490 Vankirk Road, Newfield

Barns are notoriously hard to research. While homes and businesses are documented fairly specifically in deeds, building permits, and miscellaneous ephemera, structures like barns and sheds have always been built, altered, and demolished more quietly. Some documentation on this barn has been found in the 1866 Stone & Stewart Atlas of Tompkins County. In 1866, this was listed as the E.A. Curtis Farm. It was located in an unnamed small hamlet between Newfield and Poney Hollow. Given the date and location, this probably served as part of a subsistence-level farm and was added to later to allow higher-volume production of goods like milk and wool.

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