. Bright Meadow Farms: Barns falling down

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Barns falling down

I drove to Columbus today for a dental appointment with a specialist. I went the back roads for about half the trip, and for some reason today I noticed so many of the barns that are falling down along the roadside. Roofs are caved in, rusty, or blown off, paint faded or entirely gone, siding is missing, walls leaning crazily. Some appeared to be empty but others had "stuff" in them.

By comparison I noticed a number of the Amish barns, which were either new contstruction, or well-maintained and painted white with green roofs. You can tell the Amish farms a few different ways - by the buggies parked in front; by the lack of TV antennas or satellite dishes or electrical lines running to the house, or by the typical clothing hung on the wash line.

I also noticed there aren't many new "bank" style barns, many of the newer barns were metal with peaked roof construction, not the old-fashioned gambrel style roof.

It would be an interesting project to photograph the old barns and find out some of their history, if the owners were willing.

While in Columbus I stopped an visited a bit with my sister. Always love to see her and my brother-in-law, and their two beautiful bouncing baby boys!

1 comment:

Aunt Jo said...

I love old barns and old homestead houses. There are so many dotted across Oklahoma. I have pictures of quite a few of them and they may well be the last record for some of those places.