88 wooden barn cutouts tell about Ohio’s counties

By ALISON KEMP

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

CANFIELD — Voters had a difficult time choosing which decorated barn they liked best.

Wooden barn cutouts, decorated by each of Ohio’s 88 counties, are on display in the Grange Building at the Canfield Fair, and fair attendees can select their favorite.

The Holmes and Carroll counties’ barns were winning the contest, said Joan Anderson, a Mahoning County Farm Bureau volunteer.

The Mahoning bureau, and every other county farm bureau in the state, sponsored a contest to design the barns.

Two years ago the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation began the contest. The first cutouts were pigs. Last year, each cutout was shaped like the county it was representing.

Two unpainted cutouts were displayed with the decorated ones — with the words, “It started with this,” written on paper taped to the cutout.

Each artist displayed something related to the county, whether that was the type of crops grown or that Neil Armstrong (Auglaize County) was born there.

“It gives the people viewing it a picture of what is available in the state of Ohio,” said Shirley Kellgreen, promotions education chairwoman for the Mahoning County Farm Bureau.

Artists used materials such as wood and paper cutouts, and glass to mosaic tiles and paint, to adorn their wooden barns.

Educational display

Anderson said the display attracts people, which, in turn, teaches them something. A lot of the people who looked at the display did not know there are 88 counties in Ohio.

“I just think it’s colorful, educational,” said her husband, Alan Anderson, who is also a farm board volunteer.

The barns are also reminding people of their connections to farming, said Pearle Burlingame, the Mahoning bureau’s organizational director. “I’m hoping it makes people more aware of their heritage in agriculture,” she said, since agriculture is the No. 1 industry in Ohio.

Bernice Bell, a former Mahoning County resident who now lives in Zanesville, was excited to see barns selected for the contest.

“I love barns,” she said, because they are homey and remind her of her childhood.

The quality of the work done was impressive to Sandi Lang, a former Austintown resident who now lives in Milton, Fla.

“You could just say, ‘Way cool,’” Lang said.

The barns were on display at the Ohio State Fair at the beginning of August and will be shown at the Cincinnati Flower Show and at the Ohio Farm Bureau’s annual meeting in Columbus later this year.