-Farm News photo by Darcy Dougherty Maulsby
These bark-covered support timbers and beams give a hint as to the age of the barn.

WEST BEND — Some barn owners know exactly what year their barn was built. Others only have clues, like bark-covered beams or wooden pegs, that allude to the barn’s age.

Such is the case with Ron and Kay Brown, whose barn is located southwest of West Bend.

“Kay searched through tax records in the Palo Alto County courthouse to figure out how old our barn is,” Ron Brown said. “All we found was some information from the early 1890s that said the barn was in disarray and in need of repairs.”

This large barn stands right along the west side of the gravel road that passes by the old Riverside Cemetery, about 300 yards north of the barn. This area was among the first parts of Palo Alto County settled in the mid-1800s by pioneers like Allen Benton (A.B.) Carter.

“Before my family owned the barn, it belonged to A.B.’s son, Benton Carter,” said Ron Brown, who grew up on a farm south of the barn.

-Farm News photo by Darcy Dougherty Maulsby
The Brown family barn southwest of West Bend was built for horses, as it contains the remains of stalls, large feed bunks and mangers.

The original community of West Bend (southwest of the current town) was located close to this area, in the part of West Bend Township where the Des Moines River makes a sharp turn toward the west. (Old West Bend relocated to its present site when the railroad was built in the area in the early 1880s.)

Built on a ridge near an area called Walnut Grove, the Brown’s barn is nearly three-quarters of a mile from the Des Moines River. It’s a quarter of a mile east of Cylinder Creek, which flows through a timbered area just west of the barn.

“The old town of West Bend was about half a mile southwest of the barn, right along Cylinder Creek,” Ron Brown said.

Jacobs’ stagecoach stop was located about a quarter of a mile south and half a mile east of the barn, just east of a country schoolhouse that once stood in the vicinity. It’s clear the Brown’s big barn was built for horses (possibly as many as 60), based on the remains of stalls, large feed bunks and mangers inside the structure.

“I would love to have seen the barn when all the horses were here,” Ron Brown said.

The barn’s interior also reflects an era of barn building when mortise-and-tenon joints and wooden pegs provided the strength and stability to help these large buildings stand strong. “Many of the old beams in the barn are tree limbs with bark still on them,” Ron Brown noted.

During the Great Depression of the 1930s, men traveling the countryside looking for work would sleep in that barn at night before going on their way, he added.

A farmer named Eldon Fehr used to live in a large, two-story farmhouse just east across the road from the barn. This long-time tenant milked dairy cows and raised about 300 ewes.

“That house where Eldon lived has been gone for about 50 years,” said Ron Brown, whose father, Richard “Dick” Brown, bought some of the property in this area from the Carter family around that time.

Ron and Kay Brown and their son, Tyrel, bought 80 acres of property in the area (including the barn) about 25 years ago from Dick Brown. While they thought about demolishing the barn to put up a pole building, they decided against it.

“There was no way we could tear down this barn,” Kay Brown said. “You think of all the things this barn has endured, and it’s still standing.”

Through the years, the Browns have made various improvements to the barn, such as covering the front side of the barn with metal siding. Tyrel, a contractor, incorporated an American flag design into the metal siding, above the sliding doors.

“Barns are part of the history of Iowa,” Ron Brown said. “This barn is a local landmark, it’s interesting, and we’ll maintain it as long as we can.”