Building Name (Common)

Strong-Porter House Barns

Building Name (Historic)

Strong-Porter House Barns

Address

2382 South Street
Coventry

Typology

• English/New England Hybrid
• Wagon Shed
• Other Shed

 

Designations

• National Register
• Local Historic District

Historic Significance

Architectural description:

Barn I:

This is a 1 1/2-story side or eave entry bank barn that has been modified to have a newer gable end entry. It has a shed-roofed addition on the west side with the center bay and the northern-most bay open, with the southern-most bay enclosed with a pass-through door. Un-mortared field-stone makes up the foundation. The south gable-end has a single interior sliding door entrance on the western side of the facade with a single six-pane window. Next to the sliding door is a six-over-six double hung window. Above the dropped girt line on the eastern-most section of the right (east) is a six-pane window similar to the one in the sliding door. Under the apex is a nine-pane window. Below that is a hay door. This facade is covered in clapboard painted red. The east eave facade is plain except for a pair of nine-pane windows and is covered in weathered shingles. The north gable end has weathered shingles on the first floor above grade and clapboards above the dropped girt line to the apex. The basement is open.

Barn II:

This is a 1 1/2-story gable-roofed structure with its ridge-line oriented east-west parallel to the house and the road. The left (west) three bays are open, with arch-topped trim. The right (east) portion is an enclosed workshop or shed. The foundation is composed of slabs of granite with a single window at the center; the main level has a pair of twelve-pane windows off-center toward the left. The east gable-end has a door at the left (south), a twelve-pane window at the center, and a small four-pane attic window near the peak. The west gable-end and south eave-side are blank. The building has clapboard siding with corner board trim, painted red, and wood shingle roofing.

Historical significance:

The oldest barns still found in the state are called the "English Barn”, "side-entry barn”, “eave entry” or a 30 x 40. It is a simple building with a rectangular plan, pitched roof, and a door or doors located on one or both of the “eave” sides of the building based on the grain warehouses of the English colonists' homeland. The New England barn or gable front barn was the successor to the English barn and relies on a gable entry rather than an entry under the eaves. The gable front offers many practical advantages. Roofs drain off the side, rather than flooding the dooryard. Although it was seen by many as an improvement over the earlier side entry English Barn, the New England barn did not replace its predecessor but rather coexisted with it. It this case, both an eave entry and a gable entry are used.

The 19th century would see the introduction of a basement under the barn to allow for the easy collection and storage of a winter's worth of manure from the animals sheltered within the building. The bank barn is characterized by the location of its main floor above grade, either through building on a hillside or by raising the building on a foundation. This innovation, aided by the introduction of windows for light and ventilation, would eventually be joined by the introduction of space to shelter more animals under the main floor of the barn.

Barn footings and foundations were usually built of stone, often harvested from nearby fields or quarried from local outcroppings. The earliest type of field-stone foundations found in Connecticut do not use mortar, as early builders thought it unnecessary.

Historical background:

Nathan Hale's mother, Elizabeth Strong, lived in this house before her marriage in 1746 to Richard Hale (record for Hale Homestead). The homestead was purchased and restored by George Dudley Seymour in the 1930s, as was the Hale Homestead.

Field Notes

Current owners, the Coventry Historical Society, maintain the site as a seasonal museum. Two existing barns: a carriage shed with arched openings, and a small bank barn. The foundation of the large barn was excavated as a scout project - an informational display stands near the barn site. Barns grant recipient 2011.