The Ultimate Home Improvement Project

Based on Real Events...

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 18:09:00 +0000

A day in the life of a chipmunk….

It’s been several weeks since I took up residence in this here historical house. Ma always said I wouldn’t amount to nuttin’ (mmm, I just got a little hungry) in this world but considerin’ I found myself a big ol’ house to hole up in for the winter I would say I’ve done pretty well for myself. I would love the opportunity to lord it over Ma but she had an unfortunate run in with a neighborhood cat which did not end well. (God rest the mean old fur ball’s bones.)

I saw my opportunity to get into this house one day when I was out scrounging around for nuts for the cold season. There I was scurrying across the ground when I see a sight I don’t get to see every day – a door standing wide open into a house. Sure there’s a guy who kept coming and going through the door but it only took a little patience and timing and I was in that door easy.

Course I didn’t plan on encountering nobody while I did a little reconnaissance work. Slipping around corners here, diving for cover under a table there. Things were looking good, the place had more than enough hiding places for me to stay out of the way of the humans but then my luck ran out. Temporarily that is. You see I thought the coast was clear for me to make my way into a nice dark room when this human comes walking around the corner and cuts me off. Did she ever scream. And scream. And scream. The good thing was no one else came running to see what the problem was, I only had her to deal with, which was hard enough. She was screamin’ and jumping all over the place – if I tried to go one way, she screamed and stomped her foot, if I tried to go the other way, she screamed and shut a door. It was ridiculous – I was like – ‘Lady all I want to do is get outta your way so make it a little easier on a rodent!’ But there was no reasoning with her. Finally she went running for help or somethin’ and I hightailed it outta there.

I’ve only had a couple more run-ins with humans here but luckily I have escaped any harm. They’re a shrieky bunch – it’s hard on a chipmunk’s ears you know. But I have my ways of getting revenge - like leaving a walnut on the floor of one of their offices just to see their reaction.

Found on the floor of the Education Director's office.

It’s my way of letting them know – look I’m here, I’m not going anywhere, I have now found a way to get in and out of the museum without using a door and your have-a-heart trap is a joke. Seriously – that thing is like a 7-11. I crawl in, eat the peanut butter they use to bait the trap and walk right back out. They should get their money back on that thing.

Yup – I like the way things are looking for me this winter. If I’m lucky, maybe I’ll find that special someone who completes me and we can start our own dynasty here at this house on the hill. The possibilities are endless – unless they get a better trap. I am a sucker for peanut butter on just about anything.

This next post goes out to....

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 01:01:00 +0000

…Emad Andarawis. It was Emad’s insightful and hard-hitting suggestion “I need you to do a post about plaster” that was really the catalyst for this piece. Although I fear this post may not have the level of detail that Emad is looking for (after all – this is the man who has read the entire internet and finds it lacking in answering his questions about plaster) I hope it may prove somewhat helpful. Emad if it does prove helpful, I will take all the credit and if it doesn’t, I blame #3 and #4.

Unbelievable – you don’t check in with the restoration workers for a measly two weeks and they plaster all the walls in the house on you! Maybe not all the walls, just the lower portion of the walls in the North and South Parlors and the Center Hall that were in need of plastering. On the one hand I want to be positive about their work ethic and dedication but on the other hand I wish they had taken a page out of my book and worked SUPER slow so that I would have had the time to snap some pictures of the process. Or make a plastering video – how exciting would that have been? Don’t all respond at once or anything.

This is obviously not as exciting as watching it live on a video but it's the best I could do.

Admittedly, I have been preoccupied with back-to-school stuff the past couple of weeks. I’m thinking about starting a campaign to save trees from schools. I have three kids in school this year and they easily get about 9 handouts to take home with them. Every single day. That’s 27 handouts that come into my house on any given day. That’s 135 handouts every week. That’s 540 handouts every month. That’s…that’s a lot of paper. Those poor trees. And what do I do with all of these many, many handouts? If I’m not using them to write down phone messages in illegible handwriting or to mop up yet another spilled cup of milk (whoever said “There’s no use crying over spilt milk” clearly didn’t have four children who spill milk twice a day on average. They’d be crying too if they were on their hands and knees soaking up milk from the stained and dirty fibrous mat formerly known as a carpet), I’m giving them to the garbage men so they have something to throw in to the recycling truck once a week. What I’m not doing is saving them, and I’m usually not even reading them. Wasteful.

