…Holland and Springfield Township Recollections
Editor’s Note: The Holland-Springfield-Spencer Historical Society president Karla Miller submitted this Valentine story.
A Valentine Is Red But Not Heart Shaped
Since Mrs. Lydia (Sell) Krueger could not go back to the farm, her husband Carl finally brought the farm to her, building a little red barn in the backyard of their home in the city.
Carl Krueger, a retired foreman with the plant and engineering department of Western Union Telegraph Co., was a city boy all his life.
His wife, however, lived on her parents truck farm in Holland, Ohio until they married in 1932.
“It took quite a bit of talking but I finally convinced her of the advantage of choosing me and the city,” Mr. Krueger recalled. The couple lived in the south end neighborhood for more than 25 years.
Mr. Krueger considered living on a farm, but decided such a move would be inconvenient as they grew older.
So he constructed the brightly painted red barn, which is 8 by 10 feet wide and 10 feet high.
The couple designed it themselves after seeing store bought structures while traveling through Michigan. The manufactured models are often used as storage sheds.
Mr. Krueger invested about $550 and 40 hours of labor and, coupled with some old fashioned neighborliness from a friend, he completed the gift for his wife.
To add to the authenticity, he cut an entrance in the hayloft and hung a bale of hay from a rope attached to the roof.
Despite the urban mailing address, Mrs. Krueger’s lot is a natural setting for the little red barn which is surrounded by 54 rose bushes, 96 periwinkle plants, tomatoes, green peppers and cucumbers.
The Kruegers keep some miscellaneous objects in the little red barn, but it serves as more than a storeroom.
The red barn represents the heights some men will go to please the woman they love.
Sadly, Carl passed in April 1981 and Lydia in July 1981, but the barn is still standing, although it is no longer red.
