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The Old Winegardner Barn
While Americans were busy making a living, many have awakened to the fact that a majority of the old barns on family farms across the country have disappeared and that many of the remainder are rapidly following. 'Grandfather's old barn' seems to have always been there. We are now shocked and dismayed to find it hopelessly tumbled down. Whatever it may represent to us, with its passing we lose a part of our agrarian heritage that cannot be replaced. It may be too late for many of these veteran structures, but there are those who are feverishly repairing and restoring a few that are left. Witness this old barn, the Winegardner barn, an excellent example of the few older ones destined to survive, built around 1832.
This story started when Johannes Harbard Winegardner (1713-1779), sailed on the ship "Two Brothers" from the Electorate of Palatine, Triers, Hapsburg, Germany and landed at Philadelphia in September 15, 1752. He first lived in Lancaster County, the Pennsylvania colony, and then ultimately settled near Leesburg in the colony of Virginia.
The patriarchal Johannes gave his Leesburg, Virginia, plantation solely to Herbert (equiv., Harbard, born 1752) his namesake, in his will. The older brother, Henry Winegardner (born 1750), inherited no land to give him a start, nor tie him down, and so 'adventured' to the then wild frontier. He pioneered near Gratiot, Ohio, resulting in that area's wide proliferation of the Winegardner name today. Herbert Winegardner and his wife Elizabeth Barb also soon followed to take up farming in Richland Township of Fairfield County, near what would become Rushville, in 1805-6. The farm site was selected so as to be near a reliable source of fresh water. The springhouse located near the WLRY studio marks that spot.
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