Colonnades!

 The WINTER THAT WILL NOT DIE is passing at last! Time to do more work on the house!

There were colonnades between the two front rooms sometime in the past, but they have been gone as long as anyone alive could recall, because the floor settled and the doors wouldn't stay closed.I had a set lined up about the time I bought the place but some SOB did me out of them, so the search has been on ever since. Through an interesting set of circumstances I wound up with colonnades for the front rooms. Although dirty, the price was right and the finish is reasonably decent, and is a close enough match to what's in the front rooms they will look pretty sharp.

 The columns are AWOL; they have been for a while, too-the stain on top is as dark as the sides, with only the barest footprint to be seen in bright light.

There are some broken pieces in the doors, which are “leaded” with zinc instead of lead came. Zinc has the advantage of being lighter and stiffer than lead, so the doors won't need re-enforcing straps across them like lead might at that size.The glass is pretty wavy and has lots of character, and has a sort of interesting variation on the usual diamond and vertical bar theme. When the time comes I will probably have the Glass Shop in Emmetsburg repair them-Lee is a very good stained glass artist.

There was a broken hinge on one of the doors, which will be addressed in today's post. The hinges are half-surface mounted little butt hinges with a two tone copper Geneva finish. The bottom one on one side was missing half that went on the jamb. If they were hinges I could lay hold of easily, or full morticed so replacements wouldn't be so glaring I would have replaced them all, but plan B was to find a hinge to take apart and supply the missing half.
Thanks to N D Millwork in Paullina, the missing hinge and lots of the pieces of trim-work cease to be problematic.

The hinge in question has only three knuckles, which is easier far to match than a five knuckle one, and the half missing has the long centre knuckle, so I took the donor hinge and filed enough material from the pin to allow it to be driven out. The centre knuckle of the donor hinge is slightly shorter than that of the original, so I will file down a bronze clock bushing to take up the slack. I am going to hold off fixing the glass doors until they are fixed in where I want them. Hopefully the next project is getting the damned kitchen level so I can start in there!

There it is, in all of its half-fixed glory!

2nd Annual Bungalow Blog Tour

Looks like I am on the tour this year! I am ashamed to let respectable people in the house, as big a mess as it is right now. Here's a few assorted goodies that stick out. Here is the messy parlor. It used to be two rooms, but the floor settled and the book case doors wouldn't stay closed so she took them out. The watchmakers' bench came from the old Elgin factory. It was in use sometime before 1888, because the dial room foreman put his name on it then. The Pachinko machine was in my Mom's folks' house when I was a baby-the picture behind the glass is me playing it when I was just able to stand on a chair to reach it.

The glass fronted hutch to the right was my great grand parents'. It was falling to pieces on the back porch of their farm, and my dad had it redone once, and my uncle Greg and aunt Bri gave it to me. They sort of gave it to me out of the blue one day, and I am glad of having it-it's a nice heirloom. It is perfect for player piano rolls. The big coffee pot came from my cousin's, and it is from before 1900.

The ceiling lamp was traded me for some Hammond organ tubes and a repair, and some little odds and ends where I used to teach. I am frankly surprised he doesn't try and get it back, but if he does he can pound sand. I rewired the thing and straightened it out, and mad it usable.

The back bedroom makes a good office. It is the larger of the two bedrooms, and has the stairs to the attic, and very good lighting. There are three windows and the one is the right height to put my library table underneath, like it was made to order. There are nice book cases, and the stairwell walls are beadboard. It looks like an old lawyers' office! The floor has a linoleum rug that has been down since Methuselah did the two step. It isn't going anywhere until it has to, and then only grudgingly.

The hallway is the only room besides the WC that has no wallpaper. It isn't getting any. None. The only thing it's getting is a different light and the walls painted. The hound likes it because he can lay there and see all parts of the house from where he is. There is an old disused trap door to the attic there too, and I may put a stained glass "skylight" that gives into the attic in the frame at some appropriate time. Four doors open into the hall, so it's like grand central. A little natural light from above might be a good thing. If I find a big enough register It may be a good place for an attic fan plenum, because I already have stairs to the attic.

Speaking of things hound, he likes the front bedroom. Here he is, on MY bed. In MY coat. With his snout on MY blanket. You know why dogs are so cute? Because it's the good Lord's way of making sure they can get away with half the tricks they pull!

Part two to follow!

Thanks to Stucco House for including my little house in this year's tour.

Previous house is Bungalow '23.

Next stop: Northland Stories.

Neighbors and such

Lots going on! Been finishing up the plumbing and the tin is in for the roof on the red shed.

I hear people tell about their awful neighbors, and it makes me glad that I live where I do.

