Play Me a Song

Big E and I are often called upon by friends of ours to help 

with salvaging items from our town's history.  

There was the time we helped move a large built in cabinet, stairs, doors 

and a truck bed load of wainscoting from the old fire house and public school (that post here).  

And the time we helped remove transom windows, light fixtures, 

doors and even cut out an entire entryway 

in the old parochial school at the Catholic Church.

Most recently, we were asked to help move an old, large grandfather clock.

Piece of cake.

No, really, it was, in the world of salvaging Littlestown history,

pretty easy.

(Sorry, I took no photos of the clock. It's gorgeous though, trust me)

While helping to package clock parts for the move, one of our friends asked,

"Hey, you guys wouldn't want an old player piano would you? 

It's just going to get chopped up and thrown away."

Big E's head lifted.

I said no.

Big E went with the home owner and looked at the piano.

I looked at the piano.

I said no.

Our friend reminded us it was going to get chopped up.

Big E said how he didn't want it to get chopped up.

I'm pretty sure you see where exactly this is going.

I gave in, especially after researching the piano and learning it was something that

very well could have been in our own house back in the day.

(meaning a player piano, not this specific one).

This is the photo from the Weaver Piano and Organ Company catalog  in York, PA

that shows the exact same type of player piano we would be owning.

Provided we could figure out how to move it.

There is a reason why you can find many free pianos around.

They weigh 800 pounds or more and aren't easy to move.

 I actually lucked out and missed the whole piano moving process

because Big E wanted to surprise me with a piano in the house when 

I got home from my weekend away.

This was most likely good for everyone since my anxiety is often problematic.

 Our friends managed to assemble 

a big group of people to help with the moving.

Thankfully, they had a truck with a lift gate,

which made the process a little easier.

Currently, the piano is residing in the laundry room.

Eventually, it will live in the dining room,

but it'll take some dining room demo and remodeling 

before the piano will fit in the room.

Not a drastic remodel really, just reconfiguring a plumbing closet

that was not original to the house so the hutch can move to that wall,

and the piano will have a place of honor.

An added bonus was finding the business card of the gentleman who used to tune the piano.

Big E called, and the man was alive and remembered the family who owned the piano.

He was able to check his piano book, and it was determined that the piano was

built in 1923-24.

The piano, of course, needs some work. 

It is horribly out of tune and while all the player mechanisms work,

the bellows aren't pumping to produce the air needed to play the roll of music.

We have leads on 2 people in the area who work on player pianos,

and we hope to get one out to look at it soon.

It's also obvious that the piano was painted.

(why do people DO that??!)

Luckily, I should be able to strip the paint off to uncover the original wood veneer.

There was also some damage to the wood veneer in the move,

but I know of people in the area that also repair that sort of thing.

Along with the piano we also received 2 boxes full of music rolls, 

so once we get it working we'll be able to play it.

I'd love to have it in place for Christmas.

Granted, I only saw 1 Christmas song in the boxes,

so everyone would listen to Silent Night over and over again.

I hear there are some other potential salvaging missions in the works-

can't wait.

I Smell a Project

So there's lots and lots of things going on around the house on lists of things 

that need to get started around the house.  

I'm working on my upstairs hallway project, 

I'm working on prepping Ethan's room for new paint and furniture, 

I'm getting ready to redo the redo on the upstairs bathroom

 (turns out peach isn't a great color after all) 

and I'm Big E is finally getting the laundry room started.  

Back when we were waiting for settlement on the house,

 we saw a huge deal on laminate flooring during a Black Friday sale.  

We bought what we needed for the laundry room, 

and it's been sitting there ever since... for a couple of years.  

The room needs to have a small wall built to enclose the pipes and 

cover the old window opening into the bathroom (the laundry room was once a porch).  

And other than that, it just needs the floor (that can't happen until the wall) 

and some drywall on the ceiling to replace the drop ceiling. 

 Oh, and we need to work on the doorway because 

while helping friends salvage things 

out of the old historic firehouse and community center, 

I might have found a really great door for the laundry room 

that is a little bit wider than the door that's there.

So we need a little bit wider opening, 

and, you know, some minor electrical work 

to move light switches and what not.

No big deal.

But really, isn't this door worth it?

The pebbled glass let's light in, 

but hides whatever mess might be in the laundry room.

And it's a piece of town history.

Totally worth the effort

(says the person not doing the work).

So let the work commence!

We have about a month and half to get it all completed

(before we have our Christmas Open House).

You can read about how we helped salvage stuff here

Catching Up on Summer

I was a little shocked to learn I hadn't blogged here since April.

So I figured one big post of the summer

would get all 2 of my readers you caught up.

