This is the old guy from SD again! It is too bad that so much of the structure is so far gone; that would have made a wonderful home/office/shop. However, how many of the bents (main support posts) and surrounding structure are still intact and reasonably straight? If there are two or three good arches left, I would use those in any new building. To do that; however, you would have to abandon the “pull the supports out” method of demolition.

What I would do is to start on the side of the building that is near ground level and take it apart piece by piece. If you do it this way, it is easier for less skilled labor and you will have a place to put lumber as you process it. (Very important if you have any really nice pieces that you want to be in “display” locations.)

At least you wont have to worry about the lumber being green! You also have plenty of stone for foundation work also!

Please also invest in some good equipment:
a good hard hat
work boots with a steel shank underneath
(They are much less expensive than tetanus shots after the fact.)
several good claw hammers of various sizes
leather gloves (cloth will not work, experience talking here)
a five gallon shop vac
face masks to deal with all of the dust
a good planer to process wood quickly
a hand-held metal detector to find the invisible nails that will kill your planer blades

not necessary, but nice to have:
a small generator
a small dorm size refrigerator to keep refreshing liquids handy
a radio for when you just can’t take the sound of the wind any more

I hope that some of this will be useful to you. Please keep the videos coming.

Drew Meyer