Jim & Patty Walker - 2281 220th St, Webster City, IA The Walker farm has been in the family since W.A. and Nettie Frohling purchased it from “grandpa’s” foster parents, J.L. Richardson. He was raised from the age of 4 years by foster parents because his mother had died and father and older siblings moved to Idaho. The barn was purchased from Montgomery Ward and shipped to Stonega from Washington. It was then hauled by horse and sled to the farmstead to be erected in the fall of 1919. The house was a Montgomery Ward “Countryside Style” home. Each cost around $3500. Patty Walker remembers neighbors talking about the dances that were held in the hay loft of the barn over the years.

The original function of the barn was for general livestock use. In the 1940s-50s it was converted to a dairy barn by Alvin Walker (Jim’s dad), and in the early 1970s Jim changed its use to gestation for hogs. Today it is used primarily for storage.

Patty Walker chose a quilt design to reflect the nearby wind farm. Walker looks out the kitchen window at the windmills often. The blades of the windmill pattern are painted red and yellow to reflect the colors of ISU since several family members have graduated from there, blue for the sky and green for the crops.