Thanks to a special donation of transportation by White Brothers Trucking of Wasco, IL, Garfield Farm Museum has saved from demolition a rare circa 1870s limestone smokehouse that was located in Kane County’s Campton Forest Preserve.

Since 1982, when Minnetta Barber, a professor and great granddaughter of Timothy Garfield, bequeathed her household belongings to Garfield Farm Museum, museum founders were aware of the unique stone smokehouse that stood behind her maternal grandfather’s (Gunnar Anderson) home. She had sold below market value in 1970 her family farm to the Kane County Forest Preserve to establish Campton’s first preserve.

When existing structures on preserve property were being considered for removal, an opportunity arose to preserve the smokehouse by moving the building to Garfield Farm Museum. For five years, museum organizers sought ways to preserve the building. Grandnieces and a grandnephew came to the rescue by providing seed monies in memory of Ann Barber Megaw to be used for the building’s preservation, but a challenge remained: Building movers were hard-pressed to figure out a way to move the building and keep it intact.

The problem was twofold. First, it was a stone building with no sill plate, so jacking it up and slipping steel I-beams under the foundation would not work as the stones would just fall away. Second, several exterior cracks with lost mortar made the building a particular challenge. Expense and risk would be hard to judge due to this difficulty. After exhausting several possibilities and consulting with stone masons and other building experts, the project went on the back burner.

How it returned the front burner — and ultimately got done — is a saga of perseverance, cooperation, American ingenuity and down-home generosity.

Finding a Way

When barn restorationist Rick Collins of Trillium Dell Timberworks from Knoxville, IL, was brought in to restore the museum’s 1842 barn, the smokehouse came up in casual conversation, and Collins asked to see it. He had moved several small stone buildings in Lockport, IL, when a museum village was forced to relocate. Seeing the sloped terrain, the off road nature of the site, and the troublesome exterior cracks in the walls, Collins said it could be done.

Three dominoes fell quickly at that point. Underwriting came forward from a concerned donor, Kane County Forest Preserve President Mike Kenyon endorsed the idea, and when and the full Forest Preserve Board approved the concept in May, the race was on.

The key to the plan was to create a “floor” under the 5-by-10-foot, 8-foot high building with steel beams. The beams would then be attached to dollies to be moved down the highways. This required digging out a 30-foot-wide area, 7 feet into the slope. Standing what looked like a fragile pillar of sandy gravel and clay, the first of several worrisome days began throughout the spring and summer season.

When a downstate associate of Trillium Dell looked at it to plan the move, several realities began to surface. The building stood only 8 feet tall, and the steel below surrounding the pillar of dirt — now replaced with wood cribbing and shims — added 6 more feet. Bring in the 3-foot-high dollies (semi-trailer like wheel assemblies) ,and the height approached 17 feet for going down the road.

Because the beams the dollies would be 24 feet wide, it became clear that it would be necessary to shut down highway traffic, which brought it another series of logistical challenges, including finding the most-direct route, acquiring special permits, requesting state trooper escorts and figuring how to avoid overhead utility lines.

“Time and time again, several individuals from different professional trades kept saying it would be great to just pick up and put it on a truck,” said Jerome Johnson Garfield Farm Museum’s executive director. “This was a hopeful thought, but could the building, the steel framing withstand such a move? It was not a hopeful time.”

That was when museum officials recalled a long time friend.

Enter White Brothers Trucking

Since the 1930s, White Brothers Trucking of Wasco, IL has been in the business of providing “great rides.” Growing from an agricultural based trucking firm to one that specializes in hauling outlandishly over-sized loads, nationally and internationally just like the assistance you can get from a full trailer load service by TS Europe, the results were always met with great customer satisfaction, as well as getting their good in one piece and on time.

Since the 1980s, White’s firm had helped keep a 1970 International Harvester farm truck running for the museum. In 2002, he himself drove a semi so the museum’s Americorps volunteers could disassemble and move an 1840s hand-hewn barn from Plainfield, lL. Having grown up in Wasco, he offered his trucking services free of charge, right down to obtaining necessary permits.

