from Robb Riemer on January 8, 2009
Castle needs to let go! Sell the charming old wood which is in high demand to someone who will enjoy its beauty and put it to wonderful use. To let it rot and decay is not only selfish but shortsighted in saving the harvest of more trees. To sit and let it become dinner for insects and bacteria is irrational!!!
Think beyond yourself Castle!!!!
Comment from Steve Caporiccio on January 9, 2009
I can't believe Mr. Freeman would rather burn up all of that beautiful wood before he would sell it. If he sold the wood others can share in the beauty and history of his barn. It doesn't all go to wealthy clients of designers. I'm a retired teacher living in Delaware and recently bought some recycled barn wood from an Amish craftsman who finishes furniture made from the recycled wood. He got the wood from an old barn being dismantled in New Jersey. The furniture is beautiful and affordable and doesn't go to the Hamptons! I plan on making a kitchen table with my wood. Burning it up or letting it rot away would be such a shame. Sentiment should forbid him wasting that wood!!
Comment from on January 15, 2009
Mr. Freeman, if you decide to salvage your barn (I agree with Robb Riemer's comment that it is a waste on many fronts to let it rot), consider contacting Tom at the Old Wood Workshop located in Pomfret, CT (oldwoodworkshop.com) or any number of other salvage companies (many of which are small, family owned & run like ours). You would support a "green" business and make a potential buyer of your wood happy. You can't believe how many people would treasure what you have. If you can't save it, consider sharing it.
Comment from ROSE OLTMANN on January 23, 2009
I went through your exact feelings when I went into my old barn last fall and found the results of a leaking roof. My son found two carpenters who fixed the leaks and reinforced a wing, added raw siding in spots, and rebuilt that center beam that holds the high roof. The barn again has a proud look about it. My barn is a "catch all". It, too, hasn't seen any farm activity since way when. Years ago it was suggested to sell it for salvage but I had no idea who or where then. I now think perhaps I should have and would now not have this large blank space in my check balance. Oh, well. The building is again tight and secure.
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