The Cross House

In 2014, I ‘met’ Cody on Old House Dreams. He was passionate about a house listed, and I was fascinated that an 18-year-old would be interested in historic houses. I was just like that at 18! We kept in touch over the years, and eventually even talked with long telephone conversations. But…we have never met….

      But…but…Kerri brought up the fact that such refrigerators were crazy expensive at the time, more than a Model T. I thought: Oh, that can’t be true. It is! The classic General Electric “Monitor-Top” refrigerator was introduced in 1927 and cost $525. This seems cheap, today, but this translates to a whopping $7,700…

    So…floor done. My excitement? Great.  

  For seven years, with immense forbearance, I have overlooked the kitchen flooring, the most damaged in the house. So, you can imagine my thrill at having a good, solid floor! Squee!!!!!!!! If it were not for Covid, I would schedule a dance party upon the new floor!       …there is a lot more…

  This is particularly satisfying as, for several years after buying the house in 2014, there was no floor in the servant’s hall. One looked directly into the basement. The original floor had been been eaten by termites!    

Of late, I have been bedeviled. Bedeviled! A few months ago, I stepped into the the Round Bedroom and discovered…oh, the horror…water dripping from the ceiling. EEK! The next day, I climbed a tall ladder set up on the west porch roof to see if I could ascertain the problem, which had to be between…

    Maple was a common wood choice for kitchens when the Cross House was built. I have no idea why. Suggestions? I also have no idea of what to finish the maple with. What was common in 1894? Any ideas? Oh, and again…SQUEE!!!!!!!!  

All the door hardware in the Cross House is by Yale and Towne. And it is all…F A B U L O U S ! It it all mostly…squee!!!!!!!!…in situ. Praise the Lord! Several missing door sets have now been acquired, and all that is still missing are 18 window pulls. A few weeks ago…

    Some of you have suggested using tung oil or stain. But, my goal is to recreate the lost original finish, and this was just orange shellac over bare wood. This was an inexpensive finish and thus appropriate for a room only used by servants. The butler’s pantry was also painted. I was able…

  A trick to unwarp wood is to, when it is hot outside, lay them on wet grass, warp side down. So, I have been doing this for a month now regarding the small shelf. But is has not been warm enough for most of this time, and there has been almost no rain. But…after…

  So…poo. I have no idea what to do. The wood would not have looked like this in 1894. I know because I have a section (behind a radiator) which retains its original shellac, and this looks consistent and quite elegant. So…poo.    

Computer back from hospital. Will soon be posting again!

Well, it was bound to happen. My computer crashed. Luckily, I had a external backup so I should be ok. But, I am now without a computer. A new hard drive is on order and maybe I will have the computer back on Friday. Maybe. A new super-duper computer is on order but it will…

  The first two floors of the house had wall-to-wall carpeting originally, so random cheap pine was paid down. This was, it seems, replaced with oak during the circa-1929 apartment conversion. However, because the landing was raised up, its original random pine was extant when I returned the landing to its original height in 2014….

  The original mortar had been leached out by a failed built-in gutter (hidden inside the huge curved cornice). From Day 1, the gutter in this area had been badly designed, for it could not possibly contain the massive amount of water rushing down from the massive roof. (I will later show images of the…

Yesterday, I received an email from Cody. It was marked EMERGENCY! Golly. It developed that he was in an antique store. He had found something. I scrolled down to the image. And gasped. Wanna see? Scroll down…                             This is an 1890s…

  One is in the dining room. Two are in the expansive living room. All three are in terrible condition, and the image does not reveal how wavy they are. With a slight push, each would collapse. To each side of the fireplace are two 24-inch square windows. One has a single sheet of glass….