Life lessons are
learned in barn restoration project
On a dreary, cold morning, a crew of four young men are sawing boards
and framing three windows as they put the finishing touches on a barn
restoration project at Sullivan Farm started six years ago.
"It's been amazing to see where it came from to what it has become,"
declared Pete Carlson, 27, a longtime Youth Agency staff member who has
watched this project evolve and is proud it is now near completion.
The centerpiece of the town-owned, 105-acre
Sullivan property, the 2½ story red barn on Route 202 where community
members buy their farm-grown vegetables and where the agency stores some
of its hay and farm equipment, was suffering from old age and neglect
when the agency opted to begin repairing the siding.
What the agency staff and volunteers quickly found was there was far
more to be done than first anticipated. "After we started taking off the
siding, we found more and more rotten boards," said Steve Bendrick, 19,
an agency staff member and work crew leader.
The barn was originally built by James Tarrell in 1869 – new sliding
barn doors retain a wood beam engraved with Tarrell's initials and the
date – and was about to undergo a full restoration, including a new
support structure that required the agency work crews to jack up the
barn, Bendrick described. In jest, Carlson flexed his muscles.
As the crews removed the rotten wood and siding, much of it caused by
water damage, they replaced the boards and added new structural supports
and new sliding doors with some of the old hinges and pulleys. In the
farmstand area, the crews even expanded the area so there is now more
room for produce and customers.
"It's been fun," Bendrick said, noting the
project has taught hundreds of agency volunteers and youth workers
skills they might otherwise never have learned. "It's been good
experience that will last us the rest of our lives," Bendrick said,
noting he now has carpentry knowledge that will help him as an eventual
homeowner.
Worker Matthew Coster said agency staff taught him and many others with
no carpentry or construction experience how to properly use a variety of
carpentry tools, including a table saw. He said he is grateful not only
to learn a transferable skill but also that "I didn't cut my hand off."
Before working on this project, Coster and fellow crew member Vincent
Van Wattum, 20, were employed for other agency work, including catering
jobs at the Maxx youth center and harvesting on the farm. Each has added
a new ingredient to their lives, with Van Wattum studying to become a
social worker or teacher. He credits his experiences with the Youth
Agency for his new path.
The New Milford Youth Agency is the town's premier youth programming
organization that operates Sullivan Farm, provides before and after
school care for school-aged children, operates the Maxx youth center,
offers a video production program, counseling services and a variety of
other youth-oriented activities. The Youth Agency is also the town's
largest employer of high school and college-aged teens.
For Van Wattum, the barn restoration has not only been a way for college
youth to earn cash but a way to gain a sense of self-satisfaction as
they improve a community showpiece that will now be standing for future
generations.
"This has been a wonderful project for all sorts of kids," Prevention
Program Manager Gary Leavitt said. "We are fortunate to have very
flexible, talented young people able to help us with all the phases of
it." On a tour of the barn that is about 120 feet long and 60 feet wide,
Leavitt pointed out where new structural supports were built to stand
next to beams that are well over a century old. Along with new lumber,
the agency crews also recycled a lot of the timbers they were able to
salvage as they performed the restoration.
Coster credited Leavitt with teaching him numerous "tricks of the trade"
that he knows will prove useful no matter where he goes in his life.
Leavitt said this project has given a rare
opportunity to hundreds of local teenagers. In the last few months,
there has been a steady crew of about a dozen high school and
college-aged youth devoted to completing the work. After this week, all
that will be left is to paint the siding to match the barn, a job
Carlson said will most likely be done in the spring or summer.
"I think it's remarkable what's happened here over the years," Leavitt
said. "They should be tremendously proud, and the town should be proud
of this. "They'll all come back one day with their kids and say, 'Look
what I did,' " Leavitt said.
Nanci G. Hutson
12 January 2008
http://www.newstimes.com/ci_7952477
