Barn Raising Helps Build Community Friends And Family Won’t Soon Forget They Created More Than Just A Barn

When Nils Peterson looks up at the large timber frame, ridgepole and rafters, he sees more than just a barn under construction.

He sees Josh Henry, who helped him cut down two large maple trees in Pullman that form the frame, along with the crooked timbers salvaged by logger Larry Duff.

He hears the laughter of Marc Fleisher who asked Peterson when he was going to tell his friends they were about to lift 2,000 pounds of timber during barn raising.

Jim Hoar’s chuckles still linger after telling Peterson he cued up the movie “Witness” to the barn-raising scene for use as a training video.

Somewhere in the sweat, splinters and sunburns of a barn raising on a recent Saturday, the 100 friends and family built more than just a barn near Peterson’s home on Travois Way in Moscow.

They built a community.

And that community is something Peterson, and those who attended, won’t soon forget, even after the red paint and white trim have dried.

While it may be difficult for many to understand his reasoning for using timber framing, an antiquated style of building, Peterson said it’s all about choice.

Timber framing does not rely on nails and two-by-fours. Instead, whittled wooden pegs are used to secure joints and the frame is formed by fitting tenons - projections of wood - into mortises, without the use of power tools. Peterson’s building is patterned after a house built by architect Jack Sobon of Massachusetts.

“It’s a choice to do it in a way that forced me to rely on a community and gave all of us satisfaction in that exchange that happened on Saturday,” Peterson said.

Peterson, 41, who works in educational technology at Washington State University, and wife Krista Kramer are going to use the barn as a garage and put a furnished apartment upstairs. They hope to have it completed in about a year.

Included in the furnishings will be a scrapbook, Peterson said, documenting the history of the barn raising.

“I think we need to make more choices like this to build community and be thoughtful about our resources,” he said.