In May, we had our first camping trip with the new-to-us popup.

It was also the dog's first camping trip.

I'd say it was a success.

We had rain.

We had a lot of rain.

I think we had more rain than the Biblical flooding of Noah's time.

It was definitely more than 40 days and nights.

We salvaged some stuff from the parochial school at the Catholic church.

Yes, we cut out an entire double door entry way.

We had some baseball.

We starred in the town's annual cabaret show

(this year was based on the 60's)

We dug up more garden space and found bricks.

I really hate bricks.

We had another camping trip, this one being a week long vacation

on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

We saw wild ponies.

We burned stuff.

I started a project in the upstairs hallway.  

It's nearly done, 

and I'll post all the before and after photos when it is.

The garden hosted many monarchs.

I had so many caterpillars that they stripped all of the available milkweed.

I'll have to plant more next year.

(I had a lot- close to 20 large plants)

And there were shenanigans.

We also were going through some stressful times

concerning our family's place on the water.

You can read about that here.

So the summer is behind us,

and there are lots of projects ahead for the fall and winter.

(and more time to blog)

Salvaging History

Anyone who knows me, 

or who has spent any time at all reading this blog

knows that I like old things and history.

Abandoned, dilapidated buildings make me sad.

I see old dreary farmhouses, and I can see their potential.

I want to know their story

and share it.

In my town, there is a building slated for demolition

(actually for today, but not sure because of bad weather).

Part of the building is the firehouse built in 1886

(Shown here as it was originally built. 

There have been 3 additions since)

The other portion of the building was the public school built in 1901.

It was later turned into the Community Center in 1963.

Unfortunately, the buildings fell to ruin,

and the cost of repairing them was apparently

more expensive than destroying and building new ones.

So when friends of Big E and I needed help saving artifacts,

I was eager to help.

Our friends had a dilemma.

There was a large cabinet that they wanted to save, 

but it was too large to go down the stairs.

The cabinet was built in place,

so the only option was to saw it in half.

Long story short, it got cut in half, moved downstairs, 

loaded into a truck and taken to my garage to live for a bit.

(It's their story to share which is why I went for the quick overview on this part)

While all the sawing was going on, 

I commented on how sad it was that the wainscot 

was just going to be part of a pile of rubble.

Big E mentioned how nice it would look in the dining room,

but unfortunately, we had no hammer.

Until our friends mentioned they had a hammer-

and a crowbar.

So began my job of carrying wainscoting down to the first floor

to load in the truck.

The wainscot was the old type-

the thick tongue and groove wainscot

not the thin MDF type you find today.

So I carried entire sections of wainscot,

and I carried armloads of bundles.

Some from upstairs, 

some from the 1901 elementary rooms downstairs.

I was a little worried I wouldn't have enough for the dining room.

What I ended up with was a truck bed full of wainscoting.

As you can see, the entire bed is filled to just past the top of the bed.

But that's not all.

I also saw a door with textured glass that I thought would work well

as a door between the kitchen and laundry room.

While not original to the building,

the door was still on the old side and solidly built.

It would let the light in from the laundry room

(which is full of windows)

without allowing guests to see into the room

(the dog that eats everything stays there during the day,

 plus the laundry and it's also the "mudroom"- literally,

 so I don't really want people to see it).

Big E was saying no to the door though.

But while Big E was busy loading the wainscoting,

one of the people helping with the cabinet said

if I just wanted to get new hinges for it,

he could tap out the pins for me.

So, knowing if I got the door off and carried it out,

Big E would have no choice but to take it home-

I hoped-

I had them take the pins out.

Big E was a little not thrilled about the door

making the comment that it might not even fit.

But like our friend said, we can cut it down.

I love friends who think the way I do-

that old is good, that historical items need to be saved 

and that I really needed to have that door.

The door ended up riding home with a section of the cabinet,

because our truck was full

(and if it had slid and busted out the window of Big E's cap

 I'd be in big doo-doo).

The next day while I was in the garage admiring my new door, 

Big E started talking about how he was planning on redoing that door frame

when he works on the laundry room anyway

so the door won't have a problem fitting.

(this is where I smirk to myself)

So, thanks to this salvaging crew,

some local history will be preserved and used.

The cabinet and a few odds and ends are being saved 

for inclusion in a museum in the future,

and the wainscoting and the door will be used in our 100+ year old home in town.

(so look for all the blogs about that process in the future)

I'm going to try not to be too upset over the original hardwood floors,

or the gorgeous old wavy glass windows 

or the rest of the wainscoting and woodwork

that we couldn't save.

One last look out of the school windows before demolition