New Hampshire Public Radio followed students during a weeklong training program focused on historic building techniques, a response to what the report described as a growing shortage of people able to repair older buildings. The event took place at Canterbury Shaker Village, a national historic landmark in Canterbury, where structures settled in the 1700s by followers of the Christian Shaker movement are in constant need of maintenance.
The training exposed students to multiple trades that restoration work can require, from carpentry practices such as timber framing to repairs on older building exteriors. Joshua Adams, 17, joined the program after learning about the method through a historic barn repair class, described in the report as a centuries-old approach that holds heavy timber beams together without using nails or metal fasteners.
Adams said the technique relied on wood components, describing how “They didn’t use nails. They just used wood - wooden pegs - and all fit together perfectly.” He is already in a construction track at a technical school, and the program’s “week full of classes” was presented as a way for him to connect the historic skills to future job opportunities.
The report also described the program’s broader audience. It said the training is open not only to construction and carpentry students, but also to people new to the building industry, including Rowan McGrath, an 18-year-old studying computer engineering. McGrath was learning how to replace shingles on a colonial Shaker building and said the trades could provide a financial “backup” alongside a technology path.
Organizers tied the training to workforce trends they said are pulling the pipeline in the wrong direction. NPR said a survey conducted by the University of New Hampshire found young people are not joining the historic trades workforce nearly as fast as tradespeople are retiring, which can force owners of historic buildings to wait for repairs.
Jennifer Goodman, who the report identified with the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance, warned that prolonged waiting can affect what remains of historic properties. She said such delays can mean “loss of old windows, loss of old plaster, loss of an old porch that’s really a - gives the building its character,” and added that insufficient repair capacity can increase the risk of “demolitions and total loss of buildings.”
At Canterbury Shaker Village, stonemason Kevin Fife led another part of the program focused on masonry restoration, including how to rebuild stone walls. Fife said he prefers to work in the traditional way as a matter of heritage, telling NPR, “I like to do it the traditional way ‘cause that’s a part of our ancestry, our heritage. And that’s why people come to New England. And it’s just - it’s more fitting.”
The report framed the week as a bet on the next generation of workers. Fife and other program participants, it said, were training this spring with the hope that students might later return to repair similar historic structures—potentially including the stone wall work associated with the Shakers’ buildings when older tradespeople retire. For NPR News, Jackie Harris reported from Canterbury, New Hampshire.