My neighbor to the south is a very accomplished gardener, and she came over and helped shape up some of the plants around the place, and gave me a whole thing of strawberries. They cut a few trees back this week, and I was lucky enough to get a half cord of firewood-silver birch and some sort of pine. It'll be very welcome in the fire ring, I can tell you that!

The house north of me is empty, and needs much work before it is ever livable, but the owner is a nice lady (from whom I bought my own house) and she keeps the outside neat and clean. Past that is a very pleasant lady that doesn't say much, and a fellow that helped me re-plumb and put a furnace and water heater in this place.

Pictures and that to follow.

I'm ready for my close up.

Here are some pictures of the old Tappan cook stove that came with the house. If you want to learn about Tappan stoves, go and visit http://tappantalk.blogspot.com/ . The folks that run it also have http://stuccohouse.blogspot.com/ , which details the work done on a bungalow in the cities.

This is the manifold where the oven valve and pyrometer knob are located. Since it hasn't any standing pilot, it has to be lighted by hand each time the oven is used. You set the temperature, strike a match, and touch it to the touch hole in the front of the oven. Then you push the valve in a little and turn it as far counter clockwise as it'll go. In short order, it'll light, and sucks the fire right off the end of the match!
Once it reaches its temperature, it is very accurate, because it can't relight itself so it has to mantain constant temperature.

This is the top of the cook surface, with the work light and oven vent. The handle to the right on top of the backsplash turns on the light. I am not too sure that switch is original. Most of the wiring in this stove was replaced sometime in the fifties. The cord is the next thing to get it. This one has the "hood ornament" under the light.

Here is the close up of the model and serial numbers. Smarter people than I have sort of figured out that this stove was made in a cooperative venture with a company called Philgas, who made Skelgas appliances at one time.

There is also a Ruud water heater that has been down there since time began, that was a Skelgas deal before the PPO had it converted.

Here is the plate that shows the knob positions, along with the closeups of the (dirty) knobs.

Some Hillbilly's a'livin' in my DOGHOUSE!

Moved in the week of Thanksgiving!

There was a couple thousand dollars left over from Mammie's affairs, and my brothers and I divvied it up. With my share, I got a furnace from a place in Okoboji at a hell of a discount because some other body put a ding in the side, but since it has a new warranty and that it was a no-brainer. It is 95%, and all! Also, I got a new water heater, and replumbed all of the Natural gas lines inside. I had a tankless that I wanted to use, but it didn't have the special vent hardware with it and for what it cost to dink with I just call to the hardware store and he brought one down to me.

The night we did the hot water and plumbing I did the two-step Maytag bath in the clawfooted tubbie. Know what that is? You draw a nice hot bath, scrub and lay there till the water ain't warm, then you drain the tub and draw another hot one just to sit and stew in! Since I am a bachelor, I can do that. So I do.

There isn't any galvanized plumbing left in the place, and all the cast iron sewer stack is replaced with PVC because it was rotten. We rammed a rubber boot in the cast iron pipe going out, and put the PVC in that, and added a clean out while we were at it. Now if the line stops up we don't have to pull the terlet off to do something about it. Speaking of things terlet I got to get a new one, we broke the bowl. The hardware store has a "pot-in-a-box" kit pretty reasonable, that may be what I get.

I rewired a light from my great-grandmother's house, and hung it in the back bedroom. It's a brass pan light, hangs on two chains and has two sockets. The wiring was truly scary. It was all half-assed, so it got redone. The shades are frosted, and have lilacs painted on them. One has a corner that was broke, dinged up, and glued back together, but it doesn't show so much, and even if it did what the hell, my great-grandmother won't ever buy any more lights. Besides, it ain't the Gotrocks' mansion, and in the end the only one that has to be happy about it is the one I look at in the mirror.

I also put a nice Porcelier fixture in the bathroom. I got it from Shirley Pico in Emmetsburg, when she had the antique store. She was a good friend of my Grandma's, and she made me a real deal on it, because she knew I liked them. It is supposed to be a ceiling fixture, but it looks all right on the wall. It's real art-deco-looking, and has matching colours to the rest of the room. The wiring was pretty nice yet. Those bulbs looked like hell, but they've been in the old light for who knows hows how long.


The porch of doom is no more-it started making ominous noises, so an executive decision to perform the removal. Saving all the wood I could, it took an hour to pull it off. I burnt the rotten wood up in the dark of the night, and stacked what was worth bothering with. Mammie's front storm door and the one from Teri's house are up and working.

A whale of a storm is commencing, and pictures are to follow.

Merry Christmas!

Slow goes it!

Well, the kitchen porch is getting torn apart for demolition. It has a nearly flat tar paper roof, a bad case of the rot, and smells like an army boot. It really isn't worth saving. There may be a few good pieces of lumber in it, but that's it. The city gave me permission to tear it off and put on a new one, and it is going to have the basement entry at ground level.

