Barn Memories of Justin Metcalf
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The ABA was honored to receive a grant from the Hart Family Fund for Small Towns of the prestigious National Trust for Historic Preservation last October. Our researcher Taylor Barnhill has since spent countless hours interviewing folks in the county to gather “Barn Memories” to create a true feel for a barn –“the place we played, worked, hung out with friends.” The ten interviews  (each just 3 to 5 minutes long) have been completed, 4 signs with QR codes to access and watch & listen to the interviews have been posted in the upper level of the bank barn on the Smith Farm (the other 6 will be installed throughout the other barns in the future), and all 10 interviews are available on the ABA You Tube account.
For the next ten issues of our quarterly newsletter, Taylor has created a teaser summary of each and we invite you to follow the link to see and hear the entire 3 to 5-minute interview. Welcome to the first in this series with Justin Metcalf.
Sitting with Justin Metcalf, perched on an old ladder-back chair made by a long-gone family member, the hickory strip seats worn smooth and shiny, is a rare moment captured in the sweetly scented air of a barn where time stood still. Justin has a melodious voice that transforms local dialect to something between poetry and country music, each stanza finished with a big smile.
Justin has lived where he was born, on Metcalf Creek Loop, a place that filled a boy’s curious mind with wonder of nature and from the wise and graceful older folks who watched him grow. He was drawn, not to kids his age, but to the grownups as they worked from dawn to dark, slowly but steadily on all things necessary for sustaining their families. That work, in all its simplicity yet complexity, made sense to him. He stayed with it, and while still short of forty years old, has learned more than a lifetime could hold.
A man of rare skills, some barely saved from vanishing, Justin is a Traditional Millwright who restores grain mills throughout Appalachia. Justin has also enjoyed a large internet following, his videos simply called “Metcalf Mills”, in which he invites viewers to share his exploration of traditional farm life, including the barn traditions, their construction and daily use. His ramblings through and around the 19th century barns of his valley are paved with his own questions and wonder, compelling the viewer to think and learn with him the purpose of ancient farm implements, or the wood-puzzle of mortise and tenon joinery. Justin Metcalf has accomplished much but is just finding his stride.
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The ABA is proud to be a part of the movement to boost pride in the area’s barn heritage. We have documented (and included in our database) 89 (with 12 partially completed) distinctive barns in Madison County. Sadly, in the last 10 years, we have lost several structures to weather, to age, and, most recently, we “lost” one location that had been included in our Mars Hill self-guided tour; a new property owner had decided to take the barns down.
We celebrate all of you who are striving to retrofit your precious barns for a new use. We would like to encourage you to send us pictures and your contact information so that we can chronicle your story in these Barn Alliance newsletters.
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Letter from our President
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What a busy few months that we have had! We completed the 4th grade field trips in April and May. That is always such a treat passing on the appreciation of our heritage to a new generation. We hope that First Bank will continue to grant us the money to schedule the field trips in the next school year.
Our Art Gala was such fun in a new location with new artists and new friends met. We are well on our way to the money we need to rebuild the flue-cured barn at the Smith Farm. And, we had a great crew of volunteers remove the stored logs from one place to store in the burley barn at the Smith Farm. We hope to reconstruct it later this year.
The most exciting accomplishment (which you read about above) is the completion of the 10 Barn Memories, a grant project funded by the Hart Family Fund for Small Towns under the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Signs will be posted in the barns on the Smith Farm and all ten recordings are on our YouTube account.
We took a breath before heading out to Hot Springs for our booth at the Bluff Mountain Festival. That is always rewarding to share what we are doing with the folks who attend. The steady stream of visitors spent time learning the specifics of the Smith Heritage Farmstead site plan, purchasing baseball caps and other retail items, accepting drive-yourself brochures with maps of barns in six Madison County townships and learning of our accomplishments over the last 11 years. Of course, that was the scheduled quilt raffle drawing day, too. See the story below.
And, if that isn't enough, our new "teacher/photographer" Woody Eisenberg conducted not one but two photo workshops because we had the demand to add a second one. Attendees are already asking when he will offer another.
We look forward to continuing the energy for the rest of the year. So, check out our event schedule below. And, thanks as always for your support of our projects. We are successful because of YOU!
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The Old Barn “to be preserved, and to be used as an educational tool for people to know what we are all about around here, and where we came from. That’s what this barn is to me, a testament of where I came from. ” - Elaine Ray Thomas
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Weaverville Art Gala-- a smashing success
In the elegant Weaverville Community Center on Lake Louise May 26th, sixty-five guests mingled among paintings of rural landscapes and barns of yesteryear at the Barn Alliance’s third ‘Pastoral Palette’ fundraising event.
 Trays of delectable bites donated by Homegrown, Ingles, Whole Foods Market, Fresh Market, and Zuma covered the tables, plus beer and wine were donated by the Mars Theatre Brewing Company and the 5 Walnut Wine Bar, and multi-instrumentalist David Hughes kept the crowd entertained.
