Wood

The floors are done, and they look amazing. I'm glad I decided to go with Mark's inclination, as well as that of our floor guy, Matt: Minwax "royal mahogany." The only down side is that now I am simply dying to get the rest of the floors done!

Upstairs hall:

Kitchen:

And the crown jewel... the staircase. At first, they were not going to do anything to the risers besides touch up their dings and go over them with poly. Matt said they just do not have the equipment to sand risers. This is how they looked with the steps done and the risers left as is:

I wasn't feeling it. They bothered me. Some opinions were approving of the contrast, but to my eye, the risers looked too orange. I did not mind a contrast, but I did NOT like the orange cast I was perceiving, in contrast with the mahogany stain. So after some pondering, I asked Matt what would happen if we put some stain on the risers without sanding. I told him I didn't need them to match the steps, but I would like them to be darker. Matt obliged...

He said he had to put the stain on pretty thick, but the end result, to my surprise, was that the risers actually come very close to matching the steps.

I've always loved this staircase, and now I love it even more. The way the stained glass window casts colors upon the landing is especially awesome... I will try to capture that in a photo some day.

These refinished floors have really caused me to turn a corner in my appreciation of this house. I now find that when I go over there, I don't want to leave. And we only refinished the kitchen, staircase, upstairs hallway, and upstairs bathroom. It feels cleaner, somehow, and it feels inviting, even cozy.

Now I am turning my attention toward rejuvenating the vast stretches of wood trim throughout the house... Something to occupy me until we can spend the $$$ needed to do the 2nd floor bedrooms. I really hope to do those sooner rather than later.

And so it begins...

Over the weekend, locksmiths aside, we began our first real, professional jobs. On Saturday, the plumber began. Today, the flooring guy began. In the meantime, we've been doing all manner of smaller tasks like stripping wallpaper, pulling down water-stained plaster, and cleaning, cleaning, CLEANING.

Cracking the Safe

While the locks were being changed out on all exterior doors, I found this safe in the basement. What luck to find a safe in the basement at the same time a locksmith is in your house! I lugged the heavy thing upstairs (it rattled, so I knew there was something in it) and plopped it down on the kitchen counter. I asked the locksmith if he could crack it.

"Theoretically..." he responded, never having actually cracked a safe before. He explained what he would have to do, but I had no idea what he was talking about. I told him if he could crack it, we would split any valuables inside.

So he drilled it. His bit smoked and made some strange sounds. At one point the bit got stuck on the drill and we had to pry it off. The first hole was low. He was aiming for the iterior dial. The second hole was good enough. He had this little head lamp so he could see into the hole and the the dial beyond. Whenever the correct number of the safe came up, a little notch would appear. He spun the dial and called out numbers, which I wrote down on a paper towel. After he had the four numbers, he opened the safe. What glorious treasures of lay within:

Contents: A little black address book, a 1920s news article about how to have boys rather than girls when attempting to have children, a 1912 Liberty Dime, a 1976 Dollar Coin, a silver necklace, a piece of paper with the safe's combination, and a CD with cartoonish pictures of Satan all over it...

The liberty dime was only worth about 5 bucks. Someday I will take the necklace to the jeweller in Maplewood (who still exists) and see if it is worth anything. As for the satan CD... I put it back in the safe and despite now having the combination I can't get it open again!

Closing the Deal: Part 2

The house is ours. There was much drama leading up to the final hour, including last-minute approval by the bank of the Short Sale, but somehow it all came together by 5pm yesterday. We did, however, have an unhappy surprise during our walk-through. If the seller weren’t an all-but-bankrupt, recently divorced alcoholic, we might have kicked up a fuss about it. As it is, we’re getting an incredible price, and knocking heads as we would have liked to do would not have accomplished anything. So… onward and upward.











We'll be changing the locks at our earliest opportunity. There is no telling what goons have keys to our house.

On a happier note, here are a couple shots of the beautiful (original??) fixtures on the clawfoot bath tub:

A 1908 bathroom?

I had to ask whether they (“they” meaning, at least, the wealthy) had indoor plumbing in 1908. After all, we looked at another St. Charles house built maybe 10 years before this one, and in one corner of the decrepit “garage” there was an old outhouse. It turns out that they certainly did… but it was not common. According to one source, “In 1921, only 1% of homes in the US had indoor plumbing.” It is plausible to me that it would be your bigger, more expensive homes (like ones with servant stairs) that might have been among that lucky 1% — but, of course, the municipal infrastructure would also have to be available in their location, I assume.

