HAMILTON COUNTY

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rWEBSTER CITY Known as a part of Silvers Hallow, the farm now owned by Dave and Cheryll Entriken, is home to a barn they believe was built in the 1930s.

The 32-by-40-foot barn features a gambrel roof, which, according to Cheryll, was a common Midwestern prairie barn design.

The particular design, she said, offered enough storage for bedding and fodder to accommodate livestock during lengthy harsh winters.

The barn has been shelter for many animals including horses, cattle and pigs its entire life up until the mid-1990s.

The Entrikens now use the barn primarily for storage and a shop but one unique usage is as a 4-H meeting place.

Cheryll, who is Hamilton County's Extension youth coordinator, said they use their barn for photography project meetings, an annual photography camp, as well as helping 4-H kids with other project areas.

Back when the barn was first built, the timber ground near their farm, according to the Entrikens, was a lifesaver for many farm families during the Depression years.

In the back hills, was an abandoned coal mine and many neighbors would come and chop out coal and wood to heat their homes and keeping their cooking stoves stoked. During these times the barn served as a gathering place to warm following the work of loading their horse drawn wagons.

Cheryll's father, Clinton Stemsrud, used to tell the stories of gathering coal during the 1930s. He said that during a severe snow storm, some neighbors got disoriented in the timber and they told of having to follow the fences to find their way out.

In the late 1980s the Entrikens started refurbishing the old barn and over the years it has been given new steel siding and a steel roof, as well as a new cement floor on the inside for the shop portion of the barn.

"It was a decent building and barns are disappearing at a rate of about a 100 a year," said Dave as to the reasoning of fixing up the barn. "It's a part of the heritage of history of the farm."

The Entriken family also has many fond memories, Cheryll said, of their children playing in the hay mow and also baling and putting up hay. They were all a party of that chore, she said.

The Entriken barn features a bright, colorful barn quilt for passersby to admire.

The barn quilt is titled "Harvest Star" or "Blazing Star." Cheryll said the pattern was likely published in the late 1890s in the Ladies Art Company. This company, she said is credited as the first mail order quilt pattern company.

"I enjoy quilting and thought it would be a cool thing to do," said Cheryll.

The Entrikens are participants in the Barn Quilts of Hamilton County project, which is based on a similar project that begun in Adams County, Ohio back in 2001.

Contact Kriss Nelson at jknelson@frontiernet.net.