A country retreat was all Bob and Kim Brinkmann were after when they purchased a 110-acre property complete with barn and home in Defiance. Not until after the papers had been signed did the new owners discover its rich history. (It once housed a member of the Daniel Boone family!) Three years later, the home and barn have been lovingly restored into a place perfect for sharing with family and friends.
T&S: Do you live in Defiance full time, or is it more of a weekend place?
Bob Brinkmann: It’s a weekend place. We’re there about four days a week almost year-round. We had another farm out in New Haven, but it was too far to come to work, and we wanted to retire in the Defiance area.
T&S: Tell us about the property’s history.
BB: We think the barn was built between 1801 and 1808, and the house between 1843 and 1850. Both were owned by Jonathan Bryan, who was a cousin of Daniel Boone’s wife, Rebecca, and was raised by the Boones. The barn actually was used as a gristmill, and Daniel helped build it—he was a mason, among other things, so he helped with the stonework. The stone all came from the area. There’s no sign of a quarry nearby, so we think they just scraped up the ground and got stones from the surface.
T&S: What was the process like for restoring the barn and home?
BB: We fixed it up in the first six or seven months after we bought it. I own a construction company, Brinkmann Constructors, so the process wasn’t hard for us. The barn had hardly been touched in 206 years, so we gutted it. It had a dirt floor, and we put in a walnut floor with stone where the wagons would have gone through. None of the columns touched the ground, so we had to jack the barn up and splice it with hand-hewn timbers. We also put a fireplace in the barn, and we planted a vineyard on the property—we know there was a vineyard here in the 1800s.
T&S: What’s your favorite feature?
BB: I just love the home’s history—I’ve been a Boone aficionado for years. We know he spent a lot of time here. And people from the area would camp out for two or three days waiting to get their grain. It makes it an exciting place to live.
T&S: How do you use the barn?
BB: Mostly for entertaining. We do a lot of charity events out there, including for the Katy Land Trust and the St. Louis Police Department. For more than 30 years, we’ve hosted two annual parties for friends and clients with anywhere from 100 to 150 guests. When people ask me what’s the best part about this place, I always say it’s sharing it with everyone else.
T&S: Your kitchen is gorgeous! Is that an antique oven and stove?
BB: It’s not antique. It’s La Cornue, made in France. Kim and I built all the kitchen cabinets by hand. We have a wood shop up here. It’s a good country look, which she loves. It really goes with the era of the house.
T&S: I love all the antique touches: Are the black-and-white photos on the stairwell family members?
BB: Those are our grandparents. My grandma was born in 1897 about a mile down the road. Her grandma, my great-great-grandmother, was across the road and one barn up, and the house she lived in is actually now part of the historic Boone Village.
T&S: Does the firepit in your yard get much use?
BB: When we have events, we have two fires: one in the barn, and one in the yard. People like to sit around the firepit, especially the kids. And we always have s’mores for the kids, too.
Photos: Suzy Gorman