In any case, I was told that our 2nd floor bathroom (aka, the “pink bathroom”) is likely original to the house:



It would not have been pink, of course. Paint was all oil-based at that time, and therefore very expensive. That’s largely why often everything – EVERYTHING – was wallpapered… even closets… even the ceiling. And wallpaper patterns were usually either drab or garish. (We definitely will not be restoring every aspect of this house to the original style…!) In any case, I am wondering whether the pink wainscoting would have been white, or even just wood with varnish (in keeping with the preponderance of woodwork throughout the rest of the house). We may have to strip some of that pink paint and see what the wood looks like beneath.

As we aren’t in the house yet (only 1 week to go!), I cannot get a better photograph than the above, which was actually taken by the appraiser. But based on that photo, I’ve been told that the sink is probably original. Notice the separate hot & cold taps. Also, that pedestal base you see beneath it (which is in that awkward position because someone moved it out to get a look at the plumbing), would not have been there. Either the bare pipes would have been left visible (hmm, perhaps people were still sufficiently impressed by indoor plumbing that they liked to look at the pipes?), or they would have put a fabric skirt around them, beneath the sink.

The toilet may also be original (again, need a better angle), as may the bath tub. The tub is a clawfoot tub, although upon my scant appraisal I thought the clawed feet looked rather rough and under-detailed. I’ve been told, however, that usually antique clawfoot tubs are found covered in layers upon layers of paint – this would certainly explain the rather crude look of the feet. That’s just one more thing I cannot wait to examine more closely next week. As well, the hardware on the bath tub, apparently, would be quite expensive even if it’s newer, and particularly valuable if it is original. As one sage on the Old House Web put it, “With hardware like that, your tub deserves nice feet.” We shall see!

I will post again once we can examine this room up close. Also, I will update you on the results of my latest inquiry to my wonderfully helpful contact at the Association of Historic Frenchtown; I’ve asked for her opinion on how old the bathroom is, and whether indoor plumbing was available in St. Charles in the early 1900s.

In the mean time, enlighten yourself on the history of plumbing. I, ahem, shit you not – an Englishman named Thomas Crapper had a hand in early toilet development in the late 1800s (although he did not, despite rumors to the contrary, invent the toilet).

In 1885, a revolution in toilet making occurred: Thomas Twyford created the first valveless toilet made of china. Until then, water closets were more commonly made of metal and wood…

Up until the 1800s in the US, most water pipes were made of hollowed trees. Cast iron pipe imported from England had one of its first installations in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. By the early 1800s, cast iron production began domestically in New Jersey. In 1848, the National Public Health Act was passed creating a plumbing code for the US.

Almost simultaneously in 1883, both the Standard Sanitary Manufacturing Company (now American Standard) and Kohler began the process of enameling cast iron bathtubs to form a smooth interior surface. Kohler's first clawfoot tub was advertised as a "horse trough/hog scalder, when furnished with four legs will serve as a bathtub. " These tubs soon became mass-produced as they were recognized as having an extremely sanitary surface that was easy to clean, thus preventing the spread of bacteria and diseases…

The end of World War I brought with it a construction boom in the US. Bathrooms were fitted with a toilet, sink, and bathtub - mostly clawfoot bathtubs. But even in 1921, only one percent of homes in the US had indoor plumbing. Outhouses were still the norm in rural America. The Sears catalog, with its uncoated, absorbent pages, was a popular form of toilet paper often found hanging inside the outhouse.

Quoted from http://www.homeimprovementweb.com/information/clawfoot-tub-history.htm

And a much longer, more thorough article on the subject can be found at ThePlumber.com. It is interesting to see a number of very familiar names, like American Standard, Kohler, and Moen, dating back to (and influencing) the advent of indoor plumbing in the late 1800s.

Into the Past

Who would think that 2-1/2 weeks would be too long to wait for closing? Yet it seems to be.

