Evicted!

This week we evicted quite a few creatures from our home...bats, bees and birds! A couple of weeks ago, I explored the history of our home and carefully removed the vinyl siding from the porch area of our house.

The picture above shows what the house looked like with the siding. Our house was built by a master craftsman - a true professional of masonry. Evidence of his workmanship is visible in the original fieldstone basement, deep outhouse pit, and lined well. What we did not know when we purchased our home was that his beautiful workmanship was also hidden from our sight, behind cheap vinyl. Imagine our surprise when we discovered that our house is actually entirely constructed of NATCO hollow tile brick overlayed with stucco.

Initially my husband was not too happy with me; however, he quite quickly forgave me and got involved in the history as well. In addition to the stucco, we found beautiful concrete sills under the windows and doors.

In addition to these great finds, we found a bat living under the siding. This critter was the first to be evicted. Unbeknownst to us, he had friends hiding in the wings!

We also had what appeared to be live wires that were melted (at least to my inexperienced eyes); however, after my husband took a look at it, he cleaned it up and we discovered the original placement of the meters and connectors for the electricity and phone.

We have tossed around a few ideas as to what to do with this feature. We are thinking about either purchasing antique meters or 1920's style house numbers. Regardless, we thought that this was kind of interesting. Of course, our curiosity did not stop there, and before you knew it...

Our crew was at it. We first moved into our house mid June of 2011. We were surprised by the large numbers of flies and bees that were constantly flying around the house, not to mention a few bats at night. We now know why! While removing the siding and other cracker-jack-box installations around the house, we discovered over 100 various wasp paper nests - some were still occupied! We also found a few birds nests, like this one. And four more bats!

The siding was installed in a very interesting fashion. First, huge pieces of styrofoam were put up and held in place with wooden strips. These strips were necessary so that the vinyl siding could be nailed into place. Unfortunately, whoever installed the siding used long horseshoe nails like this. We have hundreds of them to remove from the masonry.

As also seen in the picture above, we discovered that almost all of the windows stick out of the house two to three inches. This explains the extraordinarily large window ledges we had inside! Additionally, we found out that most of the windows are not even close to what was originally installed. Many of the windows are quite a bit smaller and in some cases, two windows were used to fill in the opening originally created for one. We also found a hidden door on the second floor. Here is what the house looks like now, without a majority of the siding. We still have some work to do, like actually closing up parts of the wall (now I know why I froze my butt off this winter!). But we love the new look - especially the white framing trim and concrete sills.

Right now the stucco is painted a rather faded and dirty brown. We are planning on painting the old fieldstone (since someone else already painted it) a dark charcoal black, the main part of the house a beautiful barn red and the trim a nice, clean bright white. We will be using some antique blue to accent a few of the smaller details located under the eaves and on the porch. Someday we are also planning on having a blue steel roof installed. I can hardly wait until it is all cleaned up and painted! It is going to look so beautiful and charming.

Time Flies ... Literally

This week has been an incredibly busy one! Wow, time can truly fly by and we learned this in more ways than one this week. Because we accomplished so much, we have decided to split it up into several posts for you. In a nutshell, though, here is the list of everything we accomplished this week:

• Removed 30 cedar tree stumps;
• Trimmed the silver maple;
• Discovered and dug out the original well;
• Called Diggers Hotline to mark our property;
• Removed the vinyl siding from the porch area;
• Researched original meters;
• Discovered the original laundry chute's location;
• Discovered the hard floors in the downstairs bedroom;
• Discovered the hard floors in the living room;
• Researched the history of the home; and
• Had a wonderful interview with a prior resident!

See what I mean about the time just flying? A lot of this was done in part due to the research of the history on the home and the wonderful interview with a prior resident, which is what I wanted to write about today.

The house was built in 1920 by Joseph and Ella Pockat. Mr. Pockat was a bricklayer that absolutely loved his craftsmanship. (This explains the 6' x 5' x 8' brick lined outhouse pit!) The house was built with a fieldstone basement, NATCO hollow tile bricks, and then finished with stucco. Unfortunately, Mr. Pockat was fatally hit by a train in July 1941, at the age of 49. He and his wife did not have any children.

Mr. Pockat also helped to build the house next door to ours for his wife's sister. His sister-in-law was married to Mr. Schmidt and together, had a son named Armin Schmidt, who was born in the house next door in 1921. On Thursday, I had the opportunity to speak with Mr. Schmidt at his current home for a couple of hours. We were joined by Mr. Schmidt's daughter and niece. Together, we were able to piece together a lot of the history of the house.

After Mr. Pockat built the house, the second story was used as an apartment for various family members. What is now our girl's bedroom was actually the kitchen. And the master bedroom was used as a living room, with the boy's bedroom used as a bedroom (no surprise there). Additionally, the back of the house featured a two-story, glass enclosed double porch. This area was used as a greenhouse, sleeping porch, and a place to hang the laundry on those cold wintry days.

Mr. Schmidt was living in the apartment with his father in 1941. Armin had been kicked in the chest by a horse and was recovering when the call came in at six o'clock in the morning advising of the untimely circumstances of his uncle's accident. Afterwards, Mr. Schmidt (senior) purchased the home and resided here until the 1960's. Mr. Armin Schmidt married and purchased the house next door, on the opposite side. In other words, all three houses were "in the family" at one point or another, with our house in the middle.

Mr. Schmidt's daughter and niece also lived upstairs in the family rental suite and were able to remember the layout of the house very well. Together, the three of them were able to walk me through a rough, hand-sketched floor plan, pointing out various things. It was during this time that we learned that our well was "approximately 15 paces from the backdoor". (It was!) We also learned that there had been a laundry chute that was accessible from two separate doors: one in the kitchen and one at the bottom of the stairs. (It was!) We learned that Mr. Schmidt was not a big fan of refrigeration and so used a dumbwaiter type of system and a hole in the basement to keep his food cold. It was supposed to be located at the bottom of the basement stairs right before the rainwater cistern. (Guess what...it was!) We also learned that there used to be a small bathroom in the basement where we now do our laundry. (This explains the extra covered sewage hole we were wondering about.) Mr. Schmidt asked if the "fruit cellar" was still in the basement. He seemed pleased to learn that it was and that it is the exact same room that I am using as my pantry! We learned about the original metering system, the original color of the outside of the house, and that at one time, the entire house consisted of all wood floors.

Unfortunately, Mr. Schmidt had to sell the home when his father was placed in a nursing residence (this was roughly between 1960 and 1965). At the time, a Mr. and Mrs. Mautz were renting the unit upstairs and ultimately purchased the house. While the family lost track shortly after this, they recalled that the Mautz's did sell the home. Based on our research, we believe that it was at this time it was sold to a family known as the Schroeder's. It was the Schroeder's that did most of the remodeling to the house, according to our current neighbors. While the Schroeders were in residence, the porch was removed, the well and sidewalk buried under the dirt, and the siding and windows installed.

No one really knows what happened to the house after the Schroeder's. Apparently, it was vacant and then owned, rented, etc. and at some point, went into foreclosure. It was bought out of foreclosure by the company that ultimately sold the house to us. And we are doing our very best to turn the clock back almost 100 years to restore this beautiful home to what the family originally remembers it being. A home filled with love, laughter, and both good and bad times.