Deepher

Unfortunately progress has been slow over the holiday season. Presents, family activities and sleeping have accrued a lot of time.

Right before the holidays I decided that for my brother's family I would make them a lamp. Last April my brother and I built a crib for his child. I took the extra wood and built a lamp that matches the crib in material and style. I think it turned out not bad.



What has been going on at the house? An unbelievable amount of hole-digging. I have dug more dirt in the last 2 weeks. And I have dug a lot in my day. Several classic examples I use to start digging a deep hole:

"No honey, I like your hair better when it was longer"

"I didn't say women are weak, I said they weren't strong"

"Did you gain a little winter-weight?"

I'm going to advise all the gentlemen not to use those methods.

But really there is some mystery in the back area of my house. There was a hack-job staircase going to the basement from outside of it, but you had to duck very low to get through the opening. After removing an amazing amount of dirt, I was surprised to find that it was bricked and paved at normal standing height. It appears at some point during the fire or fixing the water line that the extra dirt, along with a ton of garbage, was thrown into the stairwell and this hack job staircase was built over it. Who knows.



The "grey" line on the block wall represents where the staircase/dirt was piled up to. Now there is a nice recessed cavity to land a real staircase. Overall I'm guessing I moved over 120 wheelbarrows of dirt out of the area.



The sewer-line is the last digging project on site. I'm overjoyed.

John takes out a concrete footing as the crawlspace goes deeper

Stolen!

My parents enjoy history. I spent many of my childhood days in museums, battlefields, historic homes, historic government buildings, forts, ships, factories and the likewise. For many years of my life I thought all families spent the summer traveling up and down the coast visiting civil and revolutionary war battlefields. Note: Today they look like just "fields". (just kidding dad!)

Anyhow I spent a great deal of time at the Greenfield Village and Henry Ford Museum. I even was enrolled in several classes as a kid spending time at the tinsmith shop after hours making nutmeg grinders and candle holders. It's a pretty solid place for American history.

The Village is supposed to be "turn of the century" America. My house would fit in perfectly save the fact nothing significant happened there yet. Often after a long day of work and black snot from the 150 year old sawdust, the smell makes me think I'm at the village. Except I own it.

But in the 1930's the village took 2 houses from my street.

Henry Fords workshop at 58 Bagley* was where it all started for my company. Ford then rapidly expanded up to 688 Mack*, then to Piquette street, onto the revolutionary Highland park plant and then his crowning jewel of industrialization, the Ford Rouge plant. "58 Bagley" isn't easy to peg on a location because of the two street renumberings. My guess is that it was somewhere around where Bagley crosses 3rd street....present day MGM Casino. Also the street was "Baker" at the time all off this was happening. I shall investigate for you.

As much as I may or may not enjoy my job, I do feel a connection to "the old man" (as my grandfather would say) living on Bagley, having worked in the monster Rouge factory, and then in a historic Albert Kahn building that The Henry Ford recently absorbed, the former "Ford Powertrain Operations & Engine Engineering building or POEE".

The 2nd building was just down the street at Bagley and 20th. It's known as the Cohen Milinery. It is featured on the cover of the Corktown book that I mentioned several weeks ago. A good looking Victorian building again that the village probably moved in the 30's long before it would be missed. Today an empty lot sits next to the Matrix theater just down from the Mexican Village restaurant. It's a great example of turn of the century commercial space with some fancy brickwork that I would of enjoyed had it stayed a part of the neighborhood. Granted nobody really started noting the area as being historically significant until the 1970's. Long after the village had taken the buildings.

Check out the blog map!

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*Note that 58 Bagley is a replica of the original building built with some original bricks from 58 Bagley Avenue duplex.

*Mack > Myrtle > Martin Luther King Blvd

Sweet Heat

If you live in southeast Michigan you are probably thinking that I'm getting a bit cold these days as we are now operating below freezing for the high. But my good friend Andreas came through again with a furnace! He acquired this unit from our friend frank for his workshop, and he was nice enough to let me use it through the winter.

I temporarily turned my gas on to figure the unit out. After I got it working, I shut the gas of and I called up DTE to "have my gas turned on". This is how the conversation went.

Me: "I'd like to get my gas turned on"
DTE: "Okay. Let me just check, it appears it is already on"
Me: "Really? No seriously, it's off"
DTE: "Our records indicate your gas was turned on at the same time as the electrical"
Me: "Oh, you're right" (then I proceeded to hang up, get my wrench and turn the gas back on.)

Weird. I wonder if I will get a bill.

Anyhow the final phase of demolition has started. The house is essentially "3 additions" it seems. The original building consisted only of the first 20ft (1860?). Then the rest was added on at least by 1884, where a sanborn insurance map shows the house in it's entirety. At a later point the rear 1/3rd experienced a fire and was rebuilt. A neighbor tells me when they were a child, they remember the back half being caved in. So apparently the rear was "fixed" during the 80's. Now if you know anything about framing/construction this next picture will make you cry.


Even though it appeared "new" a quick look underneath and it was obvious that it all had to be rebuilt. The joist are overspan and shimmed with random materials from around the house. When I get through with it, it will be a tank.

Here is my rendition of what a 5 year olds rendition of the final product will look like! Enjoy!