Ephriam Myers built this Barn 1862. He and his family owned it into the mid 1900's.

 

Article in From Newspaper from the Past

On a hill on the outskirts of Littlestown on the Gettysburg pike, is the old Ephriam Myers Farm , a thing of beauty for years.

Hundreds of motorists have termed the huge white barn the most beautiful example of barn architecture they have ever seen. The red brick house, with the long sweep of green grain in the field leading up to the white barn and with cattle grazing contentedly, the farm layout represents an attractive picture of idealized agriculture.

Edward Appler is manager of the farm, now owned by Mrs. George Stoner. The barn was built in 1862 by Ephriam Myers. Today against the top of the white side of the structure is printed in bold black letters. "Ephriam Myers, 1862."

The Ephriam Myers memorialized as the builder was the former Hon. Ephriam Myers, merchant of Littlestown who was one of the outstanding figures of the county for many tears.

Born in Reading Township November 29, 1823, Myers was a farmer all of his life, branching out into numerous other activities during his active career.

In April, 1846, he became a partner with his father in a general store in Littlestown. Later he became interested in the Littlestown Rialroad and was president for 12 years, during which time it was extended to Frederick. He also carried on an extensive grain and produce business at the same time with Dr. E. F. Shorb. He was an Adams county commissioner during the Civil War period. He was one of the persons who secured the incorporation of Littlestown as a borough, and was founder of Mt. Carmel cemetery. He was also a merchant and a founder and director of a bank.

But possibly his most lasting monument was the barns he built.

Versatile, he was bank director, railroad president, owner of three farms, proprietor of two businesses and represented Adams county in the State Legislature all at the same time.

 

Memories out of the Past by Charles Ross Appler Taken from the April 2007 edition of Appler FAmily Newsletter

I look back with fond memories to my childhood and adolescence growing up on what was once considered to be one of the “show-case’ farms in the area of Littlestown, PA. Located at the north edge of the town, one could not help but notice the imposing big white barn with it’s magnificent straw stack in front during late summer & fall as they made their way northward to Gettysburg on Route 97. It was built in 1862 by Ephriam Myers, a well to do citizen of that area. It had a substantial 2 story brick tenant house by the road surrounded by almost a dozen Norway maple trees and its was always my job to rake the fallen leaves- quite a chore! It had a beautiful porch along the front and side, overlooking the road and town. Here I was born and raised where my parents, Edwin U. & Myrtle B. (Snyder) Appler tenant farmed the nearly 200 acres. Since we were closer to the town school than the country school several miles up the road, my father paid a supplemental fee to allow my siblings and myself to attend elementary school in tow. My early chores were to bring the cows in from the meadow in front of the barn in preparation to milking, weeding the garden by the side of the tenant house, and hoeing Canadian thistles from the corn field acreage. During my adolescent years, I had to assist, whenever possible, with the regular farm work out in the fields. In winter, I trapped for muskrats in a small brook that ran from a spring in the middle of the farm and emptied into Sneeringer’s quarry across the road. In the early 1930's, the then owners of the farm was Sarah Jane Myers (Ephriam Myers’ daughter) who had married Dr. George Stoner, a medical doctor with the Public Health Service at Ellis Island, NY. They decided. To build a summer home on the hill adjacent to the tenant farmhouse. I remember playing in the partially framed house while it was being built. Like the imposing barn and tenant house, the summer home was an even greater showplace! I looked forward to the Stoners being in residence as I was paid to take their ‘wet’ garbage daily to feed our pigs in the pig barn. I also looked forward to being taken to the movies by their Black maid on her day off. I never tired of listening to Mrs. Stoner playing her antique rectangular grand piano or showing me her progress painting her many water color and oil scenes. I came to be good friends with their son, Dr. Herbert Stoner, a dentist of Baltimore, Md.. And their daughter Marian, who was married to Dr. Arthur J. Huey, an ear, nose & throat specialist of New York City. After the death of Dr. Stoner and Dr. Huey, Mrs, Stoner and her daughter Mrs. Huey lived there year round.