|
Society plans old-fashioned barn-raising
By Rhiannon Meyers
The Daily News
Published September 30, 2009
FRIENDSWOOD — If Nathan and Mary Perry saw their farm house today, they might wonder: “Where’s the cow?”
The 107-year-old Perry House, one of the last vestiges of Friendswood’s Quaker heritage, has been fully restored by the Friendswood Historical Society minus two historic features — the milking barn and the family cow.
On Saturday, the Friendswood Historical Society will attempt to remedy the historic mistakes.
Society members and volunteers will rebuild the milking barn in an old-fashioned barn-raising, a throwback to the town’s Quaker days. They plan to use the event to raise money to buy the cow.
Society members have been eyeing a $5,000 life-size mechanical cow with lifelike udders that, when squeezed, emit a stream of artificial milk. The historical society wants suburban children to have an opportunity to experience what it’s like to milk a cow, member Mel Measeles said.
The society also wanted to give residents a living lesson in the town’s history, Measeles said.
The barn was the brainchild of resident Verla Perry, a descendant of Nathan and Mary Perry.
The Perrys were Quaker ministers in North Carolina and Kansas before moving to Friendswood. They finished their house, with the help of Mary Perry’s brothers, in 1902 using wood from trees felled by the 1900 Storm.
Like other Friendswood settlers, the Perrys had a farmhouse and a small barn just big enough for the family cow to stand in and chew hay as she was being milked.
By the time the Perry descendants donated the house to the historical society in 1994, the milking barn was long gone and the house was in bad shape.
The society has since restored the house and filled it with furnishings donated by the Perry family. The house, 109 W. Spreading Oaks Ave., is the oldest building in the city.
Society members already have built the frame for the milking barn. They plan to begin raising the walls of the 400-square-foot barn at 8 a.m. Saturday.
They will secure the walls to the concrete foundation already poured in place near the Perry Home, Measeles said. Society members will raise the walls one by one before putting on the roof and attaching cedar siding, he said.
The barn-raising won’t be exactly like those of 100 years ago: Volunteers plan to use power tools and install hurricane-proof metal straps from the roof to the walls, Measeles said.
Still, the barn-raising will give residents a taste of how their ancestors lived in the only permanent town in Texas that started as a Quaker colony, Measeles said.
+++
At A Glance
WHAT: Friendswood barn-raising
WHEN: 8 a.m. Saturday
WHERE: Historic Perry Home, 109 W. Spreading Oaks Ave.
DETAILS: The Friendswood Historical Society will have free breakfast and lunch during the barn raising
INFORMATION: To volunteer or donate toward the purchase of the cow, call Mel Measeles at 281-236-7345 or Steve Rockey at 713-854-3449
Share |
Save |
Mail |
Print |
Letter |
Comment
|
|
|
