In 1982 when I was about 15, dad helped me a bit (free material) and I supplied the labor to build the place. Oddly enough, I recall things like the first time I had a hangover or the licence plate number of my first car (DTW 879) but I remember little of the actual construction.
To the left and behind it, you see another shed with a low roof, I recall building that one for firewood storage. We also had our boiler for maple sap in there. That got moved when mom and dad moved. Behind my shop and leaned against the wood shed was the chassis and parts of a 1967 Ski Doo I parted out, along with some bicycles, lawnmowers and such. All is long gone and hauled for scrap. I left home in late May of '85 and ended up in first Florida and now coastal Georgia.
I do remember mixing the cement one mixer load at a time, shoveling in sand, adding the water, dumping bags of Portland cement in, then dumping it in to a wheelbarrow and wheeling it in to the form. I know I did not do it all in one shot. I believe the walls were pole construction and the slab floor poured afterwords.
As one can see it was built of rough sawn boards. If you look closer on the left, you can see a recycled door for entry. There was a potbellied wood stove for heat in the left rear corner. Due to the lack of insulation and paper thin fiberglass panels in the doors, it never really got warm in there on a cold Minnesota night while working on something on the workbench (still there!) along the back wall. "CLASS OF 85" is spraypainted on one of the inside walls. Kinda makes me feel old and rediculous at this point. :)
It was about 12" x 24'. At one time there was about 24' more of open pole shed to the right we used to store hay for the critters we had on the place at the time. I guess dad tore it down along with the small barn (constructed about the same, quickly thrown up with rough sawn boards and lots of recycled doors and windows)
My Forney 180 arc welder was wired up with enough cable to reach outside the big doors to do some repair on our various 1940's farm machinery used on our hobby farm (this was the 80's) and it always needed some sort of repair.
That's not a pic of the actual welder, mine was not as nice. Paid $45 for it from a local junk man and with the replacement of a few of the jacks (plugs) it worked great. In fact, it is in the garage (or was) of the current owners of the place. Maybe one day I'll bug him to sell it back to me! I really wish I had more pics from back in the day of the construction or possibly some of the door flung open and tools scattered about, but I had no camera at the time and this was loooong before handheld smart phones could record all.
Hopefully I'll get back that way in November for some deer hunting and get a few more pics.
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