I had a meeting today that was kind of fun. In the summer I hired Steve Sargent who is a local architect to draw the buildings of Wagner Farm. I did this as a bit of an insurance policy in case something like a fire were to take one of our historic buildings we could precisely replicate it. After last week's fire at the century old Park Service's building this seems like a pretty timely idea. Now that we have the plans we will store them off site in hopes that we will not have to use them for their intended purpose.
When Steve and I were reviewing the plans the idea did come up of using the drawing to help staff, docents and even visitors to better understand how buildings at the time were put together. From the balloon framing to the mortise and tenon construction, buildings are made the same way today. The drawings allow the skin to be pulled back and the secrets revealed. Steve said something that was kind of neat when he commented on how beautifully symmetric the barn is. The Wagner family didn't leave a lot of artifacts but the ones they did leave are pretty good.
