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Server Time:
2024-05-06 19:44:01
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 Drawbar
Location: Maine
Gender: Male
 |  | Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
< on 1/5/2012 9:59 PM >
|  | | | I know this is a site about Urban Exploration, but for some of us rural people, we like the farms too and get to them often. Maybe not so much anymore. We are losing barns in this country at a staggering rate.
My farm here in Maine lost our 200 year old, 5 story post and beam barn in 1994 due to the cost of repairing such a large structure. At one time it was the largest chicken house in the county, holding 75,000 broilers. The fate of our barn is nothing unique to our farm family (We have been here since 1757...and I am a 9th generation sheep farmer), Iowa figures it loses 1000 historic barns per year alone!
Since 2007, the US Dept of Agriculture conducts a farm census and asks "Do you have any barns on your farm built before 1960?" 664,264 farms said yes...and that only included large commercial farms!! Here in New England that is a very small percentage of people who own old barns!!
Here is the break down of the top 10 states with old barns...
Texas=51,236
Missouri=36,007
Wisconsin=35,386
Kentucky=35,224
Iowa=34,224
Ohio=33,76 2
Pennsylvania=29,321
Tennessee=27,555
Minnesota=27,165
Illinois=25,767
For Rural America, we are losing our heritage by losing these barns. At the same time, we are losing our churches too. My town (700 people) lost its church to fire this week. It was more than our church, it was our New England charm identity!
I have always said true Urban Explorers are providing a great service to our country...by documenting some of these old places via photographs. Get out there and photograph these barns (and churches) before they are gone!
[last edit 1/5/2012 10:01 PM by Drawbar - edited 1 times]
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OwlsFlight
    
Location: Ehn Jay
One foot in the grave, the other on a banana peel
| |  | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 1 on 1/6/2012 12:28 AM >
| | | | Just crazy. I know the town that I live in used to be 90% farms back in the day. It's probably 45%-40% now because of all the development. And with the farms go the barns and everything else. But unfortunately in a large part of NJ, buildable land was/is worth more than fruits and vegetables in the Garden State.
Exploring the distance between points A & B. |
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Passenger
Gender: Female
What would you do if your life exceeds your dreams?
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 2 on 1/6/2012 12:32 AM >
| | | | Thanks for the info, I love old barns and stop and photograph them and chance I get! They are America!!! Sorry to hear about your barn...
What would you do if your life exceeds your dreams? |
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Steed
   
Location: Edmonton/Seoul
Gender: Male
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Race Traitor
| | | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 3 on 1/6/2012 1:49 AM >
| | | | We went through the same thing in western Canada with grain elevators. A few were protected as heritage sites, but for the post part it was too little too late.
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Audacious
Location: Twin Cities, Minnesota
Gender: Male
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 4 on 1/6/2012 2:21 AM >
| | | | Barns are fascinating! If I'm ever back home I'll throw up some pictures on this thread of a disused round barn in South Dakota that is ANCIENT! I'm a city guy, but that barn was so effin cool to explore.
Proud supporter of the pullout method |
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Weirdlig
Gender: Female
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 5 on 1/6/2012 2:34 AM >
| | | | I'm surprised New Hampshire isn't on the list, some towns around here are just barns with land between them. Most of them have a Widow's Watch at the top, a small boxed-in window room where the wives of civil war soliders had a seat to watch for their returning family.
I've only explored two barns so far since most of them, abandoned or not, are in someone's yard. Each had a Widow's Watch but I only got into one of them...a sleeping raccoon woke up inside the other above my head and I said fuck it.
http://www.flickr....irdlingphotography |
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Skye_Ann
Location: Kitchener, Ontario
Gender: Female
I seem to have Irritable Owl Syndrome...
| | | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 6 on 1/6/2012 2:36 AM >
| | | | I know what you mean... I always photograph old buildings in order to "preserve" them in the easiest way possible... It's not actually going to save those old beauts - but it keeps some part of them alive. 
My Blog; https://historyindecay.blogspot.com/ |
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Liska
Location: Western Massachusetts
Gender: Female
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 7 on 1/6/2012 2:43 AM >
| | | | Well said- and it's truly a shame. My grandparents have an old farm/barn that they've owned all their lives in Michigan- and i've photographed it year by year to watch it collapse and die (both have passed on; my uncle owns it, and gave it a new roof, but it's still in really rough shape).
It's heartbreaking- barns have their own lovely appeal!
I'm sorry about your barn  Here's ours, if you want to take a gander:
http://www.flickr....72157627565395896/
[last edit 1/6/2012 2:44 AM by Liska - edited 2 times]
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heinrick
Location: Cascadia
Gender: Male
| | | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 8 on 1/6/2012 3:47 AM >
| | | | Still proudly using ours every season (since 1907):
Unfortunately, much of the most productive farmland in the US is being paved over with suburban development. People wonder about rising food costs—it's partly because farms are being pushed farther and farther from ideal locations. Hopefully, with cheap property costs and realty surplus, farmers will be able to buy back these lands.
Some day, I hope to retire on the D.H. Day farm in northern Michigan:
http://www.nps.gov...culture/dkhday.htm
[last edit 1/6/2012 6:19 AM by heinrick - edited 1 times]
http://www.flickr.com/photos/heinrick05/ |
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Samurai
 
