In Treasure & Filth, I described how John had to manually dig a new cellar hole under the Big Room. Each five gallon bucket of earth that he dug was dumped in the bucket loader of the tractor and then dumped out in another section of the property. The little kids, Catgirl and Ironman, had been waiting impatiently for their tractor rides, and these small trips were the perfect time. John let them steer all the way out to the dumping site and back. They were simply thrilled!
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The following is text from the Crystal Lake Falls Historical Association Museum of Education and Industry in Barton on the history of the granite quarries on Barton Mountain. The source of the text is unknown. All photos were taken with permission at the museum. In the future I will be photographing the sites and visiting the quarries that I can find.
The quest for riches from the land has often been at the back of the minds of settlers in this country and the same was true in Barton. In 1858, The Independent Standard of Irasburg reported that gold had been discovered in Barton. With the California Gold Rush in a tailspin, the find was greeted with guarded optimism. Although mining gold never proved to be a lucrative undertaking in Barton, the town did benefit from another mineral resource.
Source: unknown
Harrison Avenue next to the Bank Block.
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These photos are from the beginning of the restoration of the Big Room, which was an addition to the house sometime between the 1960 to 1990. The Big Room used to be a woodshed attached to the house. Then a one car garage was added. Then that was all torn down and a three car garage was added to a room that was attached to the house. In the photo above, you see old insulation that was riddled with mouse runs, nests and feces. The insulation was taken from under the floor. The foundation of the room was attached to the stone foundation of the house. The joists of the floor were on little piles of stone and brick and was about to fall over. The studs in the walls were hanging from the roof and mostly were not attached to the floor. Below you can see an insulated heating duct that was not connected to heat. And was not insulated. And used 10 times as much duct as required.
Under the floor was a slimy cellar hole. There are concrete walls from the old garage. But the earth was not excavated deeply enough for a person to crawl underneath and repair anything. And household trash from the beginning of the 20th century was found under the floor joists. There was a white mold growing over the wet soil. John scraped all of the mold off of the dirt and disposed of it in the sun outside. He then dug out over 600 five gallon buckets of earth to create a true crawl space. I was able to help but disappointedly dug out only 32 half buckets. There were many boulders from the old house foundation that had been tossed in. The granite for the boulders had been quarried on the Barton Mountain granite quarry up the hill.
There were a lot of mechanical items found under the floor: a spring, a sewing machine motor that would, if it worked, run my Singer machine, license plates from the thirties and forties from Connecticut and Vermont (the Vermont plates were unsafe to save), a cast iron barn door hinge and many other farm implements not shown here.
A lot of bottles were found (above). From left to right: a wine bottle, a Listerine bottle, a Minard's Liniment Bottle from Framingham, MA, and a blue green electrical insulator (found buried in a stream bed outdoors)._/\_/\_
v. 12 WAI DO THEY SPEEK DIS WAY?!?! WAI?
Psalm 104 1 Hai Ceiling Cat, I praizes u! U iz so kool, u wearz koolnez!2 He is all wrapppd up in prety lites, and rollz out teh Ceiling liek tentses 3 and he gots a penthause up there. Ooo! He ridez in ur clowds, and surfz in ur windz. 4 Teh windz even talkz 4 him, n teh firez doez what he sez, srsly! 5 Ceiling Cat made teh Urth on teh fl0r, and u karnt mez it up. 6 Teh watr wuz all ova it, rite up 2 teh mntns. 7 U screemd and teh watr wuz gon; u just yelld n ther it went - 8 the mnts went up, n teh vallys went dwn - in teh plais u wantd. 9 Yew dun mess kz? R-Lce yew gun go outsidez, k? 10 Him maek da big cheezbrgr flow tru da Urth. 11 De guna geeb yew phude, ya. 12 Dem berdiez gun geeb yew da harblz. 13 Ceiling Cat geeb da Urth da gud meelk, den hee sleepz leik slaxxor. 14 He made graz for awl teh m00c0ws, and erbs for man so that he may get the munchies. 15 He made likker to get peepul tyred 4 teyh can has cat nap, oyil to maek greesy ph00d fer speshul hang-ovahs, and bred. 16 Him mek sum trees grew in sum hole in teh Midul Eest 17 Burd make nests 4 yung ph00dlingz , storks liv in fur trees. 18 upgrayded ram satz on hillz ses, "oh hai, Celing Cat made tis 4 muh u can go now." 19 The moon trakz sezinz, and the sun kn0ez when him taek nap. 20 Ceiling Cat teh awlmitee maeks it nite, and moocows and udder stufz comes out of the forest. 21 yung liyins com owt and seek Ceiling Cat's cheezburger but Ceiling Cat has tuh ses, "wtf i luk liek i not walrus u dont steel frm muh, gtfo ur goin Basement, k? thnxbai." 22 Wen sun c0me up tey go to crib for litul wilez. 23 sunz 0f adum work awl day and rest teh bownz al nitez. 24 Ceiling Cat has butt lowdz of cheezburger and cookie but He dont giv to teh pepul dey maek invizbul error 25 In the oshinz dere fishiz but sumtimz fish slip way so u get no ph00dz, but u can praize Ceiling Cat 26 Leviathans eated ships and efurt, but not Ceiling Cat's yawt were he be tokin with the lyunz at nite. 27 teh ppl say, "Ceiling Cat, are hungry." Ceiling Cat ses, "Oh oh butt u do aks of wurship then ph00dz, k? bai." 28 He fez tey by hand 29 He luks away then pops a cap in tey sinful self. 30 He comes to teh tiny urf, makes fudz, and it lives 31 Ceiling Cat lives 4evah, so don't think you can dis Him and get off 32 Him peekz lookz at the 'urf' and she trembles, he touches the 'hills' and tey smok. 33 You gotta rap the good rap about Ceiling Cat, or else he's gunna curze wiminz agin. 34 "Mi meditashun of Him be sweet: I will b glad in the Ceiling Cat teh almitee." 35 Dun be dumb, geeve Ceiling Cat ur soulz, will gib cheezbrger |
