This Old House #2: History Lessons.

Okey dokey. Hows about a history lesson?

Like I said, the house was finished in 1903. Since then, it has (supposedly) been a home, apartments, a school, a museum, CONDEMNED, and then a home again. I'm hoping to dig up some more info on the history of the house from when it was built to about 1975, but from 1975 to present I have pretty darn good info. We are purchasing it from a daughter that inherited it from her mother I think somewhere between 1995/2000. The mom had bought it in 1976, supposedly saving it from being knocked down to make way for newer houses. So for the last 40 years it's belonged to the same family, but everyone around here STILL refers to it by the name of the original builders. Kinda funny.

Pic of the house supposedly from around the time it was finished in the early 1900's.



Couple more from between then to maybe the 60's?







And a pic when it was a musuem.



Here's where it gets fun. When mom bought it in 1976, she started this.



Which has these.









She has hand drawn maps for the yard, where she planted all the trees, drawings of each floor and then individual rooms detailing what she changed and how she went about doing it.







And she even has a bunch of pics from who knows when. Apparently, the house had been painted white at some point, and then sand blasted back to original brick. Don't know if she was the one who did the sandblasting or not. Notice the lack of the porch and the cupola? on the roof.



Porch is back, still no cupola.



This is the back of the house. Now there is a carport attached to the bump there, and lots and lots of trees.



There were also a couple of interior pics but nothing that really shows much of what was going on.






Now its our turn to start / continue the story!

This Old House: dorkpunch Edition.

Y'all thought I was dead, didn't ya?

So, not to jinx anything (knock on wood and all that) but it looks like we are set to close next week. We have been working towards purchasing this house for over a year.

A bit of back story: We've been looking to "upgrade" for a couple of years now. We knew our price range, we had a pretty good idea of what we wanted, but there was just nothing that fit the bill. We *love* our teensy little community. I got to thinking about an acquaintance who mentioned they were going to be retiring eventually. They have this gorgeous old house, that oddly enough I would see ever time I pulled out of our driveway- it was 2 blocks away at the end of the "T". I called him and one other acquaintance who also had a home a couple of blocks away the same day, explained our situation, and asked them to let me know if they were ever interested in selling. Well, we got a call back saying yes, they were planning on retiring in the next year or two anyways so why not come over and take a look at the house to see if its anything we might be interested in.

Lets just say its about as close to love at first sight as you can get. Both my wife and I (and the boys) *loved* it. The boys took a while to warm up to it but warm up they did! We worked out a deal giving them time to get retired and figure out what they wanted to do with life and also giving us time to sell our home and get our ducks in a row.

The best laid plans...

Didn't have any luck getting our house sold. Through a series of small miracles, we have been able to liquidate some assets (er... sawdust some timber?) and find renters for our house. So in the last 3 weeks, We've moved out, moved in, spent a week at Scout camp, unpacked, hauled more stuff, cleaned the old house, still working on a few other items over there that need attention, got the renters moved in, hauled more stuff, etc etc etc...

I'm pooped. School starts in a week and a half.

Anyways, without further ado- here's This Old House.













Some random specs:

Started being built 1897/98, and finished in 1903. Has had a very interesting and storied life, of which I hope to chronicle here. Sits on 1.3 acres, has a wicked awesome 30x60 shop and lots of space and one of the best parts- LOTS AND LOTS of BIG trees!

Wish us luck in getting all the i's dotted and t's crossed next week!

More Old School Greene.

Time for some more greene. We've been having a LOT of rain lately- nothing like Texas at the moment but for Idaho, LOTS. After 2 weeks of wet I finally had the chance to cut grass. My grass clipping pile is over flowing, so I decided to go old school- dug out the '65 110. Love this thing! It always fires right up and cuts pretty darn good.

Had to drive it a few hundred yards from the "shop" to my yard, and on the way I stopped to check on a neighbor who's been in the hospital and has grass over a foot tall. Doesn't sound like he's going to be able to do much for a while, so I put all 8 ponies to work knocking down his rather large lawn. Any excuse for more seat time, right!?



Finally made it to my yard and man- for 50 years old this thing does a GREAT job. There's just something about sitting on that steel seat, having to pull levers and push buttons and clang gears. Slow, but fun. SMoooootthhhh cut too.





Old mower has come a long ways- used to not be able to mow more than 15 minutes without having to stop and drain the rust from the sediment bowl or for something else breaking down. I used it for well over 2 hours and it didn't miss a beat. 

 

So after all that mowing, I figured I should give the old thing some attention. Pulled the deck off and commenced cleaning.



Lots of yuck, top and bottom.



Discovered the tensioner pulley pivot was siezed. Managed to break it loose and also managed to break the spring that pulls the belt tight... . Not a reall big deal because I've got a spare.

Pressure washed the deck off.



Decided to try something out. Probably should have spent some time knocking the rust off but I want to see how well this Rustoleum holds up to the abuse and over the rust.



Blades sharpened and back on. I know, I didn't do it right... Running out of time at this point.



Got the deck all buttoned back up and ready to mount but had to leave so I thought I was done for the night. Ended up getting back early enough to finish a few things up!



No pic, but I finally got the governor and throttle cable adjusted right so it will actually idle now instead of run at a constant 3,200 rpm's.

Also got this rat-nest figured out. No idea what they were thinking but it was wired in the weirdest way possible- the charging circuit was hooked in to the coil so it was powered even when the key was off, the starter was hooked up to something else, just everything was backwards.



ShaZAM!!! All buttoned up.



So now it will start, and more importantly STOP, with the key switch and I don't have to unplug the coil every time I'm done mowing. The throttle works, so's I can idle it down or rev it up. Blades are sharp, tensioners working so's the blades don't slow down when it runs into thicker grass.



Few things still to do though: Need to address the leaky carb and adjust the stiff clutch pedal.

Oldtimer!

Just learned something new today. This ratty old lunchbox I've been using for like the last 9 years?







Well, apparently they were built in 1913. Frickin thing is over 100 years old!!!



Near as I can tell they were built from 1913 to maybe 1917 but havent been able to find much information on them. Found it in an old garage we were cleaning out- EVERYTHING in it was headed to the dump. Thought it looked neat so I saved it and stupidly, apparently, cleaned it up and repainted it. Its starting to get a decent patina back though. Maybe in another 100 years it'll look good again. It also holds a can of Pringles perfectly!