The Red Barn
When I was growing up there were many of these barns in the area. A particular structure comes to mind when I pass one of these barns. It was known as the Red Barn. That's what it was called. It was a typical old barn along highway 41 just south of the county line. This barn was in better shape than most because the owners would have it painted by those advertising painters who traveled around painting barns with popular advertising phrases of the day. If you were lucky enough to have your barn close to a major highway you could get free maintenance in exchange for the use of the side or roof of your barn. The phrases they would paint would be such things as "See Rock City" or "Chew Mail Pouch." The Red Barn was always well painted and that's about the only use it got. Except for one other use.
There were three or four girls who lived in the house that went with the Red Barn. The house they lived in was not as nice as the barn. But it wasn't close enough to the highway to get free maintenance. The girls had a reputation of giving a "good time." It seems that on Friday or Saturday night you could go to the barn and hang out with the girls. School nights were not allowed and someone would chase you away if you went on any other night.
These stories were always told by the older guys. One time a friend and I decided to check it out. We had just got our license. He had a 1953 Ford and a full tank of gas so we took off on this adventure. We drove down 41 and got near the barn. We didn't quite have enough nerve to turn on the road to the house and so drove on by. We went down the highway a piece and turned around. Back we came and this time we made the turn. Toward the house we went. And past the house we went. This side road was gravel as were most of the side roads at that time. We went down the road and turned around. Back we came. This time we pulled up in front of the house. We sat in the car for a while. The procedure was to wait at the barn and the girls would come out. We got out of the car and walked to the barn. We stood there for a while and nothing happened. After another while someone came out of the house and told us the girls were gone.
I think we were relieved. We got into the car and made our usual Saturday night rounds. We did make another visit to the barn and found one of the girls at home. She came to the barn and we had a nice visit. After a while we left. Good time. What does that mean anyway?
