It is unfortunate that I never got a roundtuit and took photos of the construction of the 'hay loft' portion of the barn from the interior because the inherent problems of its design would be evident.
First a bit of history, some conjecture on the unknowns based on what we do know, and probably a whole lot of possibly extraneous 'stuff'. We know that the original builder on this property was here in 1878 because in that year he chiseled his name and the year into the stone of a watering trough up near the house. We know that the original house, probably built somewhere around that date, and the barn share the same stonework. The barn walls and the basement walls of the house are both of mortared field stone of nominal 12-14 inches thickness. The original house burned in the late 1920's. The house was rebuilt on the original foundation. It seems that all the house burned except for what is now the back part of the kitchen (about 10' x 12') which way back when was a porch/possible summer kitchen that was built over a continuation of the basement excavation. (Of course not knowing, but assuming that the basement was excavated before a building was erected on top of the basement 'walls' which serve as the foundation to the structure..) The reasoning for this statement is the fact that the floor 'joists' for this back portion of the present kitchen (possible previous porch) are whole bark-on white birch tree trunks while the 'rebuilt' portion of the house is standard 2x12's.
Back to the barn. It is unknown whether the barn was originally the size of the present remaining footprint or whether it was enlarged over the years. The visible stone work only lightly suggests that there was an extension on the rear, but without, probably, a structural engineer or such to examine it more closely (and possibly determine if there is a difference in mortar from 1878 and a possible later batch) visually it is a coin toss. What we do know for sure is that the top part of the barn that was standing when we moved here most certainly did not date to the 1870's. Best guess is that the original barn was 'flattoped' and a new, enlarged hay loft portion built. The construction was 2x12's - finished, not rough sawed as you would think if from 1870's. The earliest aerial photo I can find for here dating from 1956 shows the barn as it was when we first saw it (although with a good roof ;-) so the rebuild of the barn predates that.
Whoever built the 'new' barn was the one who doomed it to collapse. There were no 'truss' like structures, no 'x' shapes, no 'triangle' constructions - you know, all those things that provide rigidity.. The roof beams went up and fastened to a center ridge beam, every one of 'em up 'n over.. with no cross bracing. As you can imagine, this structure was unstable early on. The dates of the 'fixes' are unknown but there were attempts after construction was completed (and probably when the barn began to - lean ;-) to add some stability. BUT they did not ever add any crossbracing, the one thing that probably would have arrested (but not corrected) the leaning tower of Barn. Instead they resorted to 1/2" cable. You can see one of them in the photo in #2619. Up in the peak of the standing end you will notice a slightly different color board with a horizontal dark line across it. That is a cable that passed through the siding, wrapped around this board and the interior backing beam, back through the siding, and was crosby clamped to itself. The other end of this 1/2" cable penetrated the hay loft floor at approximately the midpoint of he barn and was wrapped around the floor joists of the loft floor/lower level 'ceiling' and again secured with crosby clamps. This was probably done because the 'front' of the barn (the view in the photo) had developed a noticeable lean toward the parking lot, er, drive.. (Note in the photo that the front is no longer leaning toward the parking lot, but towards the rear of the barn because of the debris resting on this cable pulling the front wall back..)
The second 'fix' that was applied (again, the exact chronology is unknown - 'first' and 'second' merely denote the order of mention) was to take another length of 1/2" cable, climb to the very top of the interior peak, drill three holes through the ridge rafter (which was triple 2x12's), loop the cable through these three holes and crosby it to itself at the peak. They then took the other end of the cable, ran it out the rear hay loft door, extended it out to a large oak tree and wrapped/crosby fastened it to the tree.
In all probability there was no maintenance done on the barn once the last dairy farmer sold it at least thirty and maybe more years ago. For a time a lawyer owned the property, and he converted the milk house (also gambrel roofed and field stone walled) into his office. It looks like it is circa 1870's because the floor joists for the second floor are rough sawed (don't quite look hewn but could be if the 'axeman' was into aesthetics ;) and thus provides further determination that the barn as we first saw it was not original.
The house is beautiful, but it has been maintained with the same amount of deferred maintenance that the other structures have...
There's a lot that I would be doing with this place if I owned it, but not too much I am willing to do for the benefit of a landlord who doesn't seem to care if the place falls down..
When I hit that bazillion dollar lotto and buy the place I'll invite you out for a consultation... ;-) (If you can make it to PA it's only a short ride from there ;-)
I’d be pleased to see the property under any circumstances, but it wouldn’t have much meaning unless someone wants to invest some TLC.
I could almost imagine getting a FReeper work crew together. I already have some names circling around.
I’m not very far away, and I do know how to drive.