The old porch was sort of a temporary deal eighty years ago, so I don't feel too bad about the whole thing.

Also, Mammie's landlord gave me the old wood storm door from her house, so I put it on my dining room door. It has the glass insert too, and is in pretty good shape, since she had a porch on the front of her house.

My uncle Greg and aunt Bri gave me a china hutch that was my great-grandparents', and it came from the farm in Pomeroy. It is in the dining room, and will go on the north wall once I get my smaller sideboard in and Earl's old one out.
Just to see what it would turn up like, I cleaned up the hallway door. The wood looks pretty nice. I replaced all of the doorknobs with porcelain, because the metal ones were oval and the dog could open them with his mouth.

Clocks and Desks and Cats in hats!

Long time no post! Lots of things are going on, but most of it has been pretty boring. The north half of the roof is scheduled to be installed. The junk outside has been cleaned up, and a few other little things. There may be a decrease in the mouse population-Kent & Tina's Mama cat hatched a litter of five babbies. This picture is when they were about ten hours old. If they don't find another home for it, I told them I'd take the Bengal striped one or the white one. I figure I can spend a few bucks getting it fixed and licensed, and it'll keep the mouse and rabbit numbers down a little around this place.

My Grannie moved to an assisted living, and it was time to clean up the house. My dad and I went down to help, and I got a few little things to remember the place by. I really didn't want much, and I got everything I wanted. The big thing I wanted was an old drop-front desk that was in the garage since I was a kid. It was my great-grandmother's, and it came from the old farm. It is sort of rough, but nothing that can't be fixed. My dad and I dropped it off at a place in Spencer that has done work for me in the past, and he can fix the big issues for a very reasonable rate. I need a couple of knobs, and some trim pieces and veneer work on the top. Most of the finish is not too far gone-a little Kotton Klenser and some wax and it'll look like a million. I also got a set of kitchen cupboard doors that match mine, a bunch of washers and screws, a pretty nice metal mailbox (which I happen to need) and the old sign with our name that came off the front porch.

A year ago, a clockmaker friend of mine left me an old master clock that came from the old High School in Estherville. It was missing a lot of parts (sort of a life-long project) but had good bones and a hell of a nice oak case. When I mentioned it to a friend in Emmetsburg (whom I was visiting on account of his 101st birthday he got really interested. He told me to hold on and got his car out, and we went to his "other house" where he keeps all of his goodies. He had a piece of slate with almost all of the missing program mechanism. It still needs wired and a pile of contacts, but the hard work is done. It's going in the dining room, so it can correct the clocks in the other rooms and ring bells in the bedrooms and the back yard.

See, Saw, Swine!

The front bedroom has been a pain in the neck for a while-the sub floor has some dry rot in it and it needs to be removed. One of the problems was how to cut the floor boards without totally destroying them-so I can relay the floor. I finally got tired of dinking with it the other day and pulled the mopboards off. I was pretty proud of myself-I only broke the quarter round and I kept the pieces-the mopboard and top trim came off pretty well.

With them out of the way, a skill saw will get close enough to the walls to cut a decent line and I can cover the cut with quarter round when I relay the floor. I had to take the closet out, but the beadboard camne out with no real damage, so I can reuse it. I am thinking of putting the closet on the wall backing with the living room.

Worked real good untill I hit a buried nail and did the sawblade in. Oh well....

Aftermath of Christmas

Well, we made it back from my brothers' house. It was pretty nice-we lay around all day and not much was expected of us. The day after Christmas was some pretty thick fog, but warm so I went schlogging around in it. Here is the high school I went to.


On the Dog House front, I got my Kindergarten rocker from my brothers. I bought it on an auction in Quincy, and the lady was a kindergarten teacher. I had a couple people tell me afterward that they remembered when it was in her classroom, but it looked nicer then! As you can see, it's pretty ratty. I took it apart to fit it in my mother's car, which was a blessing anyways because since I've owned it it's been one plump hind end away from a messy insurance claim. At first I thought that the rough and spotty surface was just a piss-poor refinish job, but while disassembling the thing the smell of smoke hit me like a pickled herring. Some dim yestertime It's also been in a fire....yippee. Well I can't squeal too loudly-I paid thirty bucks for it, and used it two years in Quincy, and it's been drug across the state since then. This is what the wood looks like under the varnish. It'll look like a million with the joints re glued and some new finish on!

Dead ringer

Ever see the old-style door bells that made one loud *pong!* and then you had to push the button or pull the cord again? Well, I got one for the Dog House. It has a respectable-sounding ring, and looks like it's been round the horn. It has a pretty simple mechanism inside, and after cleaning and greasing, works like a charm. I need to build or find the outside part to it, but there doesn't look like there'd be much to it.

