New,
old combine to save county's treasured barns
Jim
Slabonik's Boyertown-based Hometown Carpentry applies today's technology
to fresh and salvaged materials to preserve prized Pennsylvania German
structures.
By Robin Huiras
Reading Eagle
With unblemished wooden siding, new windows and a modern roof, a large
Pennsylvania German barn along Route 662 in
Amity
Township
looks like a
new addition to the landscape.
But
look closer.
Beneath
the facade, 200-year-old posts and beams and aged bricks provide support.
The
barn has been standing between Pine Forge and Morlatton roads since the
late 1700s.
It
had fallen into disrepair but recently was refurbished by Jim Slabonik and
his Boyertown-based company, Hometown Carpentry.
Throughout
Berks
County
and
southeastern
Pennsylvania
, as well as
parts of northern
New Jersey
, Slabonik
has been saving the historical, rural treasures for 12 years.
“It's
a lost art, pretty much,” Slabonik said during a break from a job along
Friedensburg
Road
in
Oley
Township
.
For
barn-lovers, such Mary and Michael Woodall, owners of the
Amity
Township
barn, it's
an invaluable craft.
“The
barns in
Pennsylvania
are very
peculiar for this part of the country, and I think they're certainly worth
preserving,” said Mary Woodall, who moved to
Pennsylvania
from
South
Carolina
about 12
years ago.
When
the Woodalls bought their home, they knew something would have to be done
to the weathered, gray structure.
“The
barn was really an eyesore to me,” Mary Woodall said.
They
never dreamed the end product would look as they pictured the barn had
looked in the late 1700s.
The
methods Slabonik uses aren't exactly like those practiced by carpenters of
old, but he studies their work to mimic their craft.
For
instance, he'll use a barn post from another so the project barn doesn't
look repaired, Slabonik said.
Salvaged
material is essential to the success of his business, and Slabonik
encourages developers who are clearing farmsteads to have old barns
dismantled by firms like his rather than bulldozing them.
Giant
planks that were cut from large, old-growth trees are hard to come by. All
the old-growth forests have been razed, he said.
And
modern barn-builders no longer bind together the frames using wooden pegs,
Slabonik said.
Just
as it's a struggle sometimes to find the right materials, working on the
centuries-old buildings can be a challenge.
“You
have to conform to what's here and still make it look good,” Slabonik
said. “You have to be flexible with what you can do.”
Over
time the barns settle and develop characteristics such as uneven
foundations and warped roofs that are hard to work around, he said.
But
Slabonik said he usually can find a solution to such problems.
In
the case of the
Oley
Township
barn, which
is owned by Robert Lawalski, it was finding a roofing material to conform
to an uneven frame warped by years of weather damage.
Whatever
the fix, the owners generally are pleased with the results, Slabonik said,
adding that he does as much restoration as the barn owner wants.
The
Woodalls couldn't be happier with Slabonik's renovation, which cost about
$25,000 and took about three weeks to complete, Mary Woodall said.
“He
put it back the way it would have been and should have been with a little
bit of modern technology that they have today,” she said.
Printed
in The Reading Eagle
8/6/03