Historical door opens a window into past

Ed Silveira, the founder of the Villa de Branciforte Preservation Society, discovered a lime kiln door at the Henry Cowell Barn on the University of California, Santa Cruz, campus after a powerful storm in mid-October uncovered it.
The 150-pound iron door is about 1 inch thick with a rounded top. Silveira said it is an unusual find.
“There hasn’t been one found like this with the curvature,” he said of his Oct. 14 discovery.
The door was probably manufactured between 1853 and 1865, he said. There is no kiln at the barn, however, and Silveira said he is unsure how the door got there.
Lime kilns are part of the history of Santa Cruz County. Spanish settlers between 1769 and the mid-1800s used lime in construction to make mortar for stone and brick work, plaster coating for walls and whitewash to seal walls, according to Frank Perry in “Lime Kiln Legacies: The History of the Lime Industry in Santa Cruz County.”
Kilns and the remains of kilns are sprinkled throughout the Santa Cruz Mountains, including Bonny Doon.