Okay, I know this title is lame. After over a thousand blog posts, it sometimes is difficult to come up with a catchy title. I stared at this photo for about ten minutes and this was the best that I could do. In any case, this photo was not from my recent scouting trip to the Palouse, but rather from my very first visit there. The Palouse extends into the western part of Idaho and this was our only sojourn there. This "salt box" barn sits all alone in this little valley and stands out primarily due to its bright red color. It contrasts quite well with the surrounding green farmland and blue sky (maybe I should have titled it "Red, Green and Blue"). It is also a great contrast to some of the abandoned and dilapidated barns that I have been posting over the past month or so.
For those of you who follow me regularly, you know that I often wonder how things got their names. So here are a couple of useless tidbits. The term "salt box" is a reference to the old wooden boxes that were used to store salt (no, I am not old enough to remember them). This style of barns and houses originated in New England, and were built that way so that snow would slide down the steep roofs. The other arcane tidbit is the name of the town that this barn is located in, Moscow. It turns out that one of the original traders was born in Moscow, Russia, and he opened the first trading post in the area. I had never heard of the town before my visit, but was surprised to also find out that it is the home of the University of Idaho.