The Spring Hill Ranch barn: a $15,000 limestone barn with a windmill that did not last

The barn of the Spring Hill Farm and Stock Ranch cost approximately $15,000 to build. It is the focal point of the ranch’s cattle operation and, the Park Service says, one of the largest historic limestone barns in Kansas: 60 feet wide by 110 feet long, with approximately 19,000 square feet of floor space over three floors. It is now part of Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve.

Lithograph of the barn with its double-head windmill, from the Kansas Picture Book.

Three floors, three jobs

• Lower floor: a stable for cattle, horses and other livestock, with a tack room on the north wall for leather harness and saddles and a grain bin for oats.
• Main floor: storage for hay, wagons, harnesses and other equipment and vehicles.
• Upper floor: hay and grain storage, big enough for entire teams of horses and wagons. Wagons loaded with loose hay or grain drove up one exterior ramp and out by either ramp. Later owners also kept farm machinery up there.

Inside the barn, with grain-grinding machinery, a grain chute, a grain auger and other equipment visible. NPS photo.

The windmill

A large windmill with two heads and a 30-foot diameter was once attached to the barn. It could generate up to 12 horsepower, enough to grind grain and drive other equipment. The high Kansas winds threatened to tear it down, and in 1884 the owner dismantled it for good. An artist’s rendering of the ranch from 1887 still draws it back in its original place between the two upper-level ramps, and remnants can be seen in the rafters of the roof.

Changes in the 1940s

The barn was modified for modern uses in the 1940s. On the western side of the main floor a large auger was installed to move grain and feed into four 1,000-bushel bins on the upper floor, which took up the entire middle section. On the eastern side steel I-beams were added to strengthen and support the upper floor and the new bins, and smaller augers moved grain into feed trucks that backed into the barn through the eastern door. The main floor’s flooring was strengthened for the heavier vehicles, and the hopper for the large grain auger is on the lower floor.

The lower level, with stalls, hay, a wheelbarrow and leather harnesses. NPS photo.

The top floor, where historic machinery is stored. NPS photo.

The stone corrals

Stone walls south and west of the barn enclosed cattle during roundups. They were reconstructed to their original appearance by stone masons from Lexington, Kentucky, using traditional dry stone methods. No mortar holds the stones; only the weight and friction of thousands of stones hold the walls together.

Limestone corral walls. NPS photo.

Sources

• National Park Service, Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, “Spring Hill Ranch Barn,” https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/spring-hill-ranch-barn.htm; rewritten in hubnx’s own words. The page’s audio-tour telephone instructions are left out.