Old barns in the New World

the long version

Born in western Massachusetts and reared on a farm, Rickard Babcock learned from his grandfather to appreciate the importance of New England's oldest barns, built three hundred years ago by farmers using techniques they brought with them to the New World. Even more important, Babcock has learned to dismantle, move, and rebuild these barns, using these very same old techniques. Babcock has explored the history of the barns themselves, leading him to controversial conclusions about tbe dates and nationalities of the earliest settlers of the Northeast and their reliance on slave labor. In a book illustrated with photographs and filled with fascinating detail, this is Babcock's story and the story of the buildings he loves best.