Whoa, baby …
The beloved Baby Barn is getting some much-needed attention and care down at the Allen County fairgrounds.
Jim Smith has been busy on the project for three weeks already, focused especially on replacing and repainting the many wood slats in the building’s ceiling.
“We’re trying to save the building,” he said. “It’s rotten everywhere.”
“Rotten, rotten.”
“I’d been watching it for a few years,” Smith added.
“I thought somebody ought to do something.”
According to Smith, “the main thing is replacing all the ‘baffle boards,’” the many rows of boards that form the octagonal rim.
“They are all in horrible shape,” he said, “but I’m just gonna replace the worst of ’em for now.”
Smith said he’s also checking all the brackets that hold everything in place.
Some of the boards have to be replaced, but others can be resurrected.
“I’m putting two coats of paint on each side to start off,” Smith said.
He’s also replacing the impressive wood flagpole in the building’s center (made from the limb of a cedar tree) with a 5-inch steel pipe.
“When they put the roof on, they didn’t seal the hole,” Smith explained, so water has caused significant damage there over the years.
“I’ve made four trips to the dump already with lumber,” he added. “It piles up in a hurry.”
As these original fairground buildings date back almost a century, it’s no wonder that the Baby Barn needs some love.
“All of the fair buildings were finished in about 1938,” said Smith, as part of a string of projects completed by the Workers Progress Administration (WPA) in the wake of the Depression.
And there’s an additional element of historical preservation as well.
