![]() ![]() “We’ve never actually worked for anyone who’s a dairy farmer,” he says. He’s showing me this one simply because he likes it the Conants aren’t clients of his. These days, most of the barns he saves end up being used for non-agricultural purposes. Lothrop earned a master’s degree in historic preservation, and his contracting company, Building Heritage, is in the business of restoring old barns. ![]() “But these barns aren’t set up for modern dairy farming anymore.” “They designed these things to last,” Lothrop says. Standing there in silence, it feels like we are in the hull of an old ship at sea. In the wind, the wooden beams and posts gently creak and groan. Once we enter the Conants’ barn, now empty of livestock, the space opens up majestically. ![]() I figure if I want to truly understand the relationship between historic preservation and the state’s dairy industry, I have to first deal with barns and cows. Let’s just say Lothrop was correct about my shoes. One cow, very curious about her visitors, slips free of the gate, and Lothrop and I spend a few awkward, messy moments guiding her back to where she is supposed to be. We enter through a more modern, adjoining cowshed, tiptoeing on the slick floor around a few dozen noisy Holsteins. This version dates to 1915, when it was rebuilt less than four months after a fire. It’s a windy, muddy spring day at the Conant family farm, along the Winooski River in Richmond, Vermont.īefore us towers the Conants’ huge, historic red barn, standing where a barn has stood since the 1850s. "You’re probably going to get some cow poop on your shoes today,” says Eliot Lothrop, as we climb out of his truck, along with his dog Cyrus. ![]()
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