Barn, ca. 1962

Taken around 1962, this photo shows the Barn in its early "Art Barn" days. A campus map from the same year refers to the Barn this way. During the transformation of the building from Horse Barn to Art Barn, the sliding south-side doors were removed and replaced by what may have been an orange door, and windows were added at the level of the second floor. Photo courtesy of USU Special Collections.

This photo, taken ca. 1947, shows a whole bunch of barns that once stood where today only "our Barn" remains. The other barns you see in the photo were moved in the mid-1950s to make room for the Taggert Student Center and the other structures of campus as we know it today. Photo courtesy of USU Special Collections, H. Ruben Reynolds collection.

Calling all Barn Stories!

Dear USU Barn lovers:

As the director of the USU Museum of Anthropology, I would like to tell you about an exciting project we have initiated involving oral history collection of stories related to the “Art Barn,” also known as the “Horse Barn” and here, simply “the Barn.”

The Barn is located along 7th North, at the heart of the USU campus and abutting the large surface parking lot used to access the Taggert Student Center and University Inn. Since its construction in 1919, the Barn has been important in the lives of several generations of Aggies, and it has stood as a witness to nearly a century of historic and cultural change at Utah State University. Although a little worse for the wear today, the Barn still embodies our Aggie heritage, and we aim to document that heritage in all its richness and diversity.

We want to hear your stories of the Barn and what it has meant to you through the years. Perhaps you knew it as the Horse Barn in the 1940s, and you curried the manes of the horses housed there. Maybe you are a successful artist who learned to throw pottery or to paint in the Art Barn. Or maybe you were a Barn student recently, when it housed programs such as Psychology and Philosophy—you undoubtedly have stories too!

If the Barn is important to you and you’d like to help us learn about its history and what it has meant to the thousands of Aggies who have passed through its doors, we would greatly appreciate the chance to talk to you. Or rather, to listen to you and whatever you would like to share with us about your experiences.

Eventually (although only with your permission to share anything you tell us!) we will compile the history and personal stories we hear and relate them through museum exhibits and public presentations to interested groups. In the interim, we have started this blog where we will share historic and recent photos, anecdotes, and other nuggets of interest.

To participate in our Barn history and oral history project, please contact Anthropology staff assistant Holly Andrew at 435-797-0219 or Holly.Andrew@usu.edu. If you have photos, documents or anything else you would like to share, Holly can help with that too. And, of course, we invite your comments here at the Barn Blog. The more voices, the merrier!

Bonnie Pitblado