December 17^th

Happy Holidays from The Barn Journal!

We have posted a special annotated photo gallery featuring barns from Wayne County, Ohio. It is called A Window onto Aesthetics: The Barns of Wayne County, Ohio and it can be found in the Barn Stories section.

December 7^th

A new poem called Old Barn has been posted in the Barn Stories section. The poet, Vance Oliphant, had this to say about the poem: "I am 75 years old and find it heartbreaking to see what were once vibrant, well-kept barns, slowly falling into ruin. I have tried to put my feelings into verse."

November 3^rd

The Web site for The Red Mill has been launched and currently features an introductory story about the restoration of the building. More articles will be added over the next few months.

October 4^th

Note that the editor and webmaster email addresses are now restored.

October 1^st

The Barn Journal experienced a server outage on Thursday, September 27th and was out of service until today, Monday, October 1st. Thank you for your patience while we restored service. Note that the editor email address (editor@thebarnjournal.org) and webmaster email address (webmaster@thebarnjournal.org) are not yet working, so please send any correspondence to cleik@aol.com in the meantime. Thank you.

September 14^th

The Barn Journal is pleased to announce that it will be hosting the future Web site for The Red Mill, a century-old wooden grain mill in Portland, Michigan. The building was recently restored under the supervision of the editor of The Barn Journal, Charles Leik, and his brother Edward Leik. An announcement will be posted here when the site is launched.

September 1^st

A new article, The Crowning Achievement, is now available in the Barn Stories section. The story describes the capping of the silos for a dairy barn at the King Farm (Montgomery County, MD). The article also gives a glimpse into the history of the Farm and recent preservation efforts.

August 25^th

Dear Readers,

This month, The Barn Journal (TBJ) is celebrating its Fifth Anniversary. TBJ was conceived by a number of barn enthusiasts during the historic March 1995 raising of a Michigan barn frame at the National Building Museum, Washington, D.C.

Jack Worthington, Grand Ledge, MI; Steven Stier, East Lansing, MI; and Charles Leik, Great Falls, VA and formerly of Portland, MI initially planned a quarterly periodical. However, due to the cost and time constraints of print media, they decided on the then relatively new technology of the World Wide Web. The goal has always been to create an authoritative, interesting, and well-organized site where visitors could obtain and share information on the preservation of barns and other vernacular rural architecture.

Charles Leik has served as Editor, Mauricio Vives as Webmaster, and our home has been a server at the Michigan State University Museum since TBJ first went online in August 1996.

In its first five years, TBJ has published over 30 articles on a variety of barns and related subjects. In addition, TBJ has become a repository of information on barn-related Events, Publications, and Contractors. The site carries, without charge, classified "Barn Ads" to aid in the removal and preservation of endangered structures. And most importantly, the Guestbook benefits from questions and comments from you, our readers.

To coincide with our Fifth Anniversary, we are pleased to announce that TBJ now has a new home on a server that allows us to eventually offer readers more direct access in the posting of Ads, Events and Contractors. With the new server comes a new location on the Web:

www.thebarnjournal.org

Although TBJ will continue to be available at museum.cl.msu.edu/barn for a short time, you should note our new address. If you encounter any problems accessing the new location while we are in transition, please contact webmaster@thebarnjournal.org. The TBJ format will undergo a gradual change in the coming months as befits five years of experience and our "coming of age." We welcome your comments and recommendations in this regard.

Two aspects of TBJ will remain unchanged: It remains "dedicated to the appreciation and preservation of traditional farm architecture" and it will continue to need the support of you, through your comments and story submissions.

Your interest is appreciated; we look forward to working with you in the coming Five Years.

Sincerely,

Charles Leik, Editor - editor@thebarnjournal.org
Mauricio Vives, Webmaster - webmaster@thebarnjournal.org

July 29^th

We would like to highlight a book listing in the Barn Resources section. Rock City Barns: A Passing Era by David Jenkins is an excellent catalog of hundreds of barns that Jenkins found in a 35,000 mile / 15-state odyssey. In color photographs and accompanying text the author captures not only the spirit of the barns, but also the spirit of a by-gone era of two land highways and the folk culture of America. Highly recommended.

Also, a new barn story has just been posted: The Van Hoosen Farm, currently the home of the Rochester Hills Museum, in Rochester Hills, Michigan. Read about the long history of the farm and the preservation efforts of the City of Rochester Hills.

May 9^th

The Barn Stories section has a new article describing the Wortendyke Barn, a Dutch barn farm museum in Park Ridge, New Jersey.  According to the author, the barn is "an outstanding example of the vernacular architecture referred to as a "New World Dutch Barn."  The article is accompanied by a bibliography on Dutch barns.

April 20^th

A new article which describes the design and history of the The Bell-Walker Barn in Indian Head, Saskatchewan is now available in the Featured Barns section.

March 19^th

The latest article in the Barn Stories section describes the Sears Barn in Newark Valley, NY.  Although rapidly disintegrating, the barn is a reminder of when barns were available as kits.  The article includes early 20th century Sears sales literature.

February 22^nd

For Mail Pouch barn enthusiasts, we have an article by Elmer Napier, Barnstorming for Mail Pouch Barns.  The article describes Elmer's search for Mail Pouch over the last three years, and includes 15 of Elmer's photos.  It can be found in the Barn People section.

February 12^th

The 6th annual conference of the Michigan Barn Preservation Network is happening March 10th at Michigan State University.  The Barn Journal has a special page with complete information on the event.  Also on that page you will find information on Understanding the Farmstead, a special forum at MSU the day before the conference (March 9th).  For more information on barn-related events, see Barn Events.