With 14 members of the Saints of Paint, an Asheville-based group of veteran artists, we split the proceeds, 50-50, and were able to net almost $9,000 from the evening. The money will be devoted to reconstructing a rare flue-cured barn, more than 100 years old, that was previously donated, disassembled and stored for future display at the Smith Heritage Farmstead in Mars Hill. When the airtight structure was dismantled in 2017, family members envisioned it becoming an educational tool for future generations. |
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Barn Tour Day features a new area
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On Saturday, September 9, for our annual Barn Day, guests will be shepherded in three small vans to barns in the Big Laurel/Upper Laurel section of Madison County, a new venture since we launched this event in 2014. Taylor Barnhill, ABA’s researcher, will guide everyone through structures from the 1800s to more recent times, one of which has been converted into a community center which has a library! Another is on the farm portion of the beautiful 158-acre Vero Mountain retreat.
The adventure will begin at 1:30 p.m. at the Ebbs Chapel Community Center, 281 Laurel Valley Road, Mars Hill 28754. Reservations are $45 per person ($40 for ABA members) No tickets will be sold at the door and reservations are limited to 36.
By 4:30 or 5 p.m., you’ll be back to have barbecue and sides plus dessert, and make your way through pottery, paintings, and other choices offered at a silent auction. In addition, the Barn Alliance will have for sale cutting boards and butter knives fashioned from the oak, walnut, poplar and pine in tobacco sticks from yesteryear, various prints and paintings plus ABA t-shirts, coffee mugs and baseball caps.
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Fourth graders luck out
when touring Smith Farm
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On gorgeous days March 30th and April 21st, fourth-grade students in Madison County, as part of their state-history studies, were treated to field trips at the Smith Heritage Farmstead, owned by the town of Mars Hill at the base of Bailey Mountain.
In advance of this excursion, Barn Alliance researcher Taylor Barnhill already had visited their classrooms to familiarize them with what would be in store: tours through three distinctive barns built in the 1930s and ‘50s. They would learn the difference in a livestock barn, a bank barn and a towering ‘burley barn’ built to let air in to dry tobacco before it was carted off to market. The crop was the backbone of Madison County’s economy for decades until a federal government subsidy to farmers ended in 2004.
As an extra treat, the students not only got to take a “mini hike” toward the Bailey summit (3,554 feet!) but also were given chalk and sketching paper to draw whatever they observed. You’d be surprised how talented some were! We encouraged them to return with friends and relatives over the summer and bring picnic provisions before heading back up the trail.
None of this would have been possible without the support of the Madison County school system, Barn Alliance volunteers, a grant from First Bank, which occupies the home in downtown Mars Hill that was originally occupied by the forebears of the Smith family, and Mars Hill University, which welcomed everyone to lunch in its cavernous cafeteria!
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Quilt Lover wins the raffle
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Our annual quilt raffle took place during the Bluff Mountain Festival June 10th, and the winner was Todd Blackley of Mars Hill. His wife Bobbie Pyron picked up the quilt a few days after since Todd answered the phone from a hike on the Appalachian Trail. Bobbie loves quilts because they are “a reflection of family and community.” Áine Brown, 14, of Marshall, who had the neighboring booth as the founder of Teens of Madison County (https://www.teensofmadisoncounty.com/) and daughter of a former ABA Board Member Chris, drew the winning ticket.
The quilt, ‘Mediterranean Garden,’ 82” by 82” was made by Cathy Bullman Stines, who grew up in the Sodom Laurel section of Madison and has been sewing since age 14. Quilting came along later when an aunt “helped me along with it.” Then she bumped into a cousin, Kathryn Zimmerman, who was highly skilled. Cathy had computer knowledge, “and we were off and running,” she told the ABA. She went on to show quilts at local fairs, then in Pigeon Forge, TN., “winning ribbons.” Now, she has slowed down but continues to produce more traditional quilts, “sewing most every day; it gives me great peace of mind.”
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Barn Photo Workshops-- fun & photos
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The two Barn Photography Workshops on weekends in June were led by ABA supporter Asheville photographer Woody Eisenberg and ABA researcher Taylor Barnhill. The participants were delighted by the experience and look forward to future workshops. Watch our calendar for dates. This is the best way to get close to these beautiful barns.
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Month of September: "Barns of Madison County" exhibit at the Madison County Arts Council, 90 S Main Street in Marshall. Opening night is Friday, September 1.
Saturday, September 9 from 1:30pm to 7pm: 8th Annual Barn Tour Day ticketed event. Tour barns in the Upper Laurel area of Mars Hill just off Exit 3 north of the town. Followed by a dinner & music at the Ebbs Chapel Community Center at Ebbs Chapel Performing Arts Center.
Saturday, September 23 from 10am to 4pm: Booth at the Bascom Lamar Lunsford Festival. Same day as the Madison Heritage Arts Festival.
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 Please forward this to an interested friend. |
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