A Story of Struggle and Resilience.

No one knows how it became what it was or how it endured so long, but it sheltered and shaped many lives for over a century.

Let’s take a tour of Grandma’s house.

The front porch was covered and inviting, but it faced the East. So, sitting out there in the Summer was plagued by too much sun in the morning and two little breeze in the evening. So the porch, both above and below, was the preferred habitat of many pets and more than a few farm animals through the years.

To the right of the porch were two tall single pane windows that furnished light to the living room. These windows were made from hand blown glass in oak frames. They had not opened in years. The settling of the house had made that impossible. The glass had a green tint and was not nearly as clear as the glass we use today. It was noticeably thicker at the bottom, having flowed downward over the decades.

Those drafty old windows offered little protection from the elements. Even with a hot fire blazing inside, it wasn’t uncommon to find ice forming on the inside of the glass and puddles of water on the sill.

Let’s walk inside, I’ll get the door, it can be a bit tricky. You have to giggle the handle.

As the door opens we find ourselves in a bedroom. This house has many secrets, this one. What you see now is a single story house sitting on a single (large) log (and several concrete blocks) . . . But it used to be much different. It used to be a majestic two-story house and this was once its foyer.

For reasons known only to the dead, the second story was removed and replaced with newer roof. In the attic, the floor that was used for the second story still existed, as did the covered-over space that was once occupied by a staircase. We’ll explore the attic a little later.

Standing in the front doorway you see a window at the back of the room. This view exposes the fact that the house is a “L” shape, only backwards. The backyard, the back porch, and the corner of the well house are all visible through this window.

The floor is noticeably unlevel. The walls are covered with old faded wallpaper. The old vinyl floor is trying to curl up on the edges. A worn pathway leads to the living room. The smell of an aged dwelling is prominent. There’s a chamber pot in the corner near the back window. A beautiful old quilt adorns the bed.

To the left is a bedroom. Let’s step in and take a look. This is the only original bedroom left in the house. The others left with the second story. In it sits the only complete bedroom suit my grandparents ever owned. A fancy walnut set that even included a makeup table. To the best of my knowledge, they never used this furniture. Not while it was in this house anyway.

This bedroom was the furthest away from the main heat source in the house, which was a stove in the living room. Similar to The living room, the windows wouldn’t open due to settling. So, this room was extremely hot in the summer and extremely cold in the winter. The main reason it was never used. But it was always made up perfectly. I slept in there just once, at my insistence, and nearly froze to death.

Moving back through the entry/bedroom where we first entered, we follow the worn linoleum pathway to the living room.

This was my grandfather’s domain. He was injured in a farming accident when I was very young, becoming disabled. His reclining chairs sat in the Northwest corner of the room. I say chairs because he wore out several over the years. My grandfather was a very good and wise man.

To his left was the only working window in the room. This window would eventually receive a small air conditioner. The first air conditioner my grandparents had ever owned.

To his right was the primary heat source for the house. Early on, before my time, this heat source was a potbelly wood stove. At some point a large propane gas stove was installed offering more heat with much less effort. I loved to sit in front of that stove on cold winter days.

Across the room, on a rusty metal stand, sat a green 19 inch black and white TV accessing 3 channels via the antenna mounted to the roof. There was no remote control, so grandpa had to depend on me and Grandma to change the channels.

Even with the addition of a large couch, Grandma’s sewing machine, and her rocking chair, the room felt mostly empty. Especially in the center of the room where I nearly died when I was around 9 years old. I suffered from what the doctors called tick fever. Oddly I remember feeling at peace throughout that sickness. You’ll learn why later.

Some years later I asked Grandma why she put me on a pallet of quilts in the middle of her living room, while I was sick, instead of in the bed in the next room. She said it made it more convenient for her. Grandpa finally confided in me that she was worried that I would die alone in the bedroom. Grandpa never lied to me.

The Southwest corner of the room offered a transition to the kitchen. Let’s take a peek.

This transition was a bit of a hallway, no more than 8 to 10 ft long. When the house was heated with wood, the left side of this hallway was the wood storage area. There were doors that allowed access to this space from the inside and the outside, removing the need to carry the wood through the house. Later, when propane replaced wood as the energy source, the outside doors were replaced with siding and the space become a closet. The only closet in the house.

The right side of the hallway was the chimney that ran from its foundation below the house through the roof. It was accessible from both the living room and the kitchen.

The kitchen was my grandmother’s domain. Let’s go in.

To the left, in the corner sat an old churn with a cap made of wood. This churn had two main purposes, (sauerkraut and sweet pickles). Oh how I love those pickles! 10 lb of sugar to every 10 lb of cucumbers. They were delicious!

I could have done without the sauerkraut.

To the right, not early on but eventually, sat a small propane heating stove venting through the chimney. To the right, near the door we just entered, was a calendar. This was an almanac calendar provided free by a local business or bank. There was always one there.

Around and to the right was a pantry area that would eventually house a hot water heater. I associate that space with the smell of turpentine. It’s where I learned not to remove the lid from chemical containers and take big whiff. If you have ever smelled turpentine, you know how unpleasant that was!

I was 14 before this house had a working bathroom and running water. Prior to 1974 our source of water was a shallow well in a building about 25 ft South of the house. Water was retrieved from the concrete lined well with a tubular device attached to a rope lowered and raised with a pulley system.

