Old Barns Live On In Us

Across the Fence #532

Beneath the cold, frozen ground, the remains of the old barn lie undisturbed. Time and nature will eventually finish what man began. The large, wood timbers, wood siding and roof, will begin to rot and crumble, and return to the earth. The old stanchions and piping, the manure carrier track, milk cooler, and battered cupola that stood atop the barn, will eventually rust and deteriorate too. Only the large stones from the foundation and the silo staves will live on. Perhaps one day in the distant future someone will be digging a foundation and come across the remains of the old barn. They’ll wonder what structure was once located on this spot and what it looked like. Will they also wonder what the people were like who occupied this area and what they did here?

Those thoughts crossed my mind this week as I walked by the final resting place of the old barn, as I do almost every day. The house of my childhood also rests peacefully below the frozen ground, but that’s a story for another day. As I thought about the old timber frame barn, I was hit with a wave of nostalgia for a way of life that is gone from this farm and from so many farms in the country.

I wrote about the passing of our old barn seven years ago. I said, “The Old Barn, exact age unknown (100+ years), of rural Westby, passed into obscurity on June 2, 2008. The end came after a long and courageous battle against all the elements Mother Nature could throw at it over the years. Obsolescence and lack of maintenance are the enemies of old barns. They’ve become an endangered species. This old barn finally succumbed to the infirmities of old age and modern farming technology. It had outlived its usefulness.” 

That was a sad day. It was like witnessing a death in the family. The death of every old barn is a sad occasion. As each one falls, an important part of the rural landscape disappears and can never be replaced. That old barn has been gone and silent for seven years now, but it was once the hub of this farm and filled with life and activity. Stop for a moment, listen quietly, and you may be able to hear it come to life again in the attic of your memory bank, just as I did earlier this week. I know many of you have these same sounds, images, and smells, stored away.

The old barn, silo, and milk house in its final days. 

   

A symphony of sights and sounds envelops the barn. I see cows in the stanchions waiting to be milked, their tails swishing at the pesky flies of summer. I hear the clanging of the stanchions as they stretch their necks trying to steal their neighbor’s feed or hay. I smell the sweet odor of fresh silage. I see the barn cats milling around the overturned milk can lid, waiting for the meal of warm, fresh milk they know is coming. I hear the noisy motor that provides the suction for the milking machines. I smell the disinfectant in the water used to clean the cow’s teats. I hear the soft mooing of a cow; the voices of hungry calves; the clanking of milk pails; the banging of a milk can lid against another lid to remove a cover that was on too tight. I see barn swallows darting in and out through the open doors as they bring food to their newborns, huddled safely in nests affixed to the ceiling beams. All this in accompaniment to country music from the local radio station playing in the background.

One thing that stands out in my memory is the warm intimacy I found in that small barn that held 22 cows. This was especially true on cold, winter nights when the wind was howling outside and snow was flying. The warmth from the cows as we milked them provided a safe haven from the harsh world outside the stone walls of the barn. The low-light conditions provided by one, exposed light bulb in the center of the barn, added to the intimacy.

I also smell cured tobacco when I think of the barn. That’s where we stripped our tobacco each winter. Along with the smell of tobacco is the aroma of fresh-brewed coffee when Ma would bring lunch to the strippers in the barn each day.

The haymow was a great place to spend a rainy day playing, as the rain beat upon the roof and tin cupola on top of the barn. I’ve mentioned in other stories the tunnels we built with the bales, how we pretended we were paratroopers and jumped off the cross beams into loose hay piles below, played Tarzan while swinging on the hay rope, and climbed up the rope to the cupola and crawled inside. In the evening the haymow was a spooky place where our only source of light was a flashlight. You never knew what creature waited in the shadows to jump out and grab you as you threw the hay bales down the chute.

The sights, sounds, and smells associated with old barns rekindle so many memories in us. As I pass by the final resting place of our old barn, it will always be alive in spirit as long as those of us, who spent time there, still walk upon this earth.

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