To occupy myself in the mean time, I’ve started delving into the house’s history. We’re very lucky to have the assistance of not one but two historical societies in this endeavor: The St. Charles Historical Society and the Historic Frenchtown Association. The house is in the heart of the Frenchtown Historic District, which has its own listing in the National Register of Historic Places, separate from the St. Charles Historic District which encompasses Main Street.

Because I had begun haunting an online forum dedicated to the subject of old houses, my first question had quickly become, “What style is it?” After doing some googling of my own, my best guess was that it was an “American Foursquare,” but once I got the input of an expert I found that this was not the case at all. I had a wonderful and thorough response to the inquiry I sent to the Frenchtown Historic Association, quoted here:

Congratulations! You may have just made the buy of the century! I love this house and the way it is sited. What you have is a post-Victorian mutt. I say that lovingly, because most houses are not a pure style, like yours, but rather a collage of many influences of the day. Overall, I would label it a late Queen Anne because of its early Arts & Crafts influences. This is evident in the asymetric fenestration (arrangement of doors, windows and porch) of the facade. Other typical Queen Anne details include the 1 over 1 double hung wood window sashes, porches that emphasize the front door, the stairway stained glass window with Classical Revival motif, pocket doors, and the turned ballusters both inside on the staircases as well as outside around the porch.

Other influences include Romanesque with the belted stone course below the main floor windows on the facade and the Roman arched top leaded glass window as well as the rough chiseled local limestone block foundation. And the house shows early Arts & Crafts details including the pyramid capped interior newel posts, wide plain casings around the interior doors and windows with flat pedimented tops, large plain baseboards and multiple horizontal raised-panel interior doors of quarter-sawn wood on oversized ball-tipped hinges.

Overall, the house looks remarkably well intact of original details. I am especially glad to see what appears to be almost all of the original windows. The only evidence of insensitive changes that I see in the images is the loss of the original dormer window sashes to vinyl ones with 1960's Ranch casing and the addition of cornice crown moulding which would not have been used anywhere in a house of this age/style.

It was difficult not to become more impatient and excited than ever, after such an enlightening and enthusiastic reply as that. The other burning question was, “Who built it?” I had another wonderfully informative reply from a different lady at the Association. Here is the breakdown of the information she provided to me:

- The property was divided and sold/built between 1907 and 1908.

- The house was built by Edward A. Ohlms. He was still there with Edw. P. Ohlms in 1934.

- Edward A. and Edward P. owned the White House Tavern, located just 3 blocks from the house.*

- In 1950, the house was owned by Edward A.'s widow, Marion Ohlms. At this time Edward P. and Ralph Ohlms still owned the White House.

- In 1960, Clarence G. Ohlms, a bookkeeper, lived there; Ralph Ohlms still owned the White House.

- In 1970, Ernest E. Ohlms lived in the house.

- In 1980, Agatha C. Ohlms, a retired widow, lived in the house with Elizabeth Ohlms. Agatha lived in the house until 1983-4.

- In 1985, the house was occupied by another family name, which is the extent of the historical society's records. The tax assessor's website only has the current owner (seller) listed, and he bought the house in '03, so we have a gap between 1985 and 2003 (perhaps it was the same guy that whole time, will have to look into it).

*In my subsequent searching on various Ohlms, I have found reference to an Edwin, so I believe Edward may have had a son named Edwin rather than Edward Jr. This is pending further investigation.

So… the short of it is this: The Ohlms family built the house, and various Ohlms members owned it from 1908 to 1984. That’s 76 years with the original family; no wonder so many lovely original features have been preserved.

And, the man himself, Edward A., was something of a merchant, builder, and entrepreneur. I’ve since gained further details from both historical societies, as follow: Edward actually built the building in which the White House Tavern was located. He built it and then leased it out to The People’s Bank. However, the bank was robbed and then closed during the Great Depression in the 1930s. Edward took the building back and opened the White House...



And today, the home of Barton Brothers Antiques… If you enlarge the photo, look for the block lettering at the very top of the building.


With some more research of my own, with my friend Google, I found a photograph of Edward A's tombstone... and then a scan of his actual death certificate. According to it, he died of "coronary asculsion" (occlusion?), his "Usual profession" was "Merchant," and his "Industry or business" was "Tavern." He was born February 22, 1875, and he died December 27, 1943.