But I can’t say there was anything wasteful about the way plaster was made prior to the 20th century. (How’s that for a transition? I’m telling you I could be a TV news anchor - ‘…the blast wiped out the entire town leaving no survivors. [pause, turn the frown upside down and go…] If you’re looking for a blast of fun this weekend, check out the doggy fashion show being held at the Downtown Community Center where you’re sure to see some real barkers strutting their stuff.’)

I found #3 and #4 in the house last Tuesday and by the very nature of the work they were doing, they were unable to escape me. #3 was perched atop a ladder in the South Parlor and #4 was squatting down in the Center Hall with a trowel full of plaster in his hand which he was systematically smoothing over the lath. These boys weren’t going anywhere and they knew it, and they knew that I knew it. I took my time, snapping pictures and then I settled in on the floor with pen and paper in hand and began the interrogation.

#3 begged off talking to me – insisting that #4 was the plaster expert. Maybe he was, or maybe #3 was still recovering from last week when I cornered him for a restoration update. (I wouldn’t have twisted his arm behind his back so hard if he hadn’t tried to run). #4 is no spring chicken so he wasn’t going to get the leg up on me and run out of the place. Having my subjects secured, I had to get them to talk. But how? I couldn’t open with an obvious question like, “What are you doing?” That would make me sound ignorant and I can’t afford to lose my restoration street cred. Instead I tried a much more subtle tack: “Can you explain what you are doing?”

“Plastering.” #4 responded.

Darn, I was back to square one. Time to pull out all of the stops – “Can you explain what you do when you plaster?” The Spanish Inquisition I am not, but effective I am, cause #4 sang like a little birdie.

The first thing he stated was that the lath only existed as a platform against which the plaster is applied. It has no function beyond that – it’s like an artist’s blank canvas, and the plaster is the masterpiece smeared on for display. The plaster alone, once applied and dried, has the strength to hold up the walls.

#4 is quite the artist. The art world is all afire!

Typically three coats of plaster are applied to lath to make a wall. The first coat is called the scratch coat. The scratch coat is flexible, it can move with changes in temperature. Plaster is a lime product, which makes it very hard, solid, durable, but it can break easily which is why the scratch coat is applied - to provide the flexibility that the top coats of plaster do not and cannot have. After the scratch coat come two veneer coats. The veneer coats are smoother, the lines left behind by the trowel used to apply the plaster are no longer visible. When the last veneer coat is applied, there may be a need for minimal sanding to smooth out the surface, and perhaps some filling but basically the top veneer coat, once in place, means the plaster wall is ready for the next phase of its makeover – painting or wall-papering.

In Cherry Hill’s case – some extra coats of plaster were needed in order to build the wall out to where it was supposed to be. So Cherry Hill had two scratch coats and two veneer coats of plaster applied to the walls. It takes about 24 hours to let a layer of plaster set. As I write the walls have all been plastered and are prepared for the decorative phase of the restoration work. But why did I mention the non-wasteful nature of plaster prior to the 20th century? I thought I told you that was a transition point. And not such a strong one the more I consider it.

North Parlor - totally plastered

South Parlor - totally plastered

Center Hall - totally...um...you probably get the point

Plaster, as I said earlier, is a lime product and when it dries it is super duper hard. Not only is it functional for use as a wall because of its strength and durability, but it is also an effective means of preventing rats and mice from having the run of the walls in a house. Rodents don’t particularly enjoy eating through plaster precisely because it is hard. They’ll do it in an emergency situation but plaster walls are an effective means of pest prevention. But what was mixed in with plaster to make the scratch coat? (Note – here is where the transition point is explained.) Fibrous materials. Once upon a time, animal hair was an essential ingredient in plaster. Hair from cows, horses or pigs, obtained from slaughterhouses or what have you, were mixed into the plaster to help boost the flexibility of the plaster as the wall moved. That’s what I meant by early plaster production not being wasteful. Get it? Okay, it’s official, my transition was terrible. Nowadays, wood fiber is mixed in with the plaster instead of animal hair, for the scratch coat. More wood – poor trees.

The veneer coat has sand in it. Sand, somehow, lends strength to the veneer coats of plaster which is essential for the top coats of a plaster wall. Sand is always used in the veneer coats of plaster – the Greeks and Romans did it, as do #3 and #4. #4 explained they have to add the sand to the plaster mixture for the veneer coat. Particularly with restoration work, one must be sure to match the size of the grain of sand used in the plaster of the original walls with the grains of sand used in the restored portion of the walls. By taking a piece of original plaster and mashing it up, #3 and #4 can look at the size of the sand and then be sure to add sand of a similar size to the plaster they are mixing for the restoration work.

