Timber frame barn tour, lecture at Garfield Farm
Garfield Farm Museum will present a Timber Frame Barn Restoration Lecture and Tour at 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 14.
The event will focus on the museum's 1842 threshing barn that is undergoing restoration. Participants will be able to see the process of restoring a timber frame barn. The afternoon speakers and guides will be David Bauer, museum special projects manager; restorationist Rick Collins of Trillium Dell Timberworks of Knoxville, Illinois, and museum executive director Jerome Johnson. Tour of the barn, pointing out its history, construction and restoration techniques.
The barn will have the newly installed restored framing that was removed sometime in the 20th century when the barn was moved from its second building site to its present and converted to a machine storage shed with corncribs. The barn will have been lowered down on its restored and reconstructed sills but the steel used to raise the barn off its foundation will still be in place to demonstrate the methodology.
This is an intermediate stage in the barn's complete restoration as once the steel and its cribbing are removed, the floor joists and threshing floor will be installed. Later this spring the barn will be resided and historically appropriate doors installed.
The restoration is a 38-year old goal since the museum's founding by the late Elva Garfield and Eve S. Johnson. More than 500 donors have contributed funds including the Community Foundation of the Fox River Valley and the Kane County Riverboat Fund, which helped secured a $115,000 challenge grant from the Jeffris Family Foundation of Janesville, Wisconsin.
Participants will first meet at the museum's Atwell Burr House Visitors Center for the lecture. Appropriate outdoor clothing and shoes are encouraged for the tour of the barn. Refreshments will be served. Space is limited. There is a $15 fee and to reserve a space call (630) 584-8485 or email info@garfieldfarm.org.
Garfield Farm Museum is five miles west of Geneva, Route 38 on Garfield Road in Campton Hills.