Gospel, good times fill Buri barn

The voices of more than 200 people filled the hayloft of David and Becky Buri’s barn Sunday night outside Colfax as they gathered for an old-time gospel sing-a-long and pie social.

“We wanted to facilitate a place where people could come together and worship in an old-fashioned, nostalgic kind of way,” said Becky Buri.

People from churches all around Whitman County gathered together, and multi-denominational choirs took the stage set in the loft of the Buri’s barn under an old basketball hoop and a single light bulb. Light from the setting sun filled the scene through the barn’s open windows. Friends helped elderly patrons up the stairs by carrying wheelchairs and holding tight to arms.

Attendees shouted out the hymnal numbers of their favorite songs, and those in the barn shared hymnals to join in the music. Becky’s parents, Fred and Mary Hart of Olympia, accompanied singers by plucking bluegrass tunes on a stand-up bass and guitar.

Afterward, attendees moved to the front lawn of the Buri place for slices of pie, visiting and ice cream.

Children delighted in a petting zoo menagerie of goats, chickens, newborn kittens and a pony on the barn’s main floor.

Because of limited parking at the Buris’ farm, shuttles ushered attendees to the sing-a-long gathering from the Baptist Church parking lot.

The Buris restored the 1919 barn in 2011. It was for many years used for the Heidenreich dairy. They put on new paint, restored the cupolas, windows and doors and, with the help of Richard Miranda and Chris Olsrud, laid 20,000 new shingles.