Down South: Barn Country
By Tom Poland
I love driving through the country and in rural areas I enjoy coming across old barns. Veterans of the Agriculture Wars, many show their scars and age. Now and then I see a barn that has a new lease on life. It’s been converted into a home or store, and one had become a modern auditorium. I’m glad to see them continuing to stand.
Many an old barn wastes away until it’s gone. The three states I travel most, Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina still have plenty of barns. Let’s hope it stays that way. I’d hate to see old barns go the way of tenant homes. I read that the director of the North Carolina Division of Historical Resources said, “North Carolina without tobacco barns would be like Holland without windmills.” That applies to Georgia and South Carolina too as barns in general go.
Instead of going on as I do, I thought maybe a small photo feature would give you a break. I find barns to be among man’s more beautiful structures. Metal barns constitute a trend. As for me, I prefer old barns like the ones you see with this column. Long may they stand.
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Tom Poland is the author of twelve books and more than 1,000 magazine features. A Southern writer, his work has appeared in magazines throughout the South. The University of South Carolina Press released his book, Georgialina, A Southland As We Knew It, in November 2015 and his and Robert Clark’s Reflections Of South Carolina, Vol. II in 2014. The History Press of Charleston published Classic Carolina Road Trips From Columbia in 2014. He writes a weekly column for newspapers in Georgia and South Carolina about the South, its people, traditions, lifestyle, and changing culture and speaks often to groups across South Carolina and Georgia, “Georgialina.”