Old House, Home

lisa June 9th, 2009

My neighbor found a few more old photos showing parts of our house.  Click on each one for the full view.

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lisa May 22nd, 2009

Our neighbor stopped by the other day to show us a photo of our house taken when he was a kid living next door (circa 1971).  You can see that there used to be a balcony railing on the second-story balcony in the front.  I wish there were more details visible, but it’s still really cool!

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lisa March 1st, 2007

Amazing that 18 months have passed since my last update. I’ve got quite a lot of news!

• Winter heating and the woodstove. I mentioned in the last entry that we were regretting having switched to natural gas. Well, we switched back to oil last year, with the help of our pal from the oil company (our neighbor to the rear). Then a couple of months ago the boiler broke, and we replaced that, too. Mark would like to replace the entire heating system with a geothermal radiant floor system, but that’s a project for after we win the lottery, I think. We upgraded our woodstove last year, too, and it seems to be doing its job well. This winter was very mild until January, but I think the stove has saved us some money on heating bills. Mark worked out a deal to get free uncut lumber from a landscaping guy he knows, and he and a friend spent much of the fall chopping up and splitting logs. We probably had 4 cords of wood starting out this winter, and we’ve gone through at least a cord. I get tired of constantly tending the stove, but it’s really nice to have it when the weather gets nasty.
• The upstairs hallway. We finally got all the trim back up in December! Woo-hoo!
• The outdoor projects… last summer I was away for the entire month of July and part of August, so I didn’t plant anything or enjoy the garden much. This year, I’m going nuts with new vegetables: spinach, sugar snap peas, edamame soybeans, cilantro, and peppers — and, of course, tomatoes. I got a bunch (60+) of old canning jars for free from a neighbor last weekend, and have plans to make and can lots of tomatoes and salsa this year. We also picked up a used chest freezer earlier this year, so I have lots of room to store my garden goodies.
• The workshop. The driveway to the workshop is finished, and the workshop itself is mostly finished. You can see pictures of the building process here.
• The front porch. We still have to finish the steps! But the rest of the porch is pretty much done.

We sat down a few weekends ago and actually made a list of just about every single remaining project. We have 16 remaining high-level priority projects. Here they are in order from highest to lowest priority:

1. Kitchen cabinets - all the drawers and doors and shelves, plus an additional wall cabinet, floor cabinet, and spice rack/corner cabinet.
2. Mudroom - the room needs to be painted and the sliding glass door needs to be installed.
3. Fence yard - we have the chain-link fence materials — we just need to install it. We have to do this before we can get a dog/dogs, and Mark wants to get it done this spring.
4. Back deck - build it!
5. Second floor cosmetics - two bedrooms left to fix up (strip the wallpaper, repair the plaster, then paint).
6. Workshop exterior - siding
7. Workshop interior - insulation, electrical work, etc.
8. Porch carpentry - those darned stairs.
9. Refinishing rest of floors - need some spare cash for this!
10. Exterior paint - would love to do this now, but we need to save our pennies.
11. Tree work - both planting new (fruit trees) and taking down old (catalpa and weed maples).
12. Heating system - completely redo (see above).
13. Basement refinish - demolish floors, excavate and install new concrete floor, repoint foundation, maybe put up some drywall, replace windows, etc.
14. Roof - we need a new one… and maybe we’ll install solar panels!
15. Replacement windows - would be great to replace all our double-hung, inefficient, warped old windows. Probably not going to happen for a while, if ever.
16. Master suite - my dream is to demolish the wall between our two remaining bedrooms, build a connecting walk-through closet, and install a full master bath. Probably not going to happen unless we win the lottery.

So I guess that’s enough for now.

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lisa May 20th, 2004

The house is coming along. We are trying to refinance. Got some great news from the appraiser today — house has increased in value to almost twice what we bought it for. The mortgage guy is coming on Saturday and hopefully we’ll be closing soon.

