Irons

Indiana had them.

You can still see signs in some of the old, old houses -- a common farmhouse plan (which I wish I knew the name of so that I could Google to find out when and why it had been in style) is a T-shape with a line of one-story rooms on the side away from the road. (Took many boring trips through the country to notice this, because the T can have any of its sides toward the road, which makes it look like at least four different house plans.) I was once in such an old house, and it was plain that the connection between the rearmost one-story room and the rest of the house had once been a breezeway.

Joy Beeson

It was quite common for a family to build their own house as they got the funds to pay for the materials. So, they would dig the basement first, pour the cement, and put a roof on it and live in it. So you find lots of basements with kitchens, bathrooms, and even fireplaces. Then as the upper floors were built, they moved up in the world. They did not have mortgages, which i don't think were widely available until after WWII.

IIRC one could get a mortgages prior to the 1950's or so, problem was in terms of mindset, getting into debt was seen as a bad thing, even to "buy" a home. One was supposed to live within one's means and that meant buying a house/property with ready money. Remember the scene from the film "Father of the Bride" where Mrs. Dunson shrieks in horror upon hearing her son and DIL have taken out a mortgage to buy a house, as opposed to moving in with either parent.

Don't forget canning or wine making! My grandparents all had basement kitchens, my grandmothers spending hours canning, my grandfathers pressing grapes and making wine. These two activities make a BIG mess and need a lot of space, and often you need to 'leave' everything in place while things cooled, etc. so using the main kitchen for these activities was problematic. Another couple of real good reasons for old homes with a basement kitchen.

-Irene

-------------- You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.=20

--Mae West=20

--------------

"Joy Beeson" wrote a common

Joy - I have a book "Country Patterns 1841 - 1883" edited by Donald J. Berg, published by Sterling; the subtitle is "A sampler of American country home & landscape designs from original 19th century sources". It shows a T-shaped house which is just called "a large farm-house" - not much help for Googling! This book doesn't seem to be available any longer but Mr Berg has a newer book "American Country Building Design" which might be helpful to you. My library has a copy - yours may too - the call number is 728.37. I wonder though if these T-shaped houses are really a "style" or just what resulted when an outbuilding (probably a kitchen) was connected to the main house. I used to own a 1908 Craftsman style house where it was obvious from the 3 different roofs in the back that this is exactly what had been done.

"Chris Underwood" wrote in news:ehk4h.3998$qJ6.2393@trndny07:

another book that might be useful is A Field Guide to American Houses by Virginia & Lee McAlester, published by Knopf... although it has more 'fancy' houses than 'folk' styles. lee

Pogonip wrote in news:45519266$ snipped-for-privacy@news.bnb-lp.com:

mortgages were available as far back as the mid-1800s, at least in New England factory towns. the huge difference between the early types of mortgage & modern mortgages is that the early ones were paid annually in one lump sum. perhaps this is why savings accounts were more popular in our parent's day... you had better have the money when it was due, or you lost the house. no waffling about it. my house was built in the early 1800s. there is a cellarhole to a *much* smaller house (about 10' x 10') where the owner lived while building this rather grand (for the time & area) house. i'm considering reconstructing that house at some point. it would be a single story post & beam, with, most likely, a single door & window. it had outside steps to get down to the cellar. lee

It's a two-story T, with a one-story outbuilding. The roof-ridge of the stem of the T neatly intersects the roof-ridge of the crossbar.

I noticed it when I started imputing heavy symbolism to the cross-shaped homes I was seeing, then I started wondering why one arm was different, then I started seeing the Ts in their different orientations: some had the low "addition" on the stem of the T and the crossbar toward the road, some had the addition on one end of the crossbar and the other end of the crossbar toward the road. And the ones that I noticed first had the stem of the T toward the road and the "addition" coming out of the middle of the crossbar.

Perhaps I should take DH's digital camera the next time I make one of those two-hour trips through the country, so as to preserve some of the details for thinking about later.

Joy Beeson

Joy Beeson wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

sounds sorta like the rural transitional Federal in New England. most are a 2 story L shape, but the ell can be on the left or the right & sometimes it's on the front (rarely). that was the 'basic' house. as the family grew & prospered, more, usually single story, outbuildings got tacked onto the ell. in the late 1800s it was considered progressive to attach the barn to the house through the line of outbuildings, usually in the order of summer kitchen, workroom, woodroom, barn. i'm trying to figure out the 'original' layout of my house (built in 1815, more or less). it's certainly *not* what it is now. i was told the barn was 'over there' & burned down in

1932. actually, the original barn was where the garage is now & was connected by an ell at a right angle to the one off the back of the house... i could use that now missing ell.

you really should. it would be great to document the style before they all disappear or get remuddled into McMansions (a huge pet peeve of mine is people gutting an old house & putting in a 'modern' interior. if you want a contemporary style house, just build or buy one!) OTOH, when i was looking at houses before i bought this one, i was shown a center chimney colonial built in the mid-1700s. the only updating in it had been adding a kitchen & bath in the late 1920s. i passed on buying it because my tendancy would be to restore it to pristine original, & really, i don't think the SO wants to live without electricity & central heat... :) lee

"enigma" wrote when i was looking at houses before i bought this one, i

But Lee - I thought the center chimney was the original "central heat"!!!