“This made all the difference,” Johnson said.

According to the plan, the smokehouse and steel would ride near but under most wires, and it would only stick out a couple feet from the side of a double drop trailer. Perhaps such a low riding trailer might clear the terrain. Now the question became whether the building could be picked up.

Dan’s Crane of Wasco took one look and said, “yes,” but a call came from staff at Trillium Dell expressing concerns about the weight of the building and steel. Conservatively, the building was estimated to weigh 36,000 pounds — beyond the abilities of the 40-ton crane.

White Brothers suggested O’Donnell Crane of Cortland, IL, which sent in a 115-ton crane. “Again with a very favorable consideration for the museum,” Johnson said.

Wrapping it up tighter than any Christmas present, Trillium Dell Timberworks went to paneling the interior and exterior, bracing the little smokehouse from inside and strapping it outside with 2-by-4s. More welds and steel were added to the steel superstructure. With less that 12 hours to go, Tom White, Jim’s son, came down from the Milwaukee terminal to check out all the safety issues of transport. Looking at the steel beams which staggered and needed a 25 foot long trailer, Tom said, “Cut off 18 inches on the one beam.”

That did the trick, allowing it fit on a special low trailer that had hydraulics to raise it above the uneven ground and the sharp crest of the driveway.

At 9 a.m. Friday Oct. 26, the monstrous O’Donnell crane began slowly put tension on the heavy cabled straps looped over each end of the two steel beams under the smokehouse. Would all the work and precautions hold?

“For all the crew it was the most tense time,” Johnson said.

Slowly the beams came off the cribbing, more gently than a child in a swing, the 10 tons of stone and mortar, the 3 tons of steel and rigging rose and in an arc, gracefully pivoted towards the White Brothers trailer.

“Not a sound, not a creak could be heard, just the pulse of the diesel engines in the crane and semi, as it sat down on the trailer,” Johnson said.

Secured, the truck pulled forward out of the low ground clearing the shoulder of the drive seamlessly climbing the drive on its approach to IL Route 64. With traffic paused, it headed out on its nine-mile route via Route 47 and Route 38 to get to its four mile away destination, the museum’s Edward Garfield/Mongerson Brothers Farmstead. With the crane going ahead, setting up at the farm, by noon, the smokehouse was unloaded and sitting on terra firma once again.

“Thoughts ran through everyone’s mind how it could have turned into a pile of rubble at any point, but all the great help and good spirits got it safely to its destination,” Johnson said. “It could have been taken apart stone by stone and meticulously rebuilt, but the very thing that made it special — the historic mortar that held it together for over 130 years — was the fabric of the building that dated and told its real story.”

It is a story of skill and forgotten methods, of surviving here on the prairies of Illinois, when just finding a way to preserve food for the winter ahead was a life skill few Americans understand or appreciate today.

The smokehouse will be restored and Johnson said it will someday be put to the test, curing some tasty hams or bacon.

Special Thanks

The museum thanks the Kane County Forest Preserve Commission and staff, Trillium Dell Timberworks, White Brothers Trucking, O’Donnell Crane, Wasco Nursery, Campton Hills Village Police, Campton Township Road Commission, Martin Implement, Neal Anderson of Anderson Building Systems, Bruce Sims of Long Eared Livery Service, and museum volunteers for all the assistance and consideration.

About Garfield Farm Museum

Garfield Farm Museum is a 375-acre historically intact former 1840s Illinois prairie farmstead and teamster inn being restored as an 1840s living history farm and inn museum. Donors from more than 3,500 households in 38 states have donated funds and labor to help preserve this National Register Historic Site. To help in the effort contact 630 584-8485 or info@garfieldfarm.org. Garfield Farm Museum is located in Campton Hills, IL, five miles west of Geneva, IL off ILL Rt. 38 on Garfield Road.

SOURCE: Garfield Farm Museum press release