Josh Baker walks a floor Thursday at the Johnson Hall Performing Arts Center in Gardiner. A team from Barn Boards & More was removing and preserving the tongue-and-groove floorboards from the third floor theatre. The Gardiner company, run by Brett Trefethen and his wife Amy Trefethen, typically dismantles barns and then sells the boards or uses them to make furniture that they sell. He said the boards could be repurposed as flooring or could be made into a tabletop. The demolition was part of a renovation project that began this month and is due for completion in December 2023.

The brand name “Cobbs & Mitchell ‘Electric'” stamped into the back of salvaged flooring from the Johnson Hall Performing Arts Center in Gardiner. Brett Trefethen, owner of the company that salvages the flooring, said the boards were likely made in the early 20th century when sawmills went electric, which is probably why it’s mentioned in the brand image.

Barn Boards & More’s Brett Trefethen shows strips of a poster that workers found used as wedges, or tapered wedges, under floorboards the company was salvaging Thursday from the Johnson Hall Performing Arts Center in Gardiner.

Trevor Sprague fires nails at salvaged floorboards near an “Opera House” sign Thursday at the Johnson Hall Performing Arts Center in Gardiner.