Vehicular Lord Rick
Location: northeastern New York
No matter where you go, there you are...
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 10 on 1/6/2012 7:30 AM >
| | | | Barns over in Vermont are a bright spot as urbanites are converting them into homes. Here in New York, most barns just rot and fall in. Very few, if any, are salvaged.
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Sceptic
Location: In the Dreams of a City that Never Sleeps
Gender: Male
120
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 11 on 1/6/2012 2:17 PM >
| | | | Posted by Samurai
Barns over in Vermont are a bright spot as urbanites are converting them into homes. Here in New York, most barns just rot and fall in. Very few, if any, are salvaged.
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QFT
"Instinctive forces influence the activity of consciousness. Whether that influence is for better or for worse depends upon the actual contents of the unconscious." |
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Drawbar
Location: Maine
Gender: Male
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 12 on 1/6/2012 4:52 PM >
| | | | The loss of barns is indeed sad. Our barn was unique, but the thing is, in looking through my photos, and the photos of my Grandmother and everyone else, no one took pictures of it because at that time, we just thought that it would always be there.
Owls Flight: Here in Maine in 1900 the land consisted of 90% farmland and 10% forest. Now just over a 100 years later it is 90% forest and 10% farmland. What a change in just over 100 years. That is changing though. With the loss of paper mills all over the state, and sawn lumber being imported from Canada cheaper than we can produce it here, forest land is a losing proposition. Myself I have cleared 20 more acres from forest into field and have many more acres to go, while there are others in town doing the same thing. Farmland is becoming valuable again!
Weirdling: I know just what you mean. My wife is from NH as well, near Littleton, (after having 2 Maine wives, I figured if I wanted a lasting marriage I had better import one) and there are some really nice barns up there. I never realized they had Widow Watches though. In my area of Maine, we have Widow Walks, but not on the barns, but on the houses overlooking the sea. These we for the wives looking for their sea faring husbands to return from their treks. At one time Searsport Maine had the highest capita of sea captains in the world, and that town is dotted with unique mansions
Samurai: There was a movement in the 1980's to use "old barn boards" in the interior of chic houses to use as a recycled building material, but as many unsuspecting urbanites transplanted found out too late, if barn boards came from barns where animals were kept, these hovels saturated the wood with the ammonia of urine and poo. When these boards were warmed in the winter with heat they emitted a smell that was less than present and could never be bleached out. The only way to get rid of the smell was to get rid of the wood..a hard lesson to learn. Wood gleaned from other areas of the barn however were fine!
Thanks for all the responses, I actually did not think I would get any let alone so many, so quick. Thanks for all the replies!
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Tupsumato
Location: Finland
Gender: Male
How close can you go?
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 13 on 1/8/2012 11:06 AM >
| | | | If the barns disappear, where will the farm kids of tomorrow have sex?
All information and details given in good faith but not guaranteed! |
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Samurai
Vehicular Lord Rick
Location: northeastern New York
No matter where you go, there you are...
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 14 on 1/8/2012 11:58 AM >
| | | | Posted by Tupsumato
If the barns disappear, where will the farm kids of tomorrow have sex?
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tractors?
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mowthelawn
Location: last one out of michigan please turn off the lights
Gender: Male
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 15 on 1/9/2012 1:49 AM >
| | | | Near as I can tell my barn is 122 years old. Every day I walk in it I am amazed it was built without CAD drawings, power tools, a crane, or building permits. Too bad some of the crap built today won't have 1/4 of that productive life. Although it is not used for livestock or hay anymore my barn is still a valuable part of my farm.
Anyone ever notice the hex near the peak of most barns?
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mowthelawn
Location: last one out of michigan please turn off the lights
Gender: Male
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 16 on 1/9/2012 1:52 AM >
| | | | http://www.thumboctagonbarn.org/
A very beautiful barn museum near me. Well worth the drive if you are in the area
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Otaku
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 18 on 1/9/2012 5:23 AM >
| | | | I want to buy an old farm with an old barn and sell off or lease the land for farmers to work. I've never been in an old barn that I didn't love.
PM me if you want to get join our board and get fit! |
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Drawbar
Location: Maine
Gender: Male
| | Re: Barns: American Heritage Being Lost at an Alarming Rate
<Reply # 19 on 1/9/2012 10:40 PM >
| | | | Posted by Neptune
Drawbar, what part of the state are you in? I live in the Sebago area.
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In the Unity Maine area.
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