With the outside taken down the builder, Jeff and his sons Jason and Jarrison, headed upstairs to the attic. These are brave souls, indeed. I guess Jason drew the short straw and climbed up in the dark. In about 30 seconds we heard shouting and Jason jumped from the attic onto the attic stairs, broke those and I'm sure set some sort of speed record. He had been attacked by a semi large animal. Of course, all the guys were laughing but no one else went up there that day. A few days later, studs were up (after leveling a four inch difference in the attic deck), beams were added to stop the inch flex in the floor of the upper bedroom which would have ripped open the seams in the sheetrock ceiling below. Jeff marveled how straight the walls were in a stone house built so long ago. It was time for the roof. When the wood was taken off the ceiling of the closets in the upper bedrooms, it revealed a slate roof with original rafters of chestnut that were 30 inches on center. Again, Jeff marveled ( Jeff is doing a lot of marveling and not always in a good way) that it had just sagged under the weight and hadn't collapsed. On top of the stone on the front and back sides of the house were chestnut beams 14 inches wide, 8 inches thick and 36 feet long on which the roof was anchored. It was amazing that that long ago men cut down a chestnut tree that tall and wide and hand hewed two beams and then hoisted them up thirty feet to set them. No lumber yards - you want a beam you go out and find a tree and then make one. A small section of one of the beams had to be removed because of rot due to a leak. My son Brad tried to cut it with a chainsaw and in a few minutes, the blade was shot. Jeff went through 4 new sawsall blades before he finally cut through it. The loss of the American Chestnut was a real tragedy. It was used to build everything, the nuts sustained families and livestock and it was incredibly beautiful in the spring with huge creamy-white blossoms. Three billion trees died from the blight and only a few are left today.
Here are a few more demo photos.
Sending sweet greetings from Frog Hollow Farm. Ahhhh, the memories of demolition!!! We didn't have any large animals in our ceilings or walls, but there was plenty of black mold. Jose was the lucky guy who had to tear everything out and chuck it out the windows down to the large dumpster plopped right in our front yard - a lovely sight when driving up to the house. Those chestnut beams sound marvelous - will you be able to save any of the wood? Ciao, bella!
ReplyDeleteHi FHFG! Glad I brought back all those wonderful memories for you. Yes black mold was all throughout our house, also. We will save every piece of chestnut we can and use it throughout the house. I think a chestnut beam in the hood over the cooktop would be great. Send me a picture of your new addition.
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