Who knew getting plastered could be so much fun? Besides college kids, and people at football tailgate parties, the bride’s embarrassing Uncle Steve, grumpy old Mr. Smith at the end of the street, attendees at museum conferences, people who ride mechanical bulls, anyone who has ever sung karaoke….I guess a lot of people knew.

Excavate and sniff!

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 14:13:00 +0000

I’m baaaccckkkk. It’s been well over a month and I wish I had a good excuse for my silence. Believe me, I really wish I had a good excuse for my silence, if only so the Director would stop looking at me with such disappointment and disillusionment in her eyes. I can say with all honesty that there was a space of a couple weeks at the end of August when work came to a screeching halt on the restoration project. #3 was gone. Just gone. We had already said goodbye to #4 in a heart wrenching farewell, heart wrenching for us of course, not so much for #4. We thought they both had gone on to greener pastures, or, perhaps more appropriately, older structures. So imagine my surprise when one fine day #3 and #4 came a’knockin’ on our door. (I didn’t hear them a’knockin’ cause that door is thick. Thankfully they remembered to ring the bell.) And, even better, imagine the surprise of my colleagues when #3 and #4 came a’knockin’. Actually, instead, imagine the horror of my colleagues, horror being the more appropriate adjective to describe their reactions. They had all been lulled into thinking they no longer had to show up at the house to let the workers in at 7am every morning. Restoration work started back up on September 1st. Staff coffee consumption increased starting around September 2nd as did staff grumpiness.

‘What?’ You ask. (Actually, it sounded more like a shriek to me.) ‘Work started up again on September 1st, and you are only posting an entry in the blog today, Saturday, September 24th? Why the delay?’ You ask/shriek again.

First of all, I say to you (holding my head to stop the ringing of my ears caused by your screeches) shrieking questions at me is not necessarily the best way to communicate. It hurts my ears and makes me defensive. (Note my defensive tone.) I’m sorry for the long silence. I’m not proud of it. I would like to say that I suffered a crippling illness or devastating injury to make you feel better, but that would be a lie and though I am many things (some of them quite unsavory), what I am not, is a liar! You deserve the truth. You can handle the truth, and the truth is…over the past month I have been part of a secret government committee working on identifying alternative sources for energy– I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up, but I will say this…we’re very close to a solution. Now that I’ve made my truthful confession maybe you realize that you were wrong to jump to conclusions (especially given the sensitive nature of what I have been working on) and maybe you could stop shrieking at me.

Needless to say I was thrilled when I was able to pull #3 aside on his first day and coax (read: bully) him into giving me the skinny on what he was doing. #3 is a patient man and, what’s more, he is a patient man with me. The first thing on his restoration work agenda was to finish the restoration work on the remaining windows in the garret – in particular the window sills. Cherry Hill is always full of surprises, and it’s not a place where anything can be done simply and easily – why would it be any different for the restoration? Apparently the damage of one of the windows that #3 was working on was not caused by age or exposure to the elements but instead was caused by an earlier epoxy restoration. Yes, it seems even restoration work needs restoration work at Cherry Hill. #3 was amazed at this “first” in his career. He has never run into a situation like this in all of the buildings he has restored, so he found it quite interesting, and, believe it or not, so did I. But then again, I think it’s pretty clear by now that I’ve developed into a bit of a restoration groupie. The story begins 20 to 30 years ago, when epoxy application in restoration work was in its infancy. As #3 pointed out to me – there is no huge body of literature available today that addresses all of the ways and when, where, why, and how epoxy can be applied. The restoration field of experts is not an overly large one, and information is probably shared mostly by word of mouth. So imagine when epoxy was first being used in the field – when there was no history of best practices for epoxy use - there was bound to be some misapplications or mistakes. Cherry Hill is so fortunate to have an example of this beginner mistake. (Note my sarcastic tone.) What #3 found with the old epoxy repair was that the epoxy had been applied as a top coat, as opposed to being used to bond wood together. What happened was that while the top coat was able to keep water out for a while, in the long run it failed. This coat of epoxy trapped moisture inside of the wood.

This is a piece of the window sill that was removed. The white part is what was once the painted surface of the sill. Where the chisel is pointing shows the location of the original epoxy application which was just coated over the wood to act as a sealant of sorts.

