Picture of the day - March 25, 2007

An Old Barn In Washington County, Virginia

Today's picture features a dilapidated old barn that I came across while traveling down a rural Washington County, Virginia road yesterday morning. All of these nostalgic old barns have a story to tell, and I believe they tell it best through images such as this one. Except for the towns of Abingdon, Damascus and Glade Spring, Washington County has historically consisted primarily of farmland. Virtually every rural road in the county is lined with farms, some of which are little more than one or two small fields and a barn while others measure in the hundreds of acres. Many of these are family farms that have been passed down from generation to generation for a century or longer, with each succeeding generation proudly taking over as owner/operator when their loved ones pass on. But today the very concept of the family farm is beginning to fade into history as small operators find it increasingly difficult to compete with large-volume corporate farms and the importation of cheap foreign-grown food products. As a result, one family farm after another is being sold off and carved up into building lots and strip malls, and all too often these wonderful old barns are either torn down or left to wither away under the relentless onslaught of the elements. It saddens me to no end that my generation is witnessing the painful death of a once-proud tradition of the American heartland.    Visit the POTD Archives for previous "Pictures Of The Day"!     Submit a photo of your own!            Why I publish the "Picture of the Day"