Barn raising, Highland Creek, Scarborough, 1909. Image: Toronto Public Library
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Resource ID
8093
Access
Open
Credit Line
Toronto Public Library
Date of Creation
1909
Keywords
Program Category
Rights
Public Domain
Caption
Barn raising, Highland Creek, Scarborough, 1909. Image: Toronto Public Library
Description
The journals of Thomas Edward Hough, a member of one of Scarborough's early-settler families, describes life in the rural community in the early 1800s. Hough describes barn raising parties, where friends and family from neighbouring farms would gather to help build a barn.
Throughout the nineteenth-century barns grew in size, and became large and costly structures, difficult for one family alone to build. Barn raisings enlisted unpaid help from community members, a type of mutual aid, with an expectation it would be reciprocated when needed.
"Raising" refers to the task of lifting into place large vertical frames and connecting them with cross-girts (horizontal frames connecting end posts below the roof plate). Raising required many men to work cooperatively to move and properly place the heavy beams.