The Canada Farmer, 1864
by Diana Macdonald
While doing research in The Canada Farmer, a fortnightly news journal printed in Toronto, from 1864 (slowing working my way through each issue), I have found detailed information on early barns in Upper Canada that I thought might be of interest to OBP. I have transcribed pertinent sections below:
1 March 1864: RURAL ARCHITECTURE.
We hope to be of service to our readers in this department of farm management, by publishing, from time to time, plans of barns and other structure adding thereto such descriptions, hints and suggestions, as may help in the actual business of building. In the accompanying illustration, we give a design for a barn-yard of moderate size, and of simple arrangement. The barn has a stone-walled basement on three sides, which may be used for stabling or cellarage. Twelve feet from the front of the building is a wall with doors and windows in it, and in front of the wall is a shelter for stock. Two sheds in the form of wings are run out to any desired length on either side. The body of the barn is built of wood above the basement, and is supposed to be 60×46 feet; the posts 18 feet above the sills, the sides covered with boards laid vertically, and battened with narrow strips 3 inches wide.
The roof spreads 3 to 4 feet over the body of the barn; a ventilator crowns the ridge and is at once useful and ornamental; a circular-slatted blind window is in each gable; there are double large doors in each end, to admit the passage of a team and waggon, and there is a single door on the yard side. The interior arrangements can be modified according to taste. A main floor about 12 feet wide should run through the centre of the barn, and at suitable places in it there may be a couple of traps for letting hay, straw, or roots down into the basement. A bay for hay storage may occupy the greater part or all of one side of the building, a grain mow, granary, and storage-room the other. An ample passage should be left leading to the side-door, to throw out litter. If horse stabling is desired on the main floor, a portion of the space can be devoted to that purpose. Movable sleepers or poles may be laid across the floor 10 feet above on a line of girts framed into the main posts for that purpose, over which, when the sides of the barn are full, hay or gain may be stacked up to the roof. Similar accommodation may also be provided over the granary, storage room, or stable. If the demands of the crops require it, after the rest of the barn is filled, a portion of the floor itself may be used for packing away hay or grain, a plan which, though it involves some trouble in getting a waggon in and out, it is better than stacking out. In the basement much room for cattle, calves, etc. may be had, or if underground stabling is deemed objectionable, the basement can be chiefly devoted to roots, and a portion in a convenient place partitioned off as a manure cellar. The ample shedding will furnish space for a line of racks or mangers for outside cattle or sheep, as well as protection for the waggons, and other implements which ought never to be left exposed to the weather. The sheds may be carried higher than in our plans, and floored overhead, so that hay or other food may be stored in them for stock. A driving way is built up to the barn-doors at the ends. This needs not be expensive, especially if the barn will be located, as it is desirable it should be, if possible, on a shelving piece of ground, or slope, which will admit of a basement without much excavation, and a roadway without a high embankment. Of course as it respects size, arrangement, and all the details, the proprietor can use his own judgement and taste. Our aim is to simply to give a general idea, which can be altered and improved upon as circumstances may seem to require, and mean permit.
15 March 1864: RURAL ARCHITECTURE – BARNS.
When barns are scattered about the farm some thirty yards from each other, and as many more from the house, it pays better to move and arrange them in a more convenient manner, as the time would soon amount to enough to pay all expenses, to say nothing of what better care the stock will receive when near the house, than they used to at the further barn. Also, it pays to put a good stone wall (laid up with mortar) under every frame building, except corn-houses and cheese-houses, which should stand upon posts set solid in the ground, with a large tin pan bottom side up placed upon the top of every post to prevent mice and rats running up. Remember and have the mason leave several small holes at the top of the wall to let the air in; for if closed tight it will cause the sill and sleepers to decay. When you build a bridge in front of the large doors, of stone and dirt, do not put any dirt near the sill, as the water from the roof will soon cause decay. I believe thousands of dollars are waster in this way every year.
Remedy – build your bridge of dirt or stone within 2 feet of the doors and place a stick of lumber four inches from the sill, and four short pieces from sill to embankment, and place two planks upon this foundation, and your sill will not decay here before it does anywhere else. Do not nail a board on the front side of the sill where the doors are, as this will cause decay. – Colonial Farmer
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