20060506 Historic Hoff Barn Relocation and Restoration Solicitors Breakfast

"The Hoff Barn"
(c) Kevin Dayhoff May 6, 2006

Historic Hoff Barn Relocation and Restoration Solicitors Breakfast

May 6^th, 2006

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org

Bright and early Saturday morning, Caroline and I attended a fund raising “Solicitor’s Breakfast” for an important project to relocate and restore an historic circa 1795 old German log bank barn. Perhaps one of only two or three left in the country, the barn is to be relocated to the Carroll County Farm Museum, in Westminster, Carroll County, Maryland and restored.

“The Hoff Barn Project” is a 501(c)(3) corporation and all contributions are tax deductible. Contributions can be mailed to “The Hoff Barn Project,” P. O. Box 124, Westminster, MD 21158. For more information, e-mail me. Put the words, “The Hoff Barn Project” in the subject line.

One of the better articles about the project was written by Mary Gail Hare, a staff writer for the Baltimore Sun, on March 27, 2005. The Baltimore Sun does not use permalinks, so I have pasted her entire article below.

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Raising the money for a 'barn razing'

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/carroll/bal-ca.barn27mar27,1,7454076.story?coll=bal-local-carroll

An 18th-century log barn, built of hand-cut chestnut without nails, pins or pegs, is the focus of an effort to preserve a piece of county history and to realize the dream of the farmer who owned the ...

By Mary Gail Hare
Sun Staff

March 27, 2005

At first glance, the rambling old barn seems unremarkable in a countryside dotted with aging farm buildings. But the sturdy interior of this building at Coldsprings Farms in western Carroll County merits another look. Its log construction is an engineering feat that stands as a testament to 18th-century workmanship.

Its 50-foot beams, made of chestnut logs sawed, hewn and set by hand, have weathered centuries of wind and storms. The logs were notched together to form the walls and ceiling and floor. There is not a nail, peg, hinge or pin anywhere.

"It is as square today as when they built it more than 200 years ago," said Bob Jones, a retired Carroll County farm extension agent. "The logs are put together by notches. The door turned on a pole, not hinges. This is real craftsmanship from people who only had axes and crude saws."

Marlin K. Hoff ran Coldsprings Farms, the largest dairy operation in the county, for more than 40 years until his death in November. His family's ties to the New Windsor land date to 1869, but the barn predates the first Hoffs by more than 75 years.

"It's just a plain-Jane building outside, but you walk inside, and you have never seen anything like it," said Kathleen R. "Kathy" Hoff, Marlin's widow, who operates the farm with her sons. "The top of the roof is stick-straight."

On its lower level, the barn housed dairy cows, which occasionally still meander in from the pasture and peer through its lower windows, Kathy Hoff said. The top tier was often filled with piles of hay that fed the animals.

"This barn was big for its time," said Joe Schwartzbeck, owner of Peace and Plenty Farm in Union Bridge. "I would hate like the devil to have to fill this space with loose hay and a pitchfork."

Although the barn is no longer used, Marlin Hoff knew its worth. He had offered it to the Carroll County Farm Museum and hoped to raise the money to dismantle, move and rebuild the structure on the museum grounds.

"Marlin was a farmer first, not a preservationist," said Melvin Baile Sr., a New Windsor farmer. "But he loved that old barn. He didn't want to sell it off or tear it down."

Hoff once turned down a builder's offer of $40,000 for the chestnut logs.

"It has no real practical use for a modern farmer," said Kathy Hoff. "Most of these barns have fallen down or were sold for the chestnut logs. This one is worth saving. We can figure out a way to move it."

Hoff's family and friends, determined to continue his "barn razing" plans, relied on one of Coldsprings' prized Holstein calves to launch the fund-raising effort. They pooled their resources and bought the pedigreed calf, with the breed's signature bold black-and-lucent-white coloring. Then they donated it back at the annual Carroll County Calf Auction in Westminster.

"I didn't talk to a soul who didn't want to donate to this," said Schwartzbeck. "Everybody loved Marlin. This was a job he didn't get done."

The sale of Coldsprings Lartist 1285F, a June calf, produced $2,050 in seed money for the razing and reconstruction, which could cost about $100,000.

Weighing a respectable 735 pounds, 1285F - cows are recorded by number and no longer named - may have been the biggest calf of the nearly three dozen in the auction. Still, it is lineage, not stature and weight, that matters most.

Kathy Hoff said, "It is who are her mom and dad."

The calf claims a productive heritage, going back through generations of stellar heifers prized for milk and butter fat. Many of its line probably spent their milking hours in the vacant barn.

'Real museum piece'

Jones, Baile, Schwartzbeck and Kathy Hoff met at the barn last week to plan fund raising and marvel at the yeoman construction effort.

"When you look at the logs, you know they must have had to lift them with ropes and pulleys," said Jones.

Baile added, "Neighbors always stepped in to help."

The area's once-abundant chestnut trees are long gone, but the 40-foot-by-50-foot barn has stood since at least 1795 and probably earlier, according to historical documentation. Built on a foundation of fieldstone, the structure rises about 40 feet, an estimate reached by counting 13 logs high - all 50-footers notched together.

"The notches are different, probably made by different people or different axes," said Jones.

Schwartzbeck said, "Good thing they had chestnut. It is a fine-grained wood, durable and strong. How did they keep the cut right?"

Baile answered, "They cut the logs on the ground and then put them up."

Baile, chairman of the farm museum's board of directors, called the barn "a real museum piece, and the only one of its size in Maryland" - and possibly in the country, he said. "West of the Mississippi, they don't even know what a log barn is."

Authentic barn

Hoff's friends want the barn rebuilt exactly the way it stands now. Otherwise, Jones said, "It would be like getting a Model A Ford and putting air conditioning and a 1995 motor in it. This is a historic barn. We can't destroy its integrity."

Research helped authenticate the family's barn lore and push the preservation cause. Ken Short, a former historian for the county, wrote 10 years ago, "As far as integrity, age and rarity, it is one of the most significant farm buildings in Carroll County."

Baile said, "It is like farm ground. Once it's gone, you can't get it back. There is no way to replace a log barn. It could become the museum's signature piece, unmatched anywhere on the East Coast."

The county commissioners said they would accept the barn for the museum but have no funds to relocate it.

"It is a good idea to have this barn preserved, but the county has no money budgeted to move and reconstruct it," said Commissioner Julia Walsh Gouge. "But when people have a goal like this, they usually get it done."

The museum has some experience with barn moving and has a space for the proposed donation, said Dottie Freeman, museum administrator. The Reception Barn, built in the 1800s, was donated and moved there by Amish farmers in the 1960s.

"When Melvin saw that barn, he said, 'I've got one older yet,'" Kathy Hoff said. "That's when he got the idea to donate our barn."

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