The first floor is pretty close to done — parlor, great room and dining room are about 95%, but kitchen and mudroom are next. Upstairs we’ve done two of the bedrooms and the sitting room, but the bathroom, our bedroom, and maid’s bedroom/study are still incomplete. Outdoors, I’ve not planted any veggies yet but the flower beds are looking quite pretty. Bought some Jacob’s Ladder and a new delphinium last weekend. Earlier this spring I went absolutely bonkers for pansies and bought a ton (almost 100 plants). My newest thinking is to put an asparagus patch in rather than bothering with annual veggies. I also want to put in blueberries and maybe a kiwi. Or a paw-paw!

Anyway, the strawberries a friend gave me last year are overtaking that patch. Quite fun! We put up a fence to try to keep at bay whatever ate them all last year. We shall see…

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lisa August 29th, 2003

I’ve uploaded a bunch o’ pics to the gallery.

We are halfway done. We bought this house two years ago, and we’re halfway to finishing the main renovation projects. We celebrated last weekend with a big party that was well attended and a huge success. We’ll have an after party in another couple of years.

Since June, a lot of things have come together - we’re pretty much totally plumbed and electrified, although we still need the electrician to finish putting up the fixtures in the mudroom and the hard-wired smoke-detectors. The fire-sprinkler system is ready to be activated, I think. We’re going to have to hire some other electrician to put in the whole-house surge suppressor I want.

As for our labor projects, (this list is totally incomplete)
- we need to finish painting the stairs
- mudroom (thinking about wallpapering with nautical maps)
- our bedroom, the upstairs sitting room, and the servant’s bedroom all need a total cosmetic overhaul
- finish cabinetry in the kitchen

As for the outdoors, I have 55 bulbs to plant this fall, but I’m cool with the garden this year - not stressed at all.

Other things we need to do, short-term:
- Re-finance. We have an application in process with East-West Mortgage that looks like it’ll happen, but if it doesn’t we only have a few more months to take care of it before Mark’s student loans start showing up as a debt.
- Sandblast and re-paint the radiators and reinstall them, before it gets cold (we might start needing heat in … 3 weeks?)
- Tile the shower and floor in the upstairs bath
- Deal with whatever dip-tank stuff we should do for woodwork and trim we want to stain instead of paint
- Woodstove. We have to get the fireplace lined and buy a woodstove and build a decorative thing around the woodstove. I don’t know if we’ll do this before winter - it depends on whether we can find a reasonably priced, used, post-1996 woodstove to buy.
- Sand and refinish the hardwood floors throughout the house

Future projects include:
- The back deck, with a sliding glass door from the mud room (priority:1)
- A garden shed (priority:1)
- Refinishing part of the basement as a playspace, which involves lowering the floor(priority:1)
- Building a conservatory from the basement out into the back yard (glassed-in three-walled conservatory/ greenhouse) (priority:3)
- A garage of some sort (priority:1)
- A woodshop for Mark (priority:1)
- Re-finishing the attic as a master suite with bathroom (priority:3)

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lisa June 10th, 2003

The property was originally part of the “Brooks Homestead,” an area about 3 acres, from Florida Road to Nason Street, plus an orchard near the Stow line. The homestead was divided up in 1873 when Mrs. Thomas H. (Rebecca) Brooks died. On the 1875 map in the Assabet Mills book, the large area between the Assabet River and Summer Street is noted as belonging to T. Brooks and Mrs. T. Brooks (divided into three parcels). There is one house shown on the map in approximately the same present-day location of 50-52 Summer Street, belonging to Mrs. T. Brooks ? the rest of the property is shown as having no buildings.

Rebecca and Thomas had three (?) children: Mary Jane (Brooks) Reed, Luke S. Brooks, and Thomas H. Brooks Jr., who was living in Montevideo, Uruguay at the time. Mary Jane Reed gave her third of the inheritance to Luke in 1887 for one dollar. Luke bought out Thomas in 1888 for $3,750. It is unclear whether the house at 48 Summer Street existed at that time, but probably not.

