Barn lectures feature work at Garfield Farm Museum
On Saturday, Oct. 20, Garfield Farm Museum in Campton Hills will offer the "Barns 101" and "Barns 201" lectures at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m.
David Bauer, museum special projects director, is the lecturer. This year's restoration of the museum's massive 1906 dairy barn and 1913 silo will be highlighted. Attendees will have a chance to see the work in progress after the lectures.
Just as the first log houses that occupied early Illinois are a rare sight today, wooden barns that defined farming in the 19th and 20th century will not survive the 21st century.
"Barns 101" will focus on barn terminology, their European antecedents, the evolution of the American barn, roof types, and modern barns, which will be followed by a tour of the museum's barns until noon.
It helps to have attended the morning session to fully enjoy "Barns 201" at 1 p.m., as methods for dating a barn, mortise and tenon techniques, truss designs, barn alterations, timber framing vs. plank and balloon framing, and silos will be discussed, followed by a tour of the barns.
This is the last generation that will have known barns as part of the rural landscape. With the changes in agriculture, most historic barns no longer meet the size needs of large machinery or large livestock herds on present day farms.
As a result, forces of nature, consolidation of small farms into large farms, economics, and the passage of time are totally eliminating what was once such a dominate feature of the American countryside.
However, museums, inveterate barn lovers, and adapting barns for homes and businesses offer a chance that more might survive their initial construction purpose.
The lectures are $6 per person, per lecture. Reservations can be made by contacting the museum at (630) 584-8485 or info@garfieldfarm.org.
Garfield Farm Museum is a 375-acre, historically intact former 1840s Illinois prairie farmstead and teamster inn that volunteers and donors are preserving as an 1840s living history museum. The museum is on Garfield Road, off Route 38, five miles west of Geneva.
Visit www.garfieldfarm.org or www.facebook.com/GarfieldFarmMuseum/.