Tredyffrin Historic Preservation Trust

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NEW HOME FOR JONES LOG BARN AT DUPORTAIL IN CHESTERBROOK

Frens & Frens architectural renderings of the Jones Log Barn - cutaway drawing indicates how visitors may see the interior of the Jones Log Barn

In 2004, the Trust entered into a formal agreement with the Board of Supervisors to place the re-constructed Jones Log Barn at the Anthony Wayne Drive entrance of Wilson Farm Park rather than at the park’s Lee Road entrance as part of a proposed entrance building. A sign was erected at the new location to alert park visitors. The Trust engaged the services of Frens and Frens to design the structure and complete construction documents. The Trust has continued to raise funds to finance the project through fundraising events and through grants. The goal is to get those historic logs moved and put back together to re-create the log barn as it was built centuries ago.

The Township has provided space at its compost site along Cassatt Road for some of the logs and a barn in Valley Forge National Historical Park has provided a home to the rest. The lease with VFNHP expires at the end of 2009.
While Trust members were grateful to the Township for providing a location at Wilson Farm Park, when the opportunity arose for the log barn to be reconstructed on the foundation of another historic barn located near the home of another Revolutionary War General, it needed to be considered. In collaboration with the Board of the DuPortail House in Chesterbrook, the Trust has decided to reconstruct the Jones Log Barn upon the stone foundation of a barn that had been an addition to the Federal Barn located on that property. That portion of the Federal Barn was lost in a fire in 1985 and the foundation remains.

DuPortail House and the Federal Barn are National Historic Register properties. General Louis Lebeque DuPortail was General Washington’s field engineer and quartered at this home during the Valley Forge encampment. DuPortail House may become one of the destinations along the new Patriot Path being designed to connect VFNHP to Malvern. The reconstructed Jones Log Barn will have a much greater historic context at this location. The Township supports the decision of the Trust to rebuild the Jones Log Barn on the DuPortail property. That choice and their new relationship with DuPortail House represent the creation of an exciting future for these special historic resources in our Township.

The barn will be rebuilt as it was when the logs were first laid over 230 years ago and it will convey tht important time period in our Township's history. Imagine walking through that 'old log barn' and enjoying the educational element through ongoing exhibits - all within the framework of the barn's amazing architecture and history. Imagine all that it could become in its new home in the township.

Would you like to help rebuild the Jones Log Barn? Would you like to join one of the Build the Barn committees? For further information about the Build the Barn campaign and how you can get involved, please email Pattye Benson at info@tredyffrinhistory.org or call (610)644-6759.