Limestone Barn at Big John Farm

Limestone Barn at Big John Farm

This barn is located on the north side of US 56 just east of Council Grove, KS. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 25, 1990. From the nomination form.^[i]

The Big John Farm Limestone Bank Barn (ca 1871-1872) is built into an earthen rise that runs approximately from east to west. The so-called bank barn measures seventy-six feet from east to west and forty feet from north to south and measures forty feet to the peak. The stone walls are two feet thick. The barn is framed with an unusual double truss design made of native oak.

Bank barns are commonly associated with Amish farms in Pennsylvania but are frequently found in other parts of the country. This is an old building type that has Western European antecedents. The Big John Farm Limestone Bank Barn is one of few extant bank barns in Morris County, Kansas. The internal double truss design supports the roof; the load bearing limestone walls are built around it. This type of construction has not been found in any other extant Morris County bank barns. The barn stands as the only remaining building that comprised the Morris County Poor Farm.

The barn is located about a mile east of Council Grove, just north of Highway 56. A private dirt road intersects with the highway and leads to the barn. The county land to the south of the barn is a closed sanitary land fill.

Seth M. Hays (1811-1873), the pioneer settler of Council Grove, purchased the property from Robert Gillespie in 1867 for $100. Gillespie has received a patent deed for the property from the United States Government in 1866. An 1894 Council Grove Republican newspaper account of Hays’ ownership of the farm credits him with improvements, noting that “He took pride in the place and spent a great deal of money in improvements.” The sale of this property, known as Big John Farm, occurred in 1877. The farms 160 acres were appraised at $2275. The appraisal and the newspaper account would both indicate that Hays very well may have been responsible for the barn among other improvements during the short time that he owned the property. The property sold ten times after that until it was transferred to Morris County in 1889 from Henry T. Hamer for $6000. The property was purchased by the county as a poor farm.

The barn fulfilled the poor farm’s needs until 1945 when the farm was leased out. An oral interview conducted in 1990 revealed that the weight of stored corn caused the west end of the upper story of the barn to collapse in 1928, breaking the floor and damaging the west wall.

The barn had been underused and not very well maintained for many years. A group representing the local chapter of the Santa Fe Trail Association, the Morris County Historical Society, the Council Grove Chamber of Commerce, the Community Arts Council, the Convention and Visitors Bureau, the Greater Morris County Development Corporation, and the Morris County Commission has formed to explore the restoration and reuse of the barn. Since Fall 1989 the south and east walls have been supported with wooden braces. The group has received a Preservation Services grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation to hire an architect or engineer to identify and solve all structural problems affecting the barn.

While the barn does suffer from severe structural problems the stone walls can be reconstructed and the settling problems can be solved. The barns retains a moderate degree of structural and architectural integrity.

The interior of the barn is defined by a lower level and an upper loft level. On the lower level, the floor joists run north to south and show signs of bending along the northern wall below the doorway. Hewn timber posts support the loft floor. Large hewn beams act as cross members in the structural support of the loft floor. One animal stall remains on the lower level. The floor on the lower level is dirt. The barn’s upper loft level is defined by several built-in ladders and the double trussing system. Tie rods run against the walls and from gable end to gable end.

According to the sign posted next to the barn, after the barn was placed on the National Register of Historic Places “walls were repaired, a new roof, drain pipes and windows were replaced.”

Photographs taken on March 1, 2025

[i] https://npgallery.nps.gov/AssetDetail/NRIS/90001576

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