Traveling the Highway

Traveling the Highway. Lincoln Highway Heritage Corridor. , Pennsylvania is well known for its beautiful farming country, fruit belts and unique barns. Many are located along the historic Lincoln Highway route. The Round Barn is one of the more unique examples., Considered an "endangered species," round barn architecture was developed by the Shakers, a religious sect, whose members believed the circle to be one the most perfect shape. After their old barn burned, the Noah Sheely family built this particular barn in 1914. To get more information on round barns, the family wrote to the Illinois Agricultural Experiment Station, and hired Architect Morris Rhodes of Chambersburg, PA., The incredible skeletal structure was built with ingenuity with manpower instead of high-tech, high-powered machines. Builder John Fritz bicycled five miles each day from his home in nearby Cashtown to work on the barn construction. The project took 256 barrels of cement to form the foundation and first floor; the circumference is 282 feet with a diameter of over 87 feet. The barn was constructed around a central silo measuring 60 feet high and 12 feet wide. Nearly 50 head of cattle and 16 horses or mules can be housed in the barn., Often the farmer was the first in a town to own a motorized vehicle. This "new" mode of transportation was extremely critical for the farmer to get his crops to market. The farmer could then build a trailer for carrying extra freight. Farmers believed motor vehicles could do the work of four teams rather than two.