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NPS Form 10 -900 -a - OM8 Approval No. 1020.0018 (8-86) _ United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number 7 Page 2 Wertz— Bestte Farm St. .Joseph County IN The interior of the house. never ornate. survives virtually intact. The original doors (photo 5). surrounds. and stairs. which appear to be of walnut. all remain.. Most are painted, as they likely would have been from the start. ti:e doors are stained and retain their original hardware. Spat -ally the interior remains essentially the same: the lead — bearing walls are bricl'.: covered with plaster. The basement. which may have been duct in the 1880s. has wails of rubblestone. Its - 1 cr retains an embedded brick circle where some -early heating source once stood. for in the floor above the circle was a crate. The aabled frame barn (photos 6.7) is appro;x i:uately three— and - a- half stories h :ah and contains two 1,vels. The uprer level has two rows of tall. narrow arched louvered openings on the east (see photo 2) and north side-, only: it .is entered on the north un a reinforced earthen bank (the concrete abutment was surely added later) through tall double doors ( photo 6). The larcre oven space looks much the same as when it was used to store hay. Tire upper level is cantilevered over the lower on the south (photo 7). forming a shelter where, no doubt. there once were animal pens. The lower level has windows on all but the north side (owing to the bank). which are four- lial ?t sashes with peaked surrounds. Inside (photo 8) there are several wooden ,tanchions_ and stalls with hand —hewn uptiaht beams. and set apart with work benches and spaces for specific farm tasks. Some of the tailing joists appear simply to be tree trunks with some fraaments of Nark still remaining. scarcely hewn at all