This is a photo of our neighbors old barn structure across the street. At one time, every early home here in Woodward, had a small barn and fenced in area for a horse and a cow or two for milk. When you see early pictures of the town they are scattered all over town as the houses were not as crowded then.
I still have two sides of a foundation, on the corner of my lot, that reminds me more of the proportion of a model T garage, but the foundation is not filled in on the ends. So I assume it was a barn structure.
The shed you see here was used for a different purpose. The house that is on the property, which was built at the same time as our house, started out as an undertaker business, a funeral home. The shed has had newer doors put on it, but that was the shed to hold the carriages for the funeral business. In our early years as a country, the funeral home was used solely as a place of business and for embalming of bodies, but the body in the casket was taken back to the deceased person's home to lie in state in their own parlor. Some houses actually had casket doors built when new so the wider casket could be taken into the home, as the standard size doors were too small. The door was usually put right next to the corner of a side of a house, and not centered on the side of the house.
In my crazier moments of my life, I wanted to tear this building down for the owners, for the wood, and wanted to build a small barn out of the material on my property across the street. I have given up on that pipe dream for now. Their newer three car garage sits right next to this old one. Sadly the shed leans more each year.
I admire old weather barns all over the east coast and when it snowed, I realized that I had my own weathered building to enjoy.
5 comments:
What great story.
What a wonderful old building with such an interesting history...and right in front of you! The snow really adds to the charm.
Sunny :)
That was fascinating, you are full of wisdom and history!
When my kids were little we did get some old barn boards from a very old barn. Our walls in our dining roam were those old washed out weathered gray boards for years.
Sunny is right, the snow really makes that carriage house even more lovely.
Larry, Great post..I really enjoyed it..it is also interesting about the casket doors..
I love the look of old buildings..:)
I love old weathered barns....we have been lucky enough to have town people offer us the wood from a few they took down..we used it on the walls of our basement to make a "cabin room"...love the character of the wood. My husband has made frames out of some of the wood too, for my photography.LOVE them!
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