Sunday, March 4, 2012

A U T H O R ' S    N O T E :
A friend recently sent me a link to an article about photographing and preserving old barns. Since I have been photographing and touting old barns for several years, I am glad to see that others realize what historic treasures these sometimes crumbling structures are. Turns out, there's even a National Barn Alliance. All of which leads me to drag out a barn archive story for this week.
 
Back in July 2010, I found a gem of a barn and was granted permission to crawl around it to my heart's content. I was able to shoot the barn in detail inside and out, a rare pleasure to a barn interloper like me. Most of the time, I just walk in and hope no one objects. Take a look at a barn whose builder was about 10-years-old at the end of the War Between the States.
 
Also be sure and visit Weekly Grist for the Eyes and Mind. And see our Weekly Grist Gallery with 20 pictures of the barn inside and out. There is a second gallery which also includes black and whites of the old barn. It is a Flash gallery so our Macintosh friends will not be able to see it.
 
Thanks,
 
Joe

Originally Published on Sunday, July 4, 2010

Occasionally, I do not reveal where a photo subject is located or who the owner might be, which is the case today. This old barn is owned by an elderly couple in a remote area. Inside are some highly desirable items — and they would like to keep them on the premises. So their names are Shirley and Ted and they live in Arkansas. You understand I'm sure.

Shirley's grandfather, the builder of the barn, was six years old during the War Between the States. He told her he remembered hearing the cannons in a battle not far from where she lives now. Shirley figures the barn was built in the late 1800s but is not for sure. It has survived well, at least on one end. Could be that a strategic re-roofing job at some time contributed to the longevity of the structure.

The barn is spacious inside. At one time the upper part was floored for storing hay. As with most barns, one side was for feed storage and one side was for stables. In this case, the corn crib and other storage areas were on the right of the picture. The log structure hints at the age.

The family owned a nice chunk of acreage in the area and raised cash crops of corn and cotton plus subsistence crops for family and livestock. This old barn was the epicenter of those noble agrarian pursuits. It was designed as a "horse-barn." The front entrance door was tall enough to admit a man on a horse. The barn, however, was not an exclusive hostelry for horses. Mules, the wagon, and plow pullers shared these quarters. In that day and time, a nice stable of mules was necessary for farming success.

The barn is now just a few feet from the highway right-of-way. When it was built, what is now the highway was not much more than a dirt road. Not in his wildest dreams did Shirley's grandfather ever imagine that his barn would overlook a hard surfaced highway with vehicles blazing by.

Originally, the family residence was adjacent to the barn. It is now across the highway from the barn. There have been members of Shirley's family residing on this property since the 1800s. Not many families can lay claim to such residential heritage. Ted and Shirley are friendly people who are happy with who they are and glad to tell others about where they came from. And they have a very cool barn.

N O T E S:  
NIkon D300, tripod mounted, ISO 200, Sigma 10-20 f4-5.6 EX DC HSM, side shot 1/400@f10 and the inside shot 1/13@f4; front shot Nikkor VR 70-400mm f4.5-5.6 D ED, 1/320@f9.

THE ADVENTURE
OF THIS BARN
continues on our blog,
Weekly Grist
for the Eyes and Mind.
See several more shots
of the barn, plus a couple
of cool old churches and some surprise stuff. Click here to go there. Be sure and see the link at the bottom of the blog page to our weekly high resolution gallery.

Click the jump wings to see the previous Photo of the Week.

Click the camera for an index to every Photo of the Week.

Most of the time, there is more to the Photo of the Week story than can be told in an essay. And most of the time there are more pictures to be seen. Presuming that some folk will enjoy being privy to this trove of information, I have created a blog, “Weekly Grist for the Eyes and Mind,” where I am showing and telling “the rest of the story." There are also some blatantly commercial mentions of some of the things we do to earn our beans and taters. Click on the Weekly Grist logo and go to the blog.  — J. D.