German master carpenter Martin Peter Hansen, from Schleswig Holstein region in northwest Germany, arrived last week to lead the project. Hansen was accompanied by his grandson Malte Christiansen, 15, and Jan Matzen, 18, a friend of the Hansen family who's studying the bank business but also helps Hansen in the summer in his construction business.

Dan Peters, who's project coordinator for the Manning Heritage Foundation, reported Sunday that the center vertical posts have been set for the structure, which will he 68 feet long, 46 feet wide and 40 feet high at its peak.

Peters said Hansen arrived in Manning ready to go right to work.

"He knows how to go about it. Mainly, we just have to get out of his way," Peters, who's also mayor of Manning, said, laughing.

"He's running and racing around there, and he doesn't communicate (speak English) very well, so he just does things himself, and were helping him as much as we can."

Peters added, "Basically we just have to follow his lead, because he's the one who knows what he's doing and has it in his head."

With the two boys assisting Hansen along with volunteers from the community pitching in, work has gone smoothly, Peters said.

He said the framework for the structure will take about four weeks. In fact, Hansen has plane tickets to return to Germany Aug. 2.

The only problem so far was finding a few mistakes made numbering the pieces of the haus barn when it was dismantled in Germany for shipment to Manning. The Heritage Foundation located the haus barn in the Schleswig-Holstein area.

"It doesn't take long to figure out that wasn't the right piece," Peters said, "then a little more searching tends to turn up the right one."

Hansen ordered everyone else to take the day off Sunday while he did more sorting through pieces of the structure.
The thatch roof for the haus barn will be put on this fall after the reeds arrive from Germany.

Plans call for the haus barn to he part of a Manning Heritage Park project. Another major part of the project is restoration of the Leets-Hassler farm house and farm buildings located just cast of the haus barn. The farm was recently approved for the National Register of Historic Places.

Peters said Hansen isn't interested in getting any attention for his work.
He's not one for stopping and talking for long when there's plenty of work to he done.
"He's cordial enough and has a great sense of humor," Peters said. "but he's all business."

In a lighter moment one after noon last week Peters' brother, Dave, who was visiting from Plano, Texas, offered Matzen his cowboy hat. Someone cautioned the fair-skinned Matzen that it wouldn't take long in the sun before he'd become the same shade as a nearby red pickup truck.
Matzen accepted the gift but seemed a bit sheepish about his new appearance.
Matzen still wears the hat, and Hansen now calls his young assistant "Tex."

The project got some surprise extra help this morning when a worker from the Molfsee Open Air Museum near Kiel, Germany, unexpectedly arrived in Manning to assist Hansen.
The new worker assists Dr. Engeman Johannson, curator of the Molfsee Museum. Johannson helped arrange the haus barn donation to the Manning Heritage Foundation.

The new worker flew in to Omaha and then took a taxi to Manning. He plans to stay in Manning until Aug. 23 and then will tour the United States before returning to help with the haus barn roof.