There's nothing older than about 1880's here in the Pacific Northwest so my house - original part built in 1906 - and the 1908 Craftsman are OLD houses out here. Actually my house is a T-shape but it wasn't the result of connecting an outbuilding. In 1990 the previous owners added a partial 2nd story and by making it a T could more easily make it self supporting since the original house was not built to support another story. It makes me laugh to think that the 1990 remodel made the house "look" like a 1906 farmhouse - T-shaped and with a porch across the front!

Ahh, it's good to hear that someone besides me does not think that stainless steel appliances, granite countertops, walk-in closets and bathrooms large enough to hold a board meeting are minimum essentials for a home.

I understand there are some people who yell at the newscasters and the pundits who hold forth on government and business. I yell at the home renovation and decoration shows.

I have this theory that "The glory of the kitchen is generally in inverse proportion to the amount of cooking done therein."

I have a pretty basic kitchen and still manage to cook three meals a day from scratch. Many of my friends have dream kitchens, and what they make for dinner is reservations, which is why (pre-Katrina) they were able to live essentially without a kitchen for about a year while the renovations were going on.

Olwyn Mary in New Orleans.

I have never cooked three meals a day in my life. My children grew up on cold cereal, and they are all hale and hearty.

I do cook dinner sometimes -- lunch is a matter of "get yourself a sandwich" -- and dinner often is "help yourself to whatever you find." I am not a good cook. My cooking is not always a pleasant experience for me or the ones who have to eat. There is a handful of things I can do acceptably....the rest.....well, thank goodness for convenience foods and the deli. But there's only two of us left at home now. Unless you count the cats.

My kitchen is small. Very small. But has the basics, unless you consider counterspace basic. However, the notion of knocking walls down and expanding into the dining room just doesn't cut it with me. If I had wanted that kind of house, I would have bought one.

Nobody's starving.

"Chris Underwood" wrote in news:CM25h.308$dz.213@trndny09:

it was... and it worked fairly well, considering the total lack of insulation. the thermal mass was a real good thing. unfortunately i have a Federal now, with the end chimneys... fancier, but less thermal mass. lee

Pogonip wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@news.bnb-lp.com:

this house has had some poor remodeling decisions in the past, like the *very* obvious late 40s Heat-a-Lator replacement brick fireplace in the dining room. that drives me nuts, but i try to ignore the elephant in the room since tearing out & rebuilding a fireplace doesn't sound like fun. i'm thinking of sticking a woodstove or gas fire insert in there. the chimney flue is 24" x 36" (now you know how Santa fit down the chimney). if i go for yuppie remodel, i'll reopen the upstairs fireplaces & put gas fires in those... and i *hate* the closets the former owners built, with those crappy bifold doors (OB sewing: i replaced the bifolds with drapes). i do understand thier reasoning though. the new real estate rules say you can't call any room a bedroom if it doesn't have a closet, so old houses have 0 bedrooms. of course, this house has 'box rooms' between the 2 big rooms both downstair & upstairs. we use them for offices & mine (downstairs) has been closed off from the parlor & had bookcases built on that wall. so it opens onto the now dining room (probably former winter kitchen) & the understairs area is now closets. i can get an amazing amout of 'stuff' into this 6' x4' area. my knitting stuff is in here. my sewing & beads are in my bedroom (and it all migrates to the porch in summer). my kitchen is ugly, but mostly functional. it will need remodeling in the next few year just because the homemade cabinetry is falling apart...

oh yeah...

lee

That would explain why you seem to have much more time than I do for sewing etc.

Olwyn Mary in New Orleans.

Mostly etc.

We put a woodstove insert in our fireplace. Nifty thing, that, with a surface on it that can be used for cooking. Then it became illegal to have. Only pellet stoves are legal now. Ours is grandfathered in, but should we ever sell (over my dead body) the insert must be removed. Now, the chimney is in need of repair, so we don't use it at all.

We had to have the chimney for the furnace lined about 15 years ago, or the oil company would not have turned on our furnace! There's a "pie plate" on the kitchen wall where the original stove was vented into that chimney, but now I guess there's sheet metal behind it.

That's all right - my drive to keep the house "original" does not extend to putting a wood cookstove in the kitchen.

Pogonip wrote in news:45561ea5$ snipped-for-privacy@news.bnb-lp.com:

this is the range i want when i win Megabucks ;)

or: 'm not so crazy about thier refrigerators, but i don't think anyone makes an oak case fridge that looks like an ice box. OB sewing: i have 6 cats, 2 dogs & a 6 year old. is replacing the undersink cabinets in the kitchen with draperies a really dumb idea? lee