Rudy Christian leans against the waste wall in the mow of the Mertz farm near Pleasantville. A crowd of about 100 barn enthusiasts listen attentively as he describes the 175-year-old structure.
"How else do we know this front forebay section was added on after the original Schweitzer barn was built?" Christian asks. "First there we can see the old nail marks from the siding on the wall girts. And secondly look at the center of the door header. Attached to the beam is a block that was standard for locking the original swinging doors shut."
Forebays (overhangs common in Pennsylvania German barns), girts (horizontal beams on the outside of the barn), scantlings (smaller sawed 4 by 4 s) and purlines (cross beams that hold the rafters) are just a few of the construction elements the barn detectives use to examine the structure of barns.
Christian and the Friends of Ohio Barns have been conducting tours of Ohio Barns as part of their annual conference for the last 12 years. Fairfield County provided a perfect location for their investigations last month. In addition to a visit to the Mertzes' barn built in 1831, the tour stopped at Steve and Debbie Miller's barn that is part of the 200-year-old family farm, Steve and Becky Pontius' 1835 barn with forebays on all four sides, Rocky and Carol Gaal's home built from a barn that once stood in Morgan County, the Kohler family's sawn oak barn built in 1910 and the rebuilt Rock Mill on the Hocking River gorge.
"We have a lot of fun visiting these sites and trying to piece together how the barns were assembled," says Dan Troth, a member of the FOB board. "The group has all levels of expertise from professional timber framers to folks who just want to know a little more about their barn."
Here's a slide show featuring some of the sights from the tour.
Steve Miller, center, discusses his double four bay barn with tour participants near Pleasantville. Barn detectives concluded the structure was rebuilt from a log barn that likely was built by the original settlers of the farm around 1800.
Tour participants trek up to Mertz barn past the spring house which was used to keep milk cool on the farm more than 100 years ago.
Steve Pontius, barn owner, stands in the middle of very large 20-foot threshing floor as he takes questions about the barn on the farm he and his wife Becky purchased 22 years ago. Barn detectives deduced the barn was probably rebuilt or moved at some point to house a large dairy operation.
The front of the Mertz barn was probably added after the original structure to increase the barn's hay holding capacity. An engraved stone in the barn's lower level indicates the structure was built in 1831.
Dan Troth use flash light beam to check out names scratched into signature plate on Pontius barn. Beam also provides good instrument for observing etchings carved on wooden beams.
James Driver probably the original barn owner and John Stickler barn builder put their names on Pontius barn in 1835.
Rocky Gaal, an architect and owner of this home that was built from a barn, tells visitors how the barn was taken apart by an Amish family and reassembled on the site in 1990.
Nearly all of the fixtures used in the structure came from recycled uses. A stained glass window comes from the church in Columbus where Rocky was baptized. The front door came from the Bexley High School.
The massive Kohler barn was built in 1910 for holding loose hay pulled the length of the barn by a hay track.
The hay hook still hangs under the hay track. A round ladder enabled loaders access to the hook. Numerous other ladders in the barn enabled the work force to load and unload giant quantities of hay produced on the farm.
The cupolas on the top of the slate-roofed Kohler barn helped dry the hay and are still weather-proof.
The restored Rock Mill is the third grist mill to stand on this site since about 1800. The first two burned down and this one was built in 1824. A 26-foot water wheel is being built to return the structure to the status as a working mill and tourist destination.