John Reardan House (Part 2 of 2) (465 Main Street, South Windsor (Central Valley))

Designations

Historic Significance

Architectural description:

This is a two barn complex towards the west of Main Street with Barn-I towards the south and Barn-II towards the north. The barns are arranged with their gable-ends facing each other and are separated by a passage which has a screen wall flush with the east eave-side on either side. The ridge lines of both the barns, Barn-I and Barn-II, run north-south parallel to each other and to the road. The following is the description of Barn-II while Barn-I is discussed in http://www.connecticutbarns.org/5291.

Barn-II: This is 1 ½ - story multi-bay eave-entry barn which appears to be eleven-bay [NR]. The ridge line of the barn runs north-south parallel to Main Street. The east eave-side of the barn facing the road is the main façade with three two-module main entrances and a single-module entrance towards the extreme north. Each two-module main entrance to the barn has two pairs of closely placed hinged wagon doors. The north gable-end of the barn has a distinct dropped girt siding divide line separating the gable attic which has a window just below the apex of the roof and one window each towards either side. The barn has a system of ventilation through the vertical siding on the east eave-side and the north gable-end in which alternate boards are hinged along the sides to open like tall narrow doors, each held in place by its own hook.

The wooden frame of the barn has asphalt shingles roofing and white painted vertical siding with dark brown painted trim and corner boards.

Historical significance:

The main residence associated with the barns is contributing to Windsor Farms Historic District, 86000723 NRIS.

The tobacco barn, or shed as it is called in the Connecticut River Valley, is one of the most distinctive of the single-crop barns. They tend to be long, low windowless buildings with pitched roofs. They are characterized by vented sides to regulate air flow and allow harvested tobacco to cure at the appropriate rate. Derived initially from the design of the English barn, the shed is composed of a fixed skeleton consisting of two- or three-aisle bents repeated at intervals of 15 feet to the desired length. The wood-framed bents sit on piers of stone or concrete and the bents are connected by girts and diagonal braces. Typically there are two doors at each end, making the shed a “drive-through,” although some sheds are accessed through doors on the sides. The interior structural framework serves a second purpose in addition to supporting the walls and roof of the building; it provides a framework for the rails used to hang the tobacco as it cures.

This is accomplished with one of four different systems (more than one method may be utilized in a single shed):

a) Vertical slats - siding in which every second board is hinged at the top and tilted out at the bottom by means of a horizontal cleat, that lifts several boards at once, and metal prop hooks to hold the boards in place;

b) Side slats - Vertical siding in which alternate boards are hinged along the sides to open like tall narrow doors, each held in place by its own hook;

c) Less commonly, horizontal siding in which alternate boards are hinged along the top edge and open like long narrow awnings; this system may be employed along the lower edge of the wall in conjunction with vertical or side slats;

d) A series of large doors along one of the long sides of the building with the other sides of the building vented by one or more of the other methods.

e) The tobacco sheds can have additional ventilation through side-pivot awning vents on the gable-ends, which co-exist with one or more of the above four systems of ventilation.

Field Notes

Originally Rearon tobacco shed - still in use to cure tobacco. Unusual tobacco shed form with four pairs of hinged barn doors along the long eave-side rather than two in the gable-end. Single-board vertical hinged panels for ventilation during curing (common typical tobacco barn detail). Also see part 1/2 : http://www.connecticutbarns.org/5291. [The Windsor Farms District is a 2 ½ square mile area on the east bank of Connecticut River which comprises the historical center of South Windsor. The Windsor Farms Historic District is a well-preserved, rural-residential community if great historic significance. It is one of the few farming villages remaining in the Connecticut still devoted to tobacco agriculture. Unlike the more typical historic rural areas of the state where the historic components are widely scattered, the Windsor Farms Historic District is highly a concentrated, cohesive entity. Not only does it contain a significant group of farmhouses, barns and other specialized buildings related to tobacco agriculture, it also encompasses approximately 1500 acres of contiguous historic farmland which has been under intensive cultivation for more than 300 years.][NR]

Use (Historic)

tobacco

Use (Present)

tobacco

Exterior Visible from Public Road?

Yes

Demolished

No

Location Integrity

Unknown

Related features

Barn

Environment features

Relationship to surroundings

The 1.47 acres property, Account Number- 0007370 and Map Number- 21 43 A, is located towards the west of Main Street. The property is located in the rural-residential community of Windsor Farms Historic District on the National Register. Residential properties flank the property towards the north, south and the east across the road while parcels of farm land with barns can be seen towards the west and the southwest.

The two barns are located along the western edge of the property with Barn-I towards the south and the Barn-II towards the north. The ridge lines of both the barns run north-south parallel to each other and to the road. The barns are arranged with their gable-ends facing each other and are separated by a passage which has a screen wall flush with the east eave-side on either side. The east eave-side of Barn-II opens into a fenced yard. The circa 1910 colonial main residence of the property is located towards the east of Barn-I, off-centered towards the south. The property is accessed by a driveway towards the south of the main residence while the rest of the plot is open land

Building Typology

Tobacco Shed

Materials

Vertical Siding

Structural System

Roof materials

Asphalt Shingle

Roof type

Gable

Approximate Dimensions

Barn: 2700 SqFt, Circa 1920; Barn: 3480 SqFt, Circa 1920;

Date Compiled

06/06/2011

Compiled By

T. Levine and M. Patnaik, reviewed by CT Trust

Sources

Field notes provided by: Art Utay, 02/06/2008.

Additional field notes and photographs provided by Dan Taylor, 04/17/2010.

Assessors’ information retrieved on June 6th, 2011 from website www.southwindsor.org/pages/swindsorct_assessor/index

GIS Map and information retrieved on June 6th, 2011 from website www.southwindsor.org/pages/swindsorct_dpw/gis/gis

Cunningham Jan, Edited by Herzan John, Windsor Farms Historic District, National Register Nomination Number-86000723, National Park Service, 1986.
http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NRHP/Text/86000723.pdf
http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NRHP/Photos/86000723.pdf

O’Gorman, James F., Connecticut Valley Vernacular: the Vanishing Landscape and Architecture of the New England Tobacco Fields, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002, 144 pages.

Photograph/Information retrieved on June 6th, 2011 from website http://www.google.com

Photograph/Information retrieved on June 6th, 2011 from website http://www.bing.com.

Photograph/Information retrieved on June 6th, 2011 from website http://www.zillow.com.

Sexton, James, PhD; Survey Narrative of the Connecticut Barn, Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation, Hamden, CT, 2005, http://www.connecticutbarns.org/history.

Visser, Thomas D.,Field Guide to New England Barns and Farm Buildings, University Press of New England, 1997.

Historic Barns of Connecticut

Barn Record South Windsor