His death certificate also stated that his father was named Christian Ohlms and was born in Hanover, Germany. Christian mmigrated to O'Fallon, MO, where he met and married Edward's mother. Edward had an older brother named Henry (born in 1872), who was a Judge. I still haven't found out how the family originally made its money...

Closing the Deal: Part 1

We scheduled an inspection with a guy specializing in old houses. At the same time we scheduled that, for the morning, we went ahead and scheduled a time to meet the seller’s agent that afternoon. I had told him that if the inspection checked out OK, we would offer the full asking price. I was not sure that would be enough. But he wanted to set up a time for us to come in & write the contract… So if it was worth his very scarce time, we knew he liked us. I should mention that somewhere in there, after a lot of phone tag, our brilliant, wonderful, indispensable loan officer finally got hold of the agent so that she could ask him some questions, and he could ask her some questions; due to some of the unusual conditions of sale (ie, “no inspections”) they needed to hash out whether we’d be able to get financing before any of us spent any more time on it. I firmly believe that the agent’s conversation with our loan officer was one of many factors that weighed in our favor; we were not only pre-approved, but this would be our third home purchase with that loan officer, and she probably did a good job of assuring the agent that we would not flake out on the sale. Time was of the essence, and above all, he needed to see this sale close before the bank’s deadline to foreclose on the property.

The house is solid. The inspector was especially impressed by the condition of the tuckpointing and the original windows. He remarked at one point, “I like your house; I don’t like your bathrooms.” (I agreed.) There were, of course, various things noted here and there. There is a pipe running through the basement that is wrapped in asbestos, but it’s been wrapped over & sealed so is considered OK as long as we don’t disturb it. Loads of other stuff. A light in the finished part of the basement that doesn’t work; no electrical wiring to the detached garage; the roof is too high and too steep to climb out on, or use a ladder for, so we’ll probably need somebody with a cherry picker to do gutter work; one of the big bedrooms has no electrical outlets(!), but wiring could be run down from the attic; etc, etc. All in all, nothing that shocked us. Nothing that was a deal breaker. Nothing of grave concern.

So after a mild freak-out session (are we doing this?! are we really going to own 2 houses??), we did it… We met with the agent, hashed out the contract with him, and signed on the dotted line. The next day, he emailed me the contract back with the seller’s signature of acceptance. Then, as now, all that remains is for the seller’s bank to OK the sale. Since it is short, they must agree to it. We are told we’ll be fine, because the bank pre-approved the asking price. Still, we’re dying to get that official stamp of approval. If all goes to plan, we will close... May 17, 2011. That is 2-1/2 weeks after we made our offer. That had always been part of the deal – an uber-quick closing… again, to beat the foreclosure deadline. It was yet another reason of many that this has all come together in our favor, instead of someone else’s. It is part of why we were the buyers of choice for this historic house; we were in the right position, at the right time. The agent told us, “You came in at the last second and stole this deal.”

Look for Closing the Deal: Part 2, hopefully, on May 17th.

The Second Visit… The Inside

I said before that I thought it would either be on a bad block, or it would be in abominable condition on the inside. We’d already seen that the former was not true, and we were about to see that the latter wasn’t true, either…

To be sure, it’s a mess right now. Like I mentioned, it is a pre-foreclosure short sale; the seller and bank both want to avoid foreclosure. We have learned that what we are paying is approximately $100,000 less than what the seller owes the bank, but the bank has approved the sale at this price. It’s all a sad story on the seller’s part, something to do with a divorce… and alcoholism. The house is being sold “as is, no seller’s disclosure, no inspections.” The mess left behind, we’ll inherit… a few trashed pieces of furniture, a lot of garbage (including moldy food sitting out on the kitchen counters), and miscellaneous, random belongings.

But we were able to see past all of this. Left to our own devices, since we’d been left the key and had no agent accompanying us, we wandered the (to us) enormous house. Every turn brought a surprise or new discovery; even the light switches were never where we expected them to be and had to be hunted down. Instead of the trash on the floors, our eyes were drawn to the wood trim and doors, the pocket doors, the old fireplace mantles, the built-in hutch in the dining room… the grand, split/double staircase – with one set of stairs presumably intended for the servants…







And of course, it was enormous. The 1st floor consists of a foyer, a living room, a formal dining room, a kitchen, and a half bath. Up the beautiful staircase, we found two very large bedrooms, two small bedrooms, and a full bathroom. Off one of the smaller bedrooms, there is a balcony. Up another flight of stairs… to the attic; it is completely finished into one enormous room, with another full bath (in dire need of a makeover), more hardwood floors, exposed beams, and great views in all four directions.