The insides remind me of door latches from that time period, in that it is simple and beefily made, one of the reasons it is still able to operate after all this time. It has a patent date of 2 July, 1872, as well as one from 18 April, 1873, so perhaps it's a little older than what would have come n a house the vintage of mine. Then again-it's out past the Styx, so maybe he could've had one laying around somewhere to use up.

I also dug out the old clock from my house when I was a kid. It is a New Haven Tambour #56, and used to run to the tick. It's had some hard luck since then, so it'll have to get overhauled. It was overhauled in 1991 the first time, and ran until one of the mainsprings broke. It sort of makes me feel old, when I think that I first overhauled this clock at age 14, and now the bushings I installed then are worn out. You can't see it, but there are four repair numbers of mine in the back, and one of Ron Sires, from whom I bought it for $15.

Next on the agenda is hooking up one of the furnaces and getting the bedroom floor taken up so I can replace the subfloor. That and the heat are the only real things keeping me from living there right now.

Fare-thee-well to warmth.

Well, what little summer we ever had here was nice, I guess, but now we had our month of warm weather and it's time for winter again! It's too damn cold to do anything in here without the furnace hooked up, so that's next on the agenda. Here is the roof done on the south side, before the vargeboard got replaced. That porch is going the way of the Studebaker next summer, because the basement stairs are in there and the whole thing was a temporary measure ninety years ago. It's truly had the pickle.

Here is a set of plates that my eldest brother scavenged from some building in Iowa City where renovations were taking place. He used to go to school at University of Iowa, and worked there for a while, so he scavenged some goods from time to time. I think I have six, which will replace all of the plates on the outside doors. At one time I had a knob or two, but they were pretty scabby, and all of the knobs in the house are china, so they'll probably get black knobs this time around.

Also, I have a pair of these old baby gates. I saw some eyelets screwed into one of the door jambs, and sort of guessed there was a gate there, but then one turned up in the attic, and I found an identical one at a local shop for next to nothing. What on Earth does a bachelor want with baby gates? Because they also keep long-snouted hounds in and out of certain parts of the house. Long-snouted blue hounds. Like this one. It's not his fault that his nose is bigger than his brain! He is pretty well trained to respect a baby gate because we had them around when he was a puppy. I do confess that when it's cold and the furnace isn't putting forth, he is a boon to have laying on the bed. He is an eighty pound furnace.

I must be living right!

The mother lode for my house!

My cousins (who always treat me better than I deserve) generously donated this old screen door to the cause-it needs some help, but fits the front door like a glove! It was on their house in town (which my great Grandfather built) but it was not original to the house, and so they were kind enough to give it to me.

It has all sorts of fancy saw work and spindles, and looks like the screen doors on all of the old movies, and there's no way in hell I could afford a new one this nice.



The screen has been dogged, likewise the front corner, but that's all easy to fix. That and a little paint will make it an entry to be proud of!

True story: A friend that I cannot name here was at someone else's house and his dog tore the screen door all to hell. When the lady of the house confronted him with the details, he didn't offer a nickel to fix it-but did volunteer this comforting thought: "Yeah....you got off pretty lucky...he done tore the one to home apart lots worse than this!" The wooden bracing has a really nice fluted profile, and it looks like it grew up with the house. I even had six old white-painted screws on the porch that matched the hinges, and an old hook screwed into the jamb matched the eye on the door for height and location.






I also got another piece of good luck, in the form of this table, which is solid quarter-sawed oak, and forty-eight inches across the top. It has a rather ingenious, but simple little latch that holds the halves together, and they slide very easily apart to put the leaves in. One of the things I remember from my Grandmother's old house as a child was the big round oak table in their dining room. I have wanted one for a while, but they all seem to go for a fortune, so when this one was made available to me almost literally for the taking, I jumped on it. (Incidentally, they told me that it was forty-two inches across, which I measured and determined would fit into my car...turns out it is forty-eight inches, which meant some disassemble time required. Such fun. If I had a tail I would wag it, but I can truthfully say it got brought home in an Oldsmobile Cutlass. I am very happy with it though, and I'd do all of it over again to get it. The people from whom I got it thought it was from about 1920. It has modern casters on it, and at first I was going to remove them, but i like being able to move it with two fingers.

Last, but not least, a friend bought a house here in town, and I went to their sale, and got this desk. It is in sort of fixer-upper shape, but for what I paid for it I am not whinging any. It's one of those combination affairs, that have the desk and book case all in one. It is quarter-sawed oak veneer, and I think I may have some pieces to replace the missing. The mirror for the back is around somewhere, but the glass is broken, so I have that to do, and I plan on replacing the back with oak bead board or car siding.

I have been thinking about the heat situation, and remembered I have the one I bought for the farm, which I may use this year-it did all right...just look at how happy the hound was to have it!