Paul Boothroyd told us that 48 Summer Street was built in 1890. The story is that the two-family house next door, 50-52 Summer Street, was the main house and this was originally the barn, which was converted into a house in 1890. We found newspaper from 1888 behind the wall in the living room. On the 1879 Bailey & Hazen map shown below, there are two houses on the Summer and Nason corner (but the one to the east is the larger house, so this probably isn?t 48 Summer, but rather 50-52 Summer).

Luke’s wife’s name was Zipporah; after Luke died in 1914, Zipporah sold the house to Kate C. Goodenow for $2,500. Kate was married to Daniel Goodenow, but he is noted as releasing any claim on the property and Kate is the one who bought it.

In 1918, the house was deeded to Lucy A. Newton; since no money changed hands, I assume this was an inheritance. Lucy owned the house for 24 years.
In 1942, George E. Newton (Lucy?s brother? Nephew?) sold the house to Mary Mabel Holly for $7,500 (the equivalent of about $90,000 today). Lucy is not listed on the 1942 transaction, so I assume she had died before then.

Mary Mabel Holly was a widow with five children. When Mary died in 1973, the house passed to Mildred and Virginia, who at that time were in their fifties and had never married.

Mildred died in 1999 at the age of 78. She willed everything to her sister.
Virginia died in 2000, also at age 78. She didn’t leave a will, and so her estate went into probate. Their brother John was the executor; we bought the house on August 31, 2001 from John Holly.

Questions that remain:

1. When was the house built or converted into a house?
2. Why is the house a mixture of balloon framing and post-and-beam?
3. Who lived in the house from 1914-1918? Just Kate, or Kate, Daniel, and family? What is known about the Goodenow family?
4. How was Lucy Newton related to Kate Goodenow?
5. Who lived in the house from 1918-1942? Was Lucy Newton married to George Newton, or was he a relative?

If any readers can help with these questions, or if anyone knows more about the house at 48 Summer Street, we would love to hear from you. We would also be very interested in pictures of the house from any era, and maps or aerial photos of Maynard which show the house. We can be reached at 48summer@linesdesigns.com.

See also:
Rough Chart/Timeline (Word Doc)

Assabet Mills, Maynard Massachusetts, by Paul Boothroyd and Lewis Halprin, 1999.

1879 Bailey and Hazen map of Maynard

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lisa October 24th, 2001

Welcome to our house. As you come in the front door, please follow the blue arrows til you come to ?

? the magic closet! Feel free to put your coat inside. The light comes on automatically (there’s a switch in the floor). Notice the detail on the keyhole. The arrows on the floor will direct you on this guided tour. Enjoy!

This is the parlor. This is where the Christmas tree will go. The pocket doors won’t close now, because the house is settled so badly. But someday, we hope this will be one of three sets of working pocket doors.

We call this the Great Room. The floors in this part of the house are oak, and they will be very nice once they’re refinished. The fireplace is what’s called a Rumford fireplace. Its design is intended to send more of the heat of the fire into the room, rather than up the chimney. The wallpaper in this part of the house is in pretty good shape. It was probably put up fairly recently ? at least after most of the settling of the house had occurred.

Welcome to the dining room! We loves the Chinoiserie-style wallpaper in this room. It’s a style that was popular in 1920’s France. We also love the chandelier, the built-in cabinet, and the bay window. We bought this huge rug recently at a going-out-of-business sale. The door from here to the pantry/kitchen is a swinging door!

Now you’re in the “butler’s pantry.” It’s very ? yellow. Lots of storage space, though. It’s a shame they painted the cabinets, in a way ? open one up to see what the wood looks like, unpainted. Pretty wainscoting.

And the kitchen. Check out that wacky sixties floral wallpaper! And over by the stove, you can see a couple of older layers of wallpaper. The ceiling in here was damaged by the bathroom, upstairs. That strange storage space near the floor is actually the back side of the china hutch, and we have no idea what it might have been used for originally. The little room off the back of the kitchen leads to the back porch. One day soon, we’ll be putting a half-bath there. If you go through the door next to it, you’ll arrive in ?