It needs a serious cleaning. It needs some stuff replaced (like the knob & tube wiring visible in the basement; our insurance company has given us 12 months to replace that). All of the systems are old and likely to need replacement before too long: the A/C, the furnace, the boiler, and the hot-water heater.

But… it is also amazing. It has original floors, original doors, original windows, original wood trim – almost all of which has never been defiled with paint. We think that even many light fixtures and bathroom fixtures are original. The original windows work incredibly well, opening smoothly and easily despite their size; I’ve learned that they operate on a weight & pulley system (they actually did know how to build things, back in the day!). We have learned that the doors (and quite possibly the trim and other items) are all made of something that is an Arts & Crafts style hallmark called “quarter-sawn oak” and would likely cost ~$500 each to replace today; and there are loads of them – there’s even one laid atop 2 sawhorses in the garage, as if it was used as a work surface.

The house has its quirks, to be sure. There is a bizarre shower-and-heat-lamp amalgamation amidst concrete walls in the basement… Our inspector took one look at the proximity of the heat lamp to the shower head and said, “Do me a favor – promise me you’ll never use this shower.” The “finished” part of the basement is gross and needs loads of work, except that we’d never need to use it. And then there is the crooked toilet in the 1st floor half-bath…. Yes, it is plumbed this way:



But there is actually incredibly little work that MUST be done to the house. There are various cosmetic revamps to do, and plenty of money to spend, but nothing that couldn’t be lived with, for a while…

We went back home. I texted the agent, told him we really liked the house, and asked if we could get an inspection done as long as we did it prior to making an offer (so the contract would not need to be contingent upon it). He said Yes. He hastened to remind me that the seller would not pay for any inspections or do any repairs, and to make sure I knew that this would be the case even if we did not get the house. In short, it was our $350 to gamble and nobody else’s. I said yep, I know.

It was well worth the risk.

First Visit

At first, I could not get hold of the seller’s agent (we weren’t working with a buyer’s agent). It’s just across the bridge from where I work, maybe 10-12 minutes away, so after work, the day after Mark had discovered the property, I did a drive-by of it. I parked, got out of my car, stared up at it, and without even walking around the back I immediately pulled out my phone and called Mark. I believe I said something like, “It’s awesome, dude. It’s huge. And awesome.” Somewhere in that conversation I also mentioned that the van parked across the street had an Obama sticker on the bumper.





It is a lovely block. There are some modest homes and some gorgeous ones, and all are well-kept. Later, when we went for our inspection, the nextdoor neighbor (whose newer, brick-with-white-trim house is beautiful and pristine) smiled and waved at us; a little while later, the lady across the street (of the Obama van) was out in her yard with her dog, and she did the same. It’s on 4th Street, which puts it on the “right side” of 5th Street for our taste; 5th Street is a very busy, 4-lane thoroughfare, so if we were going to move to downtown St. Charles we did not want 5th Street to be between us and the historic heart of the town, Main Street, because we wanted to be able to easily walk there. (We love leaving the car behind.) At one end of the block (and directly at the end of “our” alley) is a big, beautiful, stone church, whose (real) bells are heard loud and clear at the house…



The house is a 5-minute walk to the north end of Main Street; a 5-minute walk to the Foundry Art Centre; a 10-minute walk to Frontier Park (which runs along the Missouri River); a 10-minute walk (or 2-min bike ride) to the Katy Trail cycling path; and a 20-minute walk to the Trailhead Brewery on the southern part of Main Street.



When I finally got hold of the extremely harried selling agent, I really expected to be told that the house was under contract. In fact, from the moment I had seen the listing, I expected that the house was already under contract. This one had only been on the market for 2-3 weeks (the interval during which I’d stopped my daily trawling of Zillow and Realtor.com), and we had been watching houses that had been on the market for several months to a year or longer, waiting for the seller to get just desperate enough to take a low-ball offer. (As an aside, Zillow.com rules for such purposes, usually giving the entire selling and pricing history of a house, so you know what the seller paid and how much/how often they’ve lowered their price since they’ve been on the market.) However, for a brick house of that size, at that price, mentioned as being a “possible short sale,” even at just 3 weeks on the market I thought we would be too late. Instead, I was told, “You’ve really come in at the eleventh hour.” He then told me there were several offers on the house, and that they were “negotiating a contract.” But… he told me that we could go see it, and he advised me that if we liked it, we should come back to him ASAP with our best offer.