The tubular device was called a water bucket, even though it did not look like any buck that I had ever seen before, (see the photo). Once retrieved, the water was dispensed into a real bucket and carried into the house. This process happens several times a day, on most days. I carried my fair share.

One enamel covered metal bucket and dipper were reserved for drinking water. We all drank from the same dipper. Etiquette demanded that any water left in the dipper after taking a drink had to be discarded. Nothing compared to cool well water out of a cool dipper on a hot Summer day.

The water was used for typical kitchen duties throughout the day. The wastewater was collected in a bucket reserved for that purpose and tossed out the back door as needed.

Obviously cooking and washing dishes was quite the chore. There were no kitchen cabinets or countertops to prepare meals. Most work was done on the kitchen table. 

Grandma’s table was covered in well worn green laminate with chrome edging around the sides. The matching chairs were sturdy, but the green vinyl covered pads were worn and some were torn. She also had a bakers table that usually housed some sort of goodies, even during hard times.

A wood cooking stove was used early on, but eventually gave way to the only new appliance my grandmother ever owned, a beautiful white Tappan propane cook stove with a working clock. She loved that stove.

The beautiful old wood fired cook stove with fancy porcelain handles, my grandpa got used, was relegated to the well house where it collected dust for most of my childhood. I always wanted that stove. I don’t know where it is now.

At some point a new water well was required. It was a greater distance from the house and too deep for manual extraction. We required a pump.

With that pump came indoor plumbing, used kitchen cabinets and a working bathroom. No more trips to the outhouse in the middle of the winter. But who am I kidding, I only went to the outhouse for number two. For this young lad, the back porch steps sufficed fine for number one.

At some point, before my time, a bedroom was added to the back of the original house, just off the kitchen. Eventually this room was divided to facilitate the new bathroom.

My father and I replaced and enclosed the back porch area, providing a space for much needed storage.

Out back stood what we called the Smokehouse. To the best of my knowledge it was never used for smoking meats. That smell generally never goes away. Instead it was a storage shed for tools and equipment. It also had a small grain bin.

The smokehouse’s building materials matched the original house. We suspected this shed was assembled from the material removed from the second story of the house. That makes sense, since very little was wasted back then.

There was quite a bit of space under the house to explore. The large oak hand-hewn log ran the entire length of the original house, in the center. Concrete blocks supported the sides. The true dimensional lumber was all seasoned oak that laughed in the face of modern nails. Sawmill saw blade marks were evident on every piece of lumber I saw. The nails used to assemble this house were square-shank and handmade by a blacksmith. Every single one.

There were a lot of spiders down there! The Brown Recluse Spider being the most feared.

The loft was my special place. As I said earlier, the second story floor still existed, so moving around was quite easy once up there. But the trek to get there was quite challenging for adults. So, this was my domain!

There were treasures up there. Old books on veterinarian medicine. Old Sears catalogs, newspapers, and magazines. There were articles of clothing and shoes that dated back to the 1800s. There was security, privacy, and dreams galore! My fondest memories still reside there. I felt safe.

I would love to tell you that this was a happy house full of love. It wasn’t. There were moments of affection, but they don’t occupy much space in my memory. Most came from my Grandpa. We spent a lot of quality time together.

I don’t remember ever receiving a hug from my father. Not a single one. Hugs from Grandma were rare.

I received several brutal beatings in and around that house, mostly from my grandma and my father. One particularly memorable beating saw me standing with my hands pushing against the exterior wall of the Smokehouse while my father lashed me with a horse whip. I was told that each time my hands came off that wall I got another lashing from the whip. The pain was so bad on the back of my bare legs that I couldn’t remain standing after each strike. So this went on for several minutes until I couldn’t stand up any longer. Thankfully he finally stopped.

The scars on the back of my legs have faded over time. The mental scars, not so much.

It’s odd to have such cherished memories of a place where such terrible things happened. The peace that I felt when I was deathly ill came from the rare period of kindness I received from my Grandma and knowing, because of my sickness, I wouldn’t receive a beating from her or my father.

I didn’t welcome death, but it wasn’t my biggest fear either.

I left that house in 1979, at age 18. I returned when my Grandpa died in 1985 and again briefly in 1995. I didn’t speak to my grandma or father after that. Grandma died in 2007. I wasn’t even told. My father died in 2012. I didn’t go home.

Nearly 13 years later . . .

It’s all gone now. The house, the old well house, and the Smokehouse . . . Even all the surrounding trees. Wiped away, as if they never existed.

But that’s not how the story ends.

I credit the challenges that I faced as a child, and the skills I learned working on that farm, for preparing me for the unrelenting challenges of life.

I faced those challenges, many of my own making, head on. I kept getting up and pushing against that wall, preparing for the next pop of the whip . . . Because I knew I would survive.

And I did. I served 4 years in the Navy, owned 3 businesses, and achieved the position of VP of Operations for a major corporation . . . Making plenty of mistakes along the way.

I retired a few months after my father passed away at age 53 in 2013. I have a wonderful family that has stuck with me during my journey, and that hasn’t always been smooth sailing for them.

Another decade has passed now.

My future is secure and I’m in a good place in my life. But, I’d sure like to visit that attic one more time. I’d probably have to have some help getting up there, but I bet I’d make it!

Thanks for taking the tour with me! I hope you enjoyed it!