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A raccoon track on the raccoon trail_/\_/\_
We've had to plant pansies in my ancient pot by the front stoop three times now. The crazed beagles dug them up two times. The dogs' leads have now been moved so they can't dig up the pansies anymore. (Crazed beagles can't be allowed to run free. I did that once during a blizzard, thinking that even crazed beagles wouldn't stay out long. Wrong. They were out for two hours, disappearing into the whiteout. I saw them chase the plow, and they finally came home and brought back some dead moose or deer bones from the woods. They were so proud.)
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This mill pond and mill are at the outlet of Crystal Lake in Barton Village. I once thought I knew which mill this was, but I’ve been told I’m wrong. Crystal Lake empties into the outlet on the left. At the right of the pond, the water rapidly goes over five falls (see the photo below). The water goes under E.M. Brown’s (our hardware and seed store) because they used to grind flour.
E.M. Brown is the building on the left. Below you can see the water leaving the cellar of the building.
As you walk down Water Street, following even more falls where over ten mills once operated over one hundred years ago, you come across the vile Japanese knotweed (below).
The mill falls along Water Street show many ruined foundations of mills that were on the bank.
In the photo below, you can see E.M. Brown’s store above the mill falls. The Brick Kingdom trail goes behind E.M. Brown and down the other side of the mill falls through the now wooded area where there were many other businesses, including a Steinway Piano factory that made the key works, a brick yard and the Peerless Underwear Factory.
Some old mill relics by the side of the falls and by the side of Water Street. Below is one of many mill wheel shafts that are abandoned by the falls.
There are also a few pylons that were the foundations for old mills. The water was able to run underneath the mill and power the mill wheels.
The Brick Kingdom (named by students of the Barton Graded School) is a fascinating piece of history that is right in the middle of Barton Village. It needs to be upgraded and a complete and clearly written guide need to be available. Trail markers explaining what a visitor sees would be most helpful.
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I found an unidentified bird nest when I entered the bog.
May Brook runs deep in the meadow. There are places where the water is five feet deep! It runs very clear and cold. The meadow is riddled with beaver canals that run straight out of the beaver pond. The brook has curves and deep banks.
Our house on the side of Barton Mountain as seen from the bog. On the top left of the ridge, you can see the clear cut for the old Unicel tower. That tower was invisible until they cut the trees from around it.
In the photograph above, and even better below, you can see that the beaver pond is five feet above the level of the meadow. You will see how in the following photographs. The mare’s tail clouds (cirrus clouds) were the incoming snowstorm that we had most of the week after these photographs were taken. It was beautiful on the day we were in the bog. But it was ugly the rest of the week!
I hope that you can clearly see that the surface of the beaver pond is higher than the meadow. It is a full five feet higher!
Here is the beaver dam. The dam has stopped the water of May Brook so that the meadow floods.
Above, you see a wider shot of the meadow, pond and dam. The ridge behind the meadow will lead you to May Pond, where May Brook originates.
For me, the most fascinating part of the day was seeing the mud walls of the pond. After damming May Brook, the beavers made mud walls all around the pond. They scoop the mud from the pond bottom, and then pat the mud so that it makes a thick, solid wall. You can see their paw prints in the mud. This mud wall makes the pond five feet higher than the surface of the surrounding meadow.
In the center of the photograph above, you can see a beaver turd in the pond water. It is solid so that it does not contaminate the water.
I have always wanted to explore the bog. I am braver with John by my side. He knows the legalities of entering a wetland and he can read the animal and plant signs about him. We plan on going frequently in the future to learn more about the fish, mammals, birds and insects in the bog. See my previous post Vermont’s Class 1 & 2 Wetlands to learn more about your wetland area.
I love taking photographs of our house from all sorts of vantage points.
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