Historic Barns of Connecticut

Designations

n/a

Historic Significance

Architectural Description:

This is a 1 ½ story gable-entry tobacco shed.  The main façade of the barn faces northeast and the ridge-line of the shed runs northeast-southwest, roughly perpendicular to Griffin Road. This shed has two aisles and seven bents. The northeast gable-facade shed contains two pairs of hinged doors and a door in the gable attic apex. The ventilation system in the southeast eave-side of the shed is a pair of exterior track sliding doors. The southwest side contains an opening in the gable attic. The ventilation system in the northwest eave-side of the shed is a vertical sliding system where every second board is hinged at the top and tilted out at the bottom by means of a horizontal cleat that lifts many boards at once and metal prop hooks to hold the boards in place. The shed is clad in red vertical flush-board and the roof is covered with slate. A chimney is located on the northeast slope of the roof. The foundation is mortared field-stone.

Historical Significance:

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 siding in which alternating boards are hinged at the top and tilted out at the bottom by means of a horizontal cleat that lifts many boards at once and metal prop hooks to hold the boards in place,
b) Vertical siding in which alternate boards are hinged along the sides to open like tall narrow doors,
c) Less commonly, horizontal siding in which alternate boards are hinged along the top edge and open like long narrow awnings,
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.

Field Notes

aka 62 Griffin Road, East Granby Part 1: Tobacco Shed (BarnA) Part 2: 1911 Dairy barn (BarnB): One of the last post and beam barns to be built in East Granby. Source: "The Barns of East Granby - our Agricultural Heritage," Elizabeth Guinan & Ted Holly, 2000. 2009 Barns Grant pre-application.

Use (Historic)

• tobacco

Use (Present)

• unknown

Exterior Visible from Public Road?

Yes

Demolished

n/a

Location Integrity

Unknown

Related features

• Barn

Environment features

• Open Land
• Rural
• Woodland

Relationship to surroundings

This tobacco shed is located on the west side of Griffin Road just south of the East Granby/Suffield Line.  It is north of a barn complex and across from a house with barns and outbuildings.  The shed is about five feet off of the road. An active agricultural field is to the north, a stream and swampland are to the west, and open fields and woodlands are to the south.

Building Typology

• Tobacco Shed

Materials

• Flush-board
• Vertical Siding

Structural System

• Post & Beam
• Wood Frame

Roof materials

• Slate

Roof type

• Gable

Approximate Dimensions

40 ft x 80 ft Tobacco shed; and Dairy Barn with open lower level, hay loft above

Date Compiled

08/23/2010

Compiled By

Melissa Antonelli, reviewed by the CT Trust

Sources

Map of East Granby, CT, retrieved Aug 23, 2010 from website www.bing.com.

McAlester, Virginia & Lee, A Field Guide to American Houses, Knopf, New York, 1984.

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

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.