The Lost Art of Rural Life
Driving across this great land of ours I often find odd buildings and strange structures that I know little about. When I’m a in major city I usually just chalk it up to creative architects. However when I’m in the country I often have to shrug my shoulders and take into consideration that I’m sure there is a functionality for it, but having grown up in the city I can’t even guess what job it would help out with.
In the last few years this old log cabin in Goshen County, Wyoming about 22 miles northeast of Guernsey may be one of the more perplexing structures I’ve seen. Not because of the building itself, but because of the six telephone pole like posts that surround the building. Was there something else attached to these posts in the past? Maybe a deck. Seems a little elaborate to do scaffolding to repair a house. Was it a central hub for telegraph lines back in the day? Seeing as there are no other posts in eyesight, I’d say no. Was it for some type of wind, or snow screen to stop drifts on the house? Was it the most elaborate tinfoil TV antenna ever? I have no idea and as I said above, I just have to kind of silently wonder.
What I do know is that there is a ton of stuff & ways to do things that people have come up with in the countryside to help make their lives easier & their jobs more efficient and it’s slowly disappearing. Of course it’s not just happening in the rural areas. My two sons love steam trains and each time we visit a railroad museum we hear about how less and less people know what each value does, and just how to make them run properly. I live in a 118 year old house and I know the number of people who can actually work with plaster & lath as opposed to dry wall is shrinking each year. It’s part of what most of us might refer to as a “Lost Art”.
So the internet is a big place. Share these photos, ask around. I’m curious. What was going on here. Is it so simple you’re saying “silly city slicker”, or are you finding yourself showing this photo to the old timers at the local diner?
What’s your guess? Put it in the comments below. Hopefully someone out there still knows why this was done.
UPDATE: an hour after this was posted I got what is most likely the answer: Radio antenna support poles. Used for at least receiving a better signal, as well as possibly sending a better one.