The Mud Room. We’d like to put a sliding glass door in the wall at the back, and then build out the back porch (which is currently condemned). This room has a lot going for it ? all that nice dark wood wainscoting and the Arts and Crafts colonnade, plus the built-in shelves and, behind the door you came through, a built-in cabinet. We apologize if you detect a faint whiff of animal urine ? the sisters who lived here must have kept their animals in here, because you can tell they sprayed the baseboards. By the side door, there’s a bench with a storage compartment inside, and an old safe that is permanently locked. Anybody know a safe-cracker?

Going back out into the hall, directly on your right is the servant’s staircase to the second floor. And in front of you is the door to the basement. Let’s go downstairs first.

Just a few things to say about the basement. First, there’s an original, from the 40’s, central vacuum system here to the left of the stairs as you go down. Yes, it still works ? and we have the original hoses and attachments in the attic. Also, there was originally a half-bath down here. We probably won’t get that working, since the basement is below the level of the sewer lines and it would be a lot of work. Finally, the metal posts you see are holding up the house at the moment, and the hydraulic jack is what we’re using to level the house. If you face the stairs and look up at the ceiling, you’ll see a yellow string running from the front to the back of the house. This “level line” will show you exactly where the settling is, and how bad it is! This basement is where the most important work is happening right now.

Back upstairs, and up to the second floor.

As you go up the “grand staircase” please have a look at the banister. The places where the yuck has been scrubbed off are our pride and joy.

One of the things we like about this house is the floor plan. All the rooms on the second floor open up to the landing, which is a great design.

The first bedroom at the right of the top of the stairs is our bedroom, and we hypothesize that it was the parents’ bedroom. The glass fixtures are probably all original to the house, but they were originally gas lighting fixtures. When the original family lived here, the family Bible was on a stand in that alcove. Check out the closet ? there’s a built-in dresser and a window.

Proceeding left out of the blue bedroom, you come to the upstairs “sitting room.” This is where a Victorian family would hang out in the evenings ? guests normally wouldn’t see any of the upstairs. Here is the third pair of pocket doors. One alarming feature of this room is the extreme sagging at the very front of the room. Check out the crooked windows! Mark thinks there’s a rotten sill under there, which unfortunately means we will have to tear off the front porch at some point to fix it. But don’t worry ? we’re definitely going to rebuild it with the original pillars.

Next down the hall is “the ugly bedroom.” It’s got bare walls with a ton of cracks in the plaster, and it stinks. Seriously. We’ve cleaned and cleaned, and it still stinks.

Oh, by the way, all the floors on the second floor are maple.

Walk back down the other way, and you’ll come to the door to the attic. You’re welcome to go up there, but there’s not much to see. There are a couple of built-in cedar closets, a basketball hoop, and a lead-lined box which would have been used to store one’s furs (Lead keeps out the moths).

Past the stairs to the attic, you’ll come to the bathroom. Please note: it may be a little smelly. We need to take out some of the wood around the base of the toilet to get rid of the stink. The bathroom has some pretty interesting silver-and-pinkness going on ? but at least it’s big. We’re both thrilled to have a shower, which Mark put together recently, but be aware that it’s a little flimsy, so please don’t pull on it.

Okay, next up: look down the servant’s staircase and notice the wall’s odd markings on both sides. That’s from poor Virginia, who had a bad hip, and for however-many-years, she’d go down this staircase, leaning against the wall with every step. Yes, folks, that’s years and years of grime.

Just past the servant’s staircase is the servant’s bedroom. It’s where Mildred used to paint. We’re not sure what we’ll end up using this room for.

Okay, the final bedroom is the Rose Bedroom. It’s essentially a mirror image of the Blue Bedroom, except there’s no built-in dresser in the closet.

Thank you for visiting with us!

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