Lehman's Country Life

As part of our new addition to our Kidron store, we’re displaying 100’s of the many of the antiques we’ve squireled away over the years. We also added a few.

This somehow led me to a guy, whose name (ironically) was Guy. Guy called me about eight times raving about his 6 foot millstone. We kept trying to make a time to meet and somehow couldn’t make connections. Until we were done, he practically became the proverbial millstone himself!

Here I am with the giant millstone. Sorry I didn’t smile. I was standing in ice cold water and I was worried about getting shot or (worse yet) getting bullet pockmarks in my precious millstone!

Meeting Guy meant a three hour trip during our busiest time of year, but I eventually carved out the time to meet him. Thus began the great adventure of finding the millstone.

I drove to the little town near Lake Erie where the stone had been dumped by its previous owner. Actually finding a place to meet involved another four cell phone calls, which went something like this:

Guy – “I’m on such-and-such exit on the interstate, where are you?”
Galen – “I just got off the exit after that one. Should I go to the north or south?”
Guy – “Just find a gas station and call me from there.”

Two minutes later:

Galen – “I happened to pass a quarry. Is that it?”
Guy – “Does it have giant stone slabs like stacked up like sheets of paper?”
Galen – “Yes, but there’s no sign. Shall I wait by the ’sheets’?”

Five minutes later:

Galen – “Hey, where is the millstone? Maybe I can go look at it while I’m waiting.”
Guy – “I’m on Main Street, where are you?”
Galen – “The stacks of stones I found were north of Main Street. Where are you?”
Guy – “Well, there must be two quarries. Come down to Main Street. I can’t tell you where the millstone is because it’s down this long lane behind this place and I don’t know the address. I just know how to drive there!”

When Guy and I finally got together in the center of town, he jumped in and we drove west a short distance before he said, very tentatively, “I think you turn right here.”

Then, it was (as we say in Ohio) “around back” of a place called Wylie’s Lounge, past two muddy tractor-trailer rigs parked haphazardly at odd angles, down a muddy lane (ignoring the huge “STOP – TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED” sign) and around a corner. Between a rusty backhoe and a tilted equipment shed stood a giant millstone. By that time, I was fearing for my life!

But, it was worth the trip just to find such an amazing relic!

Stop at our retail store and see the giant millstone sometime when you’re in Ohio. I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I do. And you won’t even have to remember the sinking feeling I had when I drove by the giant “STOP – TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED” sign!

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I am a local artist and will resume painting at Lehman’s during store hours during the month of March in the Buggy Barn. For those of you not familiar with this project the Buggy Barn at Lehman’s is an actual post and beam Amish Buggy Barn that was dismanteled and reconstructed for their multi-media/demonstration room inside the store. We are recreating the atmosphere of being inside an actual buggy barn by displaying various props, tools, gardening implements and other things commonly found in a buggy barn. My contribution is the addition of the lively painted farm animals! It has already become a tradtion for families to bring their kids to the store to see the farm animal murals and stop for a treat at the cafe while mom (or dad) shop! All ages will enjoy this unique exprience but I especially enjoy seeing the children’s reactions to the playful scenes on their level. I am thinking some cute, fuzzy barn kittens are needed as well as a pair of wooly twin lambs with their momma! I will be posting work in progress photos here regularly. I enjoy your input so stop by often to see it take shape. If you are in the store please stop by to say hi! You can let me know if I missed a spot! For more picutures click on the Mural link on this blog to see whats been painted already.

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