John High demonstrates the use of an adz  —  the ax-like tool early American builders employed to roughly dress timbers.

At his booth in the main hall at the Pennsylvania Farm Show, the 47-year-old Narvon man shows onlookers a section of an old barn beam hewn by such a tool.

High turns the beam to reveal a mortise-and-tenon joint, made by laboriously carving out holes with a hand drill and chiseling out a section of the wood.

      The Barn Saver at Pa. Farm Show

The Barn Saver — his business name and often his nickname — slides a wood peg, or pin, into a hole to secure the joint.

"There could be 250 pins in a small barn," High said. "The Star Barn (in Harrisburg) has close to 1,000."

High appreciates the hard work and ingenuity it took to erect 18th- and 19th-century barns, some of which still dot Pennsylvania's rural landscape.

That's why he's trying to save them from disappearing, one barn at a time.

High deconstructs the barns to either be rebuilt as they were or as homes, or he sells the wood to be used in other projects.

It's a full-time business for High and his son, John Jr.

High didn't always save old buildings.

"Before 1990, I had to be the one to smash these things up," he said. He operated a bulldozer for a Chester County company that cleared properties for development.

Then, on the same day his wife was due to have a child and the United States launched Operation Desert Shield in the Persian Gulf, High was laid off permanently from his job.

So he responded to an ad in a local newspaper seeking someone to take down a mid-1800s house in New Holland, and The Barn Saver was born.

Since then, High has saved 300 to 400 barns, homes, sheds, corn cribs and outhouses, mostly in Lancaster County and throughout southeast Pennsylvania.

Each old barn or home he takes apart increases his appreciation for the structures and their builders.

He shows Farm Show visitors a nail and a screw that were made from recycled railroad cable.

One beam he cut through revealed a perfect star pattern, so High keeps it and shows everyone his "Christmas Star log."

He's even found evidence in some buildings that the structures were actually moved over 100 years ago.

Seventy percent of the barns that are rebuilt become homes, but High doesn't reconstruct them.

"I stay busy trying to save them," he said, adding that the recession hasn't hurt his business much, at least not yet.

High deconstructed a nearly 5,000-square-foot barn for Armstrong World Industries that will be reconstructed in Delaware County.

He's working on deconstructing a house, barn, equipment shed and mill house for Elizabethtown College.

It's not easy work and can be dangerous. High has a scar on his nose , a reminder of when he fell 20 feet from a beam in an old barn.

But High loves his job almost as much as some of his clients love the old barns and homes that are saved.

"I've had people cry when I took down their grandparents' barn that they played in as a kid," he said.

High dismantles many old structures board by board, numbering each one so they can easily be put back together when they are rebuilt.

Some barns in disrepair are too dangerous to take apart, so he carefully takes certain supports down and then uses cables to "lay over the barn."

Every structure he dismantles tells a story, sometimes an unexpected one.

On one job in East Lampeter Township, he found about 50 family photographs belonging to Sonny and Cher in a box in an attic.

Apparently, the famous singers left the box with a relative who lived in the house and forgot about them.

High returned the photos to Cher without charge, he said.

High doesn't know the ultimate use for all the structures he takes apart,    but actor Robert De Niro has bought some of the materials for reuse in New York state, he said.

In perhaps his best-known job, one yet to get under way, High will document and dismantle the Gothic revival-style Star Barn and its surrounding complex of outbuildings — a chicken coop, carriage house and pig barn.

The historic, white clapboard barn sporting a star-shaped louver will be moved from its location along Route 283 to a spot along Interstate 81 near the Hollywood Casino at Penn National Race Course.

In its new location in Lebanon County, the barn will become the centerpiece of a planned educational center devoted to agriculture.

High said he may take some of the smaller buildings apart this winter. He's hoping funds will be in place so he can start on the Star Barn next winter.

If so, he could finish taking it apart by the spring of 2010.


Staff writer Ryan Robinson can be reached at rrobinson@LNPnews.com or 481-6032.