The Republican., 1900-11-22
A CHEAP MOVING.
Big Barn of "A Maine Farmer Carried
Down Hill by RainstOrm to
Desired Location.

Forty years ago Abel Chick came out
to Beddington, Me-, and put up house
on top of the Whales Back, intending
to run it as halfway hotel on the
old airline road from Bangor to Calais.
He did fair business until the Euro
pean & North American railroad was
pushed through the woods from Bangor
to St. John. n. b., where the Canadian
Pacific caught up the passengers and
whirled them to Calais in less time
than a horse could travel from Bangor
to Chicks hotel. After shat, as his
patrons fell away, Chick took up farm
ing. He cut large quantities of hay, which
he sold to the operators who were going
into the woods. His buildings. how
ever, stood on top of the steepest hill
in New England the land sloping away
on both sides like the roof of a house,
says an eastern exchange.
Chick had a great barn on the hill
top near his home. but hauling hay up
the ascent took off all the profits. For
several years he stacked his crop where
it was cut. Then the deer hunters
came, pitching their tents and kindling
their fires in the woods near by, and
the fires spread, consuming the stacks
before the snow fell. AS Chick could
not afford to lose his only means of get
ting a living. and as the companies
would not insure hay in the stack, he
made up his mind to move his barn
from the hilland pace it on the meadow
in the middle of his hay fields. All last
summer he worked many days hauling
stones and getting out timbers for
foundation on which to rest the barn
after he had guided it down the hill.
He finished the job about October l.
Then he spent a few days in making
cables fast to large trees in order to
control or check the progress of the
building, should it attempt to take the
descent on a run. On Saturday prepa
rations for the hazardous labor were
completed Monday morning it was
raining hard, so work was delayed un-
til the storm should clear off.
Early Tuesday morning Chick start
ed for his barn with lantern to feed
his horses. When he arrived where the
barn had been for more than 25 years
it was not there, though there was
| hole in the ground to show where the
| cellar had been. A barn that was 100
feet long, 40 feet wide, and 20 feet high
would seem an easy thing to discover
in an open country, but Chick hunted
for more than an hour before he found
what he sought. The barn had been
| lifted off its underpinning and put on
| long timber shoes so it would not plow
up the land in its path. During the
night the rain had penetrated the clay
| bank where the barn had stood and
had made it so soft and squashy that
| the entife hillside had concluded to
move down to the meadow. The barn.
which was on top of the mass of earth
sad ridden down the hill as safely as
a privileged spectator on board a new
| ship al the launching.
The portable hill of clay had stopped
| about a quarter of mile short of the
| spot where Chick had built a founda-
tion for the barns reception, but as
the transported earth was in the form
| of hill, and lifted the barn far above
possible contact with water, Chick will
put in a few stones for underpinning
and let the building remain where the
| storm deposited it. He says the land
slide saved him an expenditure of more
| than 5000.