“The Barn”
“Close that door! What do you think you live in a barn!” was a rhetorical question my husband and I both grew up hearing bellowed across the lips of various family patriarchs. My father was the doorkeeper at our house, while Jamie often heard it from his grandfather. The message was loud and clear, but the reason would vary from season to season, heat in, heat out, cats in, dogs out, babies in, bugs out. Some fifty-plus years after we heard those words as kids, we can whisper the answer back to those men we miss the most, “Yes, we live in a barn.”
As Hamptonites go, we are just mere babes. In 2014 Jamie and I began searching for just the right home. We wanted someplace he could run his business from, so a large workshop or barn was on our checklist, while I was hoping for a lovely farmhouse like the one I imagined Lassie came home to at the end of every episode. Of course, we both wanted a big wraparound porch. We searched far and wide in the western side of the state where we lived and where our families were all located. Exhausting all affordable and logical options, I reluctantly expanded the computer search to include east of I-91.
One evening I found a listing for a home that looked interesting. It had a workshop, so I put one mark on the checklist, but it wasn’t a farmhouse, nor did it have a wraparound porch. Nonetheless, I held up the laptop to Jamie and said, “Would you live in something like this?” He didn’t hesitate to answer in the affirmative.
The next day we scheduled a visit. But wait, where’s Hampton??? Thank god for Google Earth and GPS. We found our way and saw the property that Wednesday. The place was unique, with lovely wide-open floor plans, a beautiful fieldstone fireplace, and spectacular views of the valley and surrounding hillsides. A charming Main Street with beautiful homes. Lots of open space. Low taxes. Yes, we definitely could see ourselves living here. We were in love.
On that Saturday, we signed the contract. On Halloween day 2014, we closed on our new home. We immediately referred to it as “The Barn.” It fulfilled a dream for both of us. Ever since I was a child, I went past a barn in my neighborhood that was in disrepair, but it always tugged at my heartstrings. It was a place that I thought should be turned into a home. Every day my school bus went by this structure, and I imagined how I would make it into a place I would live in someday. On the other hand, The Barn fulfilled my husband’s dream to live in a place as unique as his childhood home, with massive 20-foot tall walls of windows letting in dappled sunlight and a loft way up above the living area he called his own. We both had found something that we thought we had lost a long time ago.
The Barn is a 30×40 timber-frame English bank barn, which, by definition, has three “bays” created by four bents. The center is called the ‘drive’ while either end is called the ‘mows.’ The fieldstone foundation it sits on allows for the original sliding barn doors to open out at ground level in the rear of the structure. The building is two stories tall. The main floor joists visible in the basement were left round. The first floor is 12 feet high, but in the beginning, there would have been minimal flooring separating the first and second floors. The second floor was initially open right to the roof. There is evidence of the original vertical barn siding, although it was resided with horizontal clapboard sometime in the past. Everywhere you look, there are 130 years of history. Some even say that a ghost was seen, but I think that may have been parents just trying to scare their children away from exploring the barn. The wind is the only howling we ever hear, and if things go bump in the night, it’s a cat. But if a ghost would dust away cobwebs, I would welcome its presence.
We only know a little history about The Barn itself, and as best we can determine, it was probably built around 1891. That would have been just a few years after the lovely original Victorian home was constructed for the property owner Ellen Gill. The property was then passed on to her child or children after her death. The trail went cold for us until the property, which included the Victorian house, the barn, and plenty of land, was purchased by the Viens family in the 1950s. Sometime around 1959, The Barn became a place of residence for the first time. It was a home for the young and recently wed William and Sandra Viens. A portion of the first floor was carved out as an apartment by Bill’s father. Evidence of the original linoleum tile squares that covered the floor in the apartment is still visible. During that time, the double doors remained, and the center portion was still used for vehicles that sat right outside the entrance to the apartment. There is still an apple tree in the backyard that Bill planted and it still produces lovely fruit. Last year Bill was in the area, sadly to have his wife’s ashes interred, but he stopped by to introduce himself. We gave him a small tour and he was amazed at how The Barn had changed from the time he lived here. It was a memorable visit for both he and ourselves. We loved hearing about his life and times here.
After the elder Mr. Viens passed, the barn, the Victorian house, and some other land were subdivided into separate parcels. Since then, The Barn had changed hands twice before we purchased it. Windows and doors have been added over time and other modern conveniences, but the structure’s core remains. For most of its 130 years, The Barn has been a workshop. It has also had other unique purposes in the more recent past. For a short time, it was a playhouse, with one show directed by Hampton’s own Gordon Hansen. It was also an art gallery for Neil Parrow, a prior owner who did a lot of remodeling of The Barn into its present form. Neil recognized the magnificent view provided by the broad eastern exposure. Early risers can witness morning’s first light and some stunning sunrises. Hence, Neil named his place First Light Studio. As we began to develop our plan to raise Pygora goats, we decided to call our little homestead First Light Farm. Spend one sunny morning looking out our eastern-facing windows, and you will appreciate how accurately the name captures the breathtaking view we have.
As we look at historical images of Hampton and the views captured looking down onto the lovely Bigelow Pond, we can see how drastically the landscape has changed over the years. Not only was the Pond lost, but those views no longer exist as the trees have grown and the forest has thickened. We long to know what it would have been like to look out our windows and see boaters and swimmers right below us or to skate on the frozen pond. We wonder what the terrain of our property was like back then. How close did the edge of the pond come to us? Answers we can guess at but never really know for sure. As for the present day, we have made several changes to The Barn. For a while, a portion of the first floor was used for Jamie’s business as we originally intended, but then he outgrew the space. Since then, we’ve added a big window to enhance our view. We’ve added walls to formalize bedroom spaces. We did a total kitchen renovation because I was tired of washing dishes by hand. We still have many things we want to do.
Maintenance of an old structure is never-ending, tedious, time-consuming, expensive, and tough on weary old bones. Nevertheless, we love The Barn. It’s filled with a lot of quirks, ones that come with a timberframe structure this old, like sloped floors requiring shims under furniture legs, exposed beams that attract cobwebs, and gaps in floorboards that allow light in places you don’t need it, but it also has lots and lots of character. Where else could we live so that our cats could use the wind braces as perches and have an unlimited supply of scratching posts? Although it’s a barn, ironically, it has never housed animals, that is until this year when we had to bring two of our little newborn baby goats in out of the frigid winter cold.
We enjoy entertaining, and people often tell us it’s a place that feels so comfortable that it naturally induces a nap or two. One hundred thirty years ago, I doubted anyone would have imagined that a structure built for utilitarian purposes would someday be a much-loved home. It is a home for two people who feel very lucky to say, “Yes, we live in a barn, an extraordinary barn.”
Pat and Jamie Boss