We arranged to see it that very night. He would have the neighbor leave the key under the mat.

The Discovery

It isn’t even ours yet, and here I am starting a blog about it… the house that we have, with the aid of the Frenchtown Historical Society, already dubbed the “Edward A. Ohlms House,” for the man who had it built in 1908.

We’d been house shopping, but we didn’t know whether we would actually buy. We own another house, a ca. 2005 rowhouse finished to our specs in the New Town at St. Charles, an up & coming, highly successful new urbanist development. We love New Town, but having just returned from 3 years in Edinburgh, Scotland, in November of last year, I had been feeling the pull to live somewhere… established… more than ever before. Despite all the coolness of New Town, I have periodically missed the little, 1940s brick house we had in University City (and which took only 2 days to sell in 2005). Seeing opportunity in (a) the bottomed-out housing market, (b) the excellent tenants who’ve been renting our New Town house and wish to stay indefinitely, and (c) our temporary free housing with my mom, we started… “just looking.” Everywhere…

We considered buying a second property in New Town. We considered Kirkwood, which has been largely out of our financial reach until the current housing crisis. We considered St. Louis City, especially somewhere very near the Botanical Garden. And we considered historic, downtown St. Charles. As my husband will quickly attest, what I wanted from a house could change from one day to the next; however, there were some consistencies: Brick… hardwood floors… preferably a lovely wood staircase… and a fireplace. An extra perk would be a balcony, and another extra perk would be a water view.

The house Mark discovered, quite late in our “just looking,” has all of those things except for the water view. It does have a view, though, especially from the finished third floor, aka the attic; the house is at the crest of a hill, and then you walk up 3 floors… from the north windows, you can even see the top of the Discover Bridge (Hwy 370). I love living up high. In Edinburgh, our flat was on the 7th floor. I think it bestows a certain sense of security, like the way castles are often situated on hilltops.

As I was saying, the house was discovered quite late. In fact, we had just decided that we were unable to find anything that was cheap enough and worth the stress of dual-property owning for us to actually pull the trigger. We were trying to keep our costs down as much as possible, “just in case” we suddenly lost the tenants in the NT house. We had decided that we would just move back to New Town when the lease on our house ran out, and our tenants were banished. We both felt a little bad about that; they love the house and New Town, and they have waited anxiously to hear whether we’d buy something else or kick them out… We had decided to do the latter, when suddenly Mark gave Zillow another peruse (the first time we’d looked in a few weeks), and discovered… the short sale. Mark, the would-be day trader, is a sucker for a bargain, especially one that also presents a real investment opportunity. Me, I'm just a sucker for brick.

St. Charles has a negative, white-bread, “Real America”™ reputation in some circles, probably because it was, not long ago, the destination for much of the “white flight” out of St. Louis city. However, it has changed and continues to change. These days the downtown area, in particular, is much more diverse than a lot of people give it credit for. There is a thriving community of artists at the Foundry Art Centre at the northern end of Main Street (where Mark used to go to fire the pottery he threw on his wheel at home, and where he’ll soon be going again – now by foot). The grade school Lily will attend is only 70% white; the rest is mostly African-American (20%) and Hispanic (8%). And then there is the wide-ranging economic diversity… There are enormous, beautifully preserved, brick houses right across the street from simple, 1960s vinyl ranches, and there are meticulously maintained blocks immediately adjacent to blocks where people seem to think that their front yard is the best place to store the junk they are too cheap or too lazy to throw away. So when I saw the listing Mark had found, for an all-brick, all-hardwood, 2233 sq ft house priced at $129,900 and looking rather lovely from the photos…




I thought, it has to be in abominable condition, or (despite the listing’s claim of “location, location, location!”), it has to be on a “bad block.” Even IF the house were as lovely as it appeared, surely nextdoor we would be presented with weeds and rusty car parts...