The garret window sills were made from yellow pine wood, not oak, which, it turns out, was a very fortunate thing for the windows. Had the sills been made of oak, the oak would have very quickly rotted once it got wet. In addition to the rot, we probably would have got some funky fungus to grow inside of it as well. Yellow pine is a wood of a different sort, namely – it is much more rot resistant then oak. So why wasn’t yellow pine used in all of the windows of the house? While yellow pine may be rot resistant it does not have the same weight bearing qualities that oak does. Oak is a much stronger wood and when it is sealed properly, it will last forever. This explains why yellow pine was used in the windows in the garret, as opposed to the oak used in the windows on the bottom three floors, which have the weight of the house and roof to contend with.

The rotted wood is the dark part of the fragment being held and the still healthy pine is the bottom part.

To restore the window, #3 had to excavate the sill (dig out the rotted wood), and he epoxied “new” yellow pine to the surviving original yellow pine to make the repairs. By “new” yellow pine, I mean 150-year old yellow pine with the right moisture content, originally grown in the northeast, and which Western had a surplus of from another restoration project. So the “new” old yellow pine was epoxied properly to the “old” old yellow pine to restore the window sill which I am happy to report is sloughing off water quite nicely.

Isn't it a beaut? Look at that new sill and note all of the water sloughing action. I have no words...I am speechless.

But the truly amazing thing about yellow pine (which is my new favorite wood…hello, haven't we establishe dthis already? Groupie here!) is that, since it is rot resistant, the surviving yellow pine from the original sill is in really good condition. No, you don’t get it. A shaving of the surviving yellow pine which was removed during the restoration still smells like pine. I tell you no lie (for real this time). #3 gave me a sample (to keep!) and I walked around the museum forcing all of my colleagues to “sniff the wood.” At first they thought that was slang for some new street drug, but once it became clear that I literally wanted them to smell a piece of wood, they sniffed and were…whelmed by the significance. (I use whelmed here because they were neither overwhelmed or underwhelmed, they were just… whelmed.) Apparently I’m the only crazy wood sniffer on staff and I now have the wood shaving sitting on my desk. No one will step into my office for fear I will insist they sniff it. But I don’t care how….eccentric…I may seem – I’m sniffing pine (fresh pine) from wood that was cut down over 224 years ago – if you don’t find that impressive, then you are obviously not a restoration groupie like me and, chances are, you’re not too into this blog either!

Pine-sol has nothing on this wood chip.
Any of you who play the Curatorial Curiosity game on HCH's facebook page will recognize this picture.

Who you gonna call?

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 20:23:00 +0000

#4 left us. He left us! He is gone. On Thursday, July 21st, (which also happened to be the 150th anniversary of the first battle of the Civil War at Bull Run), #4 packed up his car, said his fare-thee-wells and rode off into the sunset. Coincidence that his last day happened to be on the 150th anniversary of a civil war battle? Let’s hope so for all of our sakes.

Actually it would be more accurate to say he rode off into the late morning sunshine. But even more accurate would be to say he rode off into the late morning sunshine obscured by the heat haze hanging over Albany on what must have been a day to make even the Devil shift his pitchfork in discomfort between his cloven hooves. What I’m saying is that it was hot that week, so even if #4 was sorry to leave us, I don’t know how sorry he was about not having to climb up and down stairs to work in the attic in this heat.

Since his departure, work at the site has come to a standstill. It feels a bit like a ghost town in recent weeks without the hustle and bustle of restoration activity. Certainly if you look at the house from the outside, with its missing siding and metal fence, the place looks like it has been abandoned and is now the playground of the spirit world. Which gave me an idea. Ghost tours and paranormal investigations at historic sites seem to be all the rage these days. Maybe Historic Cherry Hill should use this national craze as an opportunity to make something positive out of the current external appearance of the house. But how does a historic site go about offering this sort of “special tour” to the general public. Sure, Historic Cherry Hill conducted its own “ghost investigation” last fall but it wasn’t open to the public. (Click on the following link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_U5utT9dhwI or click below to watch the "investigation.")

While I scratched my head in thought, an opportunity arose that really was quite fortuitous. A historic site in central New York was offering a Haunted History Investigation to the public at a “reasonable” $25 dollars a ticket. The Director, the Curator and I decided that we should attend to see how this sort of thing worked. For the purpose of research. Perfectly objective research.

I learned a couple of things from the research trip (please note, the following lines are delivered in a heavily sarcastic tone):

• There are four types of ghosts: residual, intelligent, poltergeist and non-human entities.

• Apparently measuring electromagnetic fields is really big in the ghost hunting world. You wouldn’t believe the number of gadgets that exist to measure electromagnetic readings. I’m serious. You would not believe it.

• Clearly there is a growing need for colleges and universities to offer a Bachelor Degree of Science in Ghost Hunting. One of the ghost hunters who addressed the full capacity group was forced to waste years of his life on a college campus, accumulating various Bachelor of Arts Degrees in really random subjects, (I think one of them may have been Basket Weaving but I’m not sure), just to get the appropriate training for this line of work. Don’t even get me started on the poor girl who had to get a degree in Animal Behavioral Science before she could finally be qualified for ghost hunting.

• The federal government needs to invest more money in support of the study of science at the high school and college levels. A lot more money. A lot.

• Museum professionals do not always act professionally when on a ghost hunt.

The conclusion? This isn’t Historic Cherry Hill’s thing, no matter whatthe house’s exterior currently looks like as a result of the restoration work. Besides, its outward appearance is only temporary – and who knows how long these ghost investigations at historic sites are gonna be around. For at least as long as the general public finds them fascinating…and we all know how long the general public’s attention span lasts. Coke II anyone?

Vacations are overrated....

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 00:43:00 +0000

Everyone keeps asking me how my vacation was last week and although I know they mean well, frankly I just want to say: “I went on a beach vacation with four kids under the age of 8--how do you think it was?” That sounds a little nasty I admit, but you must cut me some slack. A beach vacation with four kids, ages 7, 5, 3 and 2 is not, well, it’s not a day at the beach. They can’t swim; they can’t apply their own sunscreen (30 minutes! 30 minutes is the length of time it takes to get all four children properly lathered with sunscreen); they can’t seem to keep the sand off of their wet hands or their wet, sandy hands out of their mouths (trust me, you don’t know embarrassment until you are standing on the beach telling your kid to stick their tongue out so you can wipe their mouth down with the one non-sandy square inch of beach towel left while they gag uncontrollably); they want ice cream from the ice cream truck but they don’t know how to eat it before it melts all over the place- you try explaining to the nice elderly couple strolling by with horrified looks on their faces that “No, my son did not rip open the flesh of some helpless seagull with his teeth but instead ‘ate’ a Spiderman ice cream stick that has permanently stained his face, his hands, his stomach, his legs and his feet blood red.”

Caution: May cause others to think your child is stained with the blood of some evil deed.

You can imagine then how happy I was to return to the comparative calm of Historic Cherry Hill. I can sit at my desk and concentrate on what I’m doing, as opposed to conducting a head count of the Doehla children every two minutes, always coming up one short and then discovering that the one short kid is three blankets over trying to pilfer beach toys from an unsuspecting family of four. A well-behaved, family of four where there is a brother and a sister who dig sand castles together instead of trying to bury each other head first in the sand. Gosh – vacations are stressful – it’s so much nicer to be back at work.

At coffee time on Tuesday I sat down, relaxing in the comforting routine of the museum,. I pulled out a paper and pen to ask the Director what, if anything, was new with the restoration. The Director, startled, jumped and looked up from her coffee before saying, “I thought it was a little bit louder in here than last week.” I hoped she was referring to the oscillating fan blowing hot air around a hot room and not to the fact that I was gone all last week.

Between the Director’s sips of coffee, I gathered I didn’t miss much. A lift was supposed to arrive at the museum last week to allow #3 and #4 to work on the upper windows of the house – to fit storms, to paint [note of not particular importance—painters will do the painting, not them], (and if the Director asks really nicely), to clean out the gutters. The lift never materialized for which I am profoundly grateful, because I am hoping to talk the guys into letting me go for a little ride on the lift when it does come and I might have missed my opportunity if it came last week. Also we were awaiting the visit of the City Building Inspector to look at the sill work and pronounce it sound. Until the Inspector makes his determination, #3 and #4 cannot finish putting up the siding on the house.

When I arrived at work today, I found two things – 1) #4 waiting to get into the building to work in the attic and 2) my preference for the relative luxury of my air conditioned mini-van to the hot air in the museum. Focusing on my first finding, I asked #4 what he would be doing in the attic today. He explained that he is preparing the window openings in the attic for the reinstallation of the restored windows. He had a question regarding the window specifications. According to the specs, the architects are calling for four window sills to be replaced in the attic. #4 invited the Director and the Curator up to the attic to take a look at the four sills in question as he wondered if total replacement of each sill was necessary. I invited myself along because that’s what I do. And when I reached the top of the attic stairs, I kind of started wishing I had stayed downstairs in the comfort of the basement air because it was hot as Hades up in the attic and it wasn’t even 10:00 in the morning yet. The Director and #4 examined each window sill, testing it for soundness. One of the window sills clearly