Nothing at all unusual about phones in barns. There's computers in barns here in Iowa.
It's all about access to the outside world from the workplace.
Man. We are in the middle of moving to the country. Our pole barn is shabby by any standards... expecially these!! ;)
Computers in barns...wow. It's funny, my dad was the guy who invented the hardware tester for the first IBM PC and he has this dinky little and very old computer in the house he plays games on. He's in the sticks, kinda, and won't get a new computer or internet because it's long distance. Having a phone in the barn is the only way I can reach him. :)