The Bormann barn was built back in 1896 when the Peter Klein family owned the farm.

Pat Bormann said on January 19, 1896, there was an article in the Livermore, Iowa Gazette that stated: “barn-raising at Peter Klein Farm last Monday. 40×56. 40 friends on hand to help.”

The barn, Bormann said was built for the family’s cattle and dairy cattle operation. The Klein’s continued to use the barn until Bormann’s great-grandfather purchased the farm in 1917.

“My grandfather, Nick was the first Bormann to live here,” he said. “He used the barn for cattle and dairy as well.”

-Messenger photo by Kriss Nelson
The Bormann family barn was built in 1896. Today, it still houses the Bormann children’s 4-H cattle and pig projects.

Two weeks after Bormann’s father, Jim Bormann graduated from high school, the dairy cattle were sold.

Bormann said although his father, Jim Bormann knew it was a good business decision, he was disappointed in the timing.

“He was upset that the cows were sold then, after he had been milking cows before school every day of his high school life,” he said.

In about 1970, after Jim Bormann got out of the cattle business, the barn was used to house gestational sows and for straw storage and then later used for feeder pig finishing after the farrowing was discontinued.

Bormann said during those years, they would put up 3,000 bales of straw per year in the haymow after one very hot day of baling each summer.

“We would use the straw up in a way that by winter we cleared an area to play basketball with friends on cold, winter nights,” said Bormann, adding his “city cousins” loved visiting to swing from a barn rope and fall into a pile of loose hay.

The aesthetics of the barn changed in the spring of 1989.

Bormann said a tornado ripped through the southern part of Kossuth and the northern part of Humboldt counties.

“It was a long, narrow destructive tornado that destroyed nearly 80 barns that day and other structures,” he said.

The storm caused significant damage to the barn, taking off the barn’s original gambrel style roof.

Although the insurance company felt the barn was a total loss, Bormann said the sides, foundation and even the hay mow were still in good shape, leaving it an effective use for a gestation sow building.

Bormann’s parents decided to hire a contractor to replace the gambrel roof with a simple truss roof, which has extended the barn’s life for over 30 years so far.

The family continued to finish hogs in the barn until about 10 years ago when custom feeding moved strictly to confinement buildings.

Bormann said since that time the barn is presently used for housing their children, Scott and Molly’s, 4-H cattle and pig projects, some chickens and continues to be a place for storing hay and straw.

Julianna Bormann said she enjoys seeing her children utilizing the old barn.

“They get out the old-fashioned elevator after the hay is baled and they help to get it to the upper floor. They have the radio on inside the barn for their cattle. They go out there daily and check them,” she said.

For Pat Bormann, growing up, he said he can’t consider the barn was the center of their farm as much as the farrowing buildings were, since they saw a lot more activity, however, he believes a farm should have a barn.

“Every farm needs a barn and we have a good one,” he said.