>
> It's likely the explanation was scheduling, or a last minute change in
plans,
> but there is no doubt the barn was built all at once. The romantic side
of me
> wants to beleive that some callused old frame carpenter, with a heavy
accent,
> wasn't going to compromize the strength with any of those sawn timbers in
the
> heart of the frame.
>
> Everything makes sense, except what doesn't.
>
> Rudy

There's a huge old dairy barn up here that was put up in the 1920s. Its
P&B, following the most common framing pattern, and overbuilt like nobodies
business; 12X14 plates and sills, 10X12 studs and rafters, etc.,
just as if it had been built a century earlier, except that all the timbers
save one were sawn out on a portable mill that was set up in the back of
what is now my field.

The one exception is the plate on the north gable-end wall, about 45' 0f
12X14. The story, told me by the son of barn's owner and builder,  is that
the day before that wall was to be pinned together and raised, a tractor
accidentally ran over the timber just at the place where it spanned a low
point in the ground. There must have been a big knot or some other weakness
right there, because the wood developed a sheer fracture which made it
unusable. Someone ran over to the mill to see if Tom Colpitt had a log on
the brow that was big enough to make a replacement from. He did. The only
problem was, he was, as was his want when between sawing jobs, passed out
dead with the drink, and when Tom was on a toot there was no telling how
long it would be before he was in any condition to fire up the mill.. Not
wanting to hold up the scheduled raising, a couple of real old-timers and a
bunch of lights were rounded up and work went on into the night. At
gathering time of the crew the next morning a replacement plate was sitting
in the field, hewn and adzed and set on a couple of trucks to be pulled
down the road.

Bruce

Bruce