We have acquired an old Pennsylvania Dutch farm property in south central Pennsylvania that we will build a new house on. However, there is an existing barn and log home that we were told were from around 1840. The house gives me the creeps for some reason, but the barn is of interest. It is timber frame, and the inside roof rafters are logs. The barn has a bunch of later extensions that I'm not certain the age of, except some have cinder blocks at the base rather than the stone foundation of the original barn. To my totally untrained eye, the roof and inside frame look good, but some of the foundation beams of the extensions are either sagging or have cracked. The best preserved part however looks to be the original barn.

My partner would like to pull all of it down, and maybe it should be pulled down. There is nothing appealing about it from the outside; just white weatherbeaten planks. But when I went inside that barn and saw the framing I tell you what. It was what made me purchase that property as much as anything else about it (and it is a very beautiful 30+ acres). It made me buy and read all the PA barn books and skulk around unregistered on this forum for a good while to see what I could learn until surfacing now.

My question to this forum is what should be my approach to saving, or at least assessing this barn without making ignorant mistakes? I do have a company coming out to have a look at it, and like I told the guy, I would rather say I own a Pennsylvania bank barn than that I had one demolished. Thanks for any advice you could give me.

Until you have more expertise, I would suggest that you get more than one opinion or check carefully on references of any contractor/timber framer that you engage. Most framers that I know of are decent, honest folks but I have heard a few not so happy tales. There is a recent posting in this forum about a new frame with some questionable joint pegging techniques and it happens to be in southern PA. Rehab-ing an old barn can be an expensive endeavor and it would be a shame to see your money spent in-efficiently. If you can afford it, it would be wise to 'do it right'. Just don't let someone sell you a bill-of-goods.
You have another option, as I'm sure you know, and that is to sell the barn as a package or as separate timbers. This saves the material for future use and solves your problem of dealing with a failing structure.
I agree with the idea of being able to say "I OWN a Pennsylvania bank barn". Good Luck!

I am in central PA and would be interested in looking at the log house if you are going to take it down.

Dan F,

Thank you for your response. The company that is coming out to have a look specifically restores old barns, which brings me to another question, which may be naive. Is anyone who knows how to timber frame qualified to work on the old buildings? My gut says no; someone who knows how to build new furniture for example would not necessarily know how to restore old, but maybe this is different. I do plan though to have a few people come out ultimately before I do anything. Thanks again.

snevel,

I can definitely let you know. We have no plans to keep it right now. Although it is a log home, the only way to tell is by looking at the attic ceiling, which is identical to the inside barn roofing (and outside roof of both is metal), so they seemed to have been built at the same time. There are also brick chimneys in the attic; but we haven't investigated where they end since there are no fireplaces evident. Other than that though there is aluminum siding on it and it just looks like a square white house. What is your email? I can keep in touch with you as our plans progress. Thanks for your interest.

Thanks for the reply. My email address is
nevel717705@windstream.net