art, Esarey embraced the creative challenge.
"Everything was there. It was just in bad
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of extraction than design. The barn that was
sitting there is pretty much intact as it was
originally built. There wasn't a whole lot of
new wood brought in. It was just cleaning it
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all the wood doors and all the paneling that
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Esarey tries to be budget-conscious, so a
lot of that work, he said, was able to be ac-
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without bringing in specialty contractors.
A particularly dense thicket of an invasive
species known as Chinese honeysuckle had
entrenched itself behind the stallion barn
over the decades. When it was cleared away,
Esarey discovered an equine cemetery that
had been rumored to be on the property
somewhere, complete with stone markers
dating to the early 1900s.
Esarey said he consulted old farm doc-
uments to pinpoint exactly where Man o'
War's paddock used to be.
"We knew which paddock was his. We re-
spected where the original fence lines were.
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Esarey said.
Esarey did have to make some concessions
to modernity. The iron gates and stone col-
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21st Century vehicles and equipment.
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that has been in the news quite a bit recently
because of the March 29 centennial of Man o'
