House maintenance, who has the time..........

[Oaktree]

WOW, that's back in the day of square nails wooden pegs and every house had a barn, if those wall could talk. Any old pictures of it from the 1800s?

Unfortunately, no. All I was able to find at what passes for our town's historical society was an old 1850s map that shows the house, but my (current) road did not exist. Access to the house was thru what's now woods and part of a snowmobile trail. No photos though. The previous owner's grand daughters (from whom I bought the house at an estate sale) were exceedingly unhelpful. Too bad, I would love to learn some of the history of the place, and why some odd things were done here (for example, one side of the house was extended by 3 feet at some point, and that wall is of a different construction style from the rest of the house. Why?
Over the past almost 200 years many owners have left their mark, and it's hard to tell what's original other than the basic bones of the house.
When we re-did the kitchen a few years ago, I did find some old letters dating back to the 1940s behind the counter, other than that no much of historical interest remained.


The house is so-called plank construction...the walls are vertical 4 x 24 planks notched and pegged into huge beams at the top & bottom. It's a construction technique I'd never heard of before I bought the place, but apparently was quite common here in the first half of the 19th century.
Sure makes insulating (and pulling wiring) a challenge!

 

[Oldpath05]

The house is so-called plank construction...the walls are vertical 4 x 24 planks notched and pegged into huge beams at the top & bottom. It's a construction technique I'd never heard of before I bought the place, but apparently was quite common here in the first half of the 19th century.
Sure makes insulating (and pulling wiring) a challenge!

Well that's a shame no old pictures. 4 x 24? Are you saying these are 4' x 24' planks? Beam are always notched but I never seen planks notched.

 

[Oaktree]

Well that's a shame no old pictures. 4 x 24? Are you saying these are 4' x 24' planks? Beam are always notched but I never seen planks notched.

Well, they're 4 by 24 inches, not feet, but yes it appears that the planks were also trimmed down (not sure of the exact term) to fit into slightly over 2 inch slots cut in the beams, or at least that's the way it was done on the one kitchen wall I'd opened up. I don't know why they did it that way, and anyone who does know is long gone.
It appears that wall had a door in it once upon a time, but it was boarded over and an adjoining section of wall opened up to put in a small picture window (which I replaced with a bay)...that's where I saw the slots in the upper beam that were narrower than the thickness of the planks.