Folk Architecture - Siding

Exhaustive investigation of southern Indiana log buildings led Warren to believe that many had received a covering of poplar clapboard siding at the time they were built. This was not ornamentation for ornamentation’s sake, but rather a pragmatically functional solution to the problem of rotting logs. His position challenged long-held beliefs and restoration practices, such as those that led to the removal of original siding from log buildings in the pioneer village at Spring Mill State park. On field trips to the village, Warren instructed his students to look for nail holes and other evidence of the original siding.

 

 

 

The Albinus Wendholt farm in Ferdinand Township.

 

 

 

 

 

Folk Architecture


[Log churches were similar in construction to log houses], except for two important details. First, their doors are never in the long walls as they are in log houses, but are instead in one of the gable-end walls. Usually the gable-end of the building with the door, or doors, in it faces the road. The interior lay-out of the churches seemingly dictates this door placement. The pulpit is at one end of the church, usually on a slightly raised platform that has space for a choir. Rows of benches occupy the floor in front of the pulpit. It is convenient, therefore, to have the entrance to the church in the wall behind the benches. In this way the seating arrangement is not broken up and late-comers to the service can enter the church at the rear without disrupting the service. Some churches have a single door in the center of the gable-end wall while others have two doors in this wall. In those churches with two doors the sexes were separated during the services.

- (Log Buildings in Southern Indiana, 1996 rev. ed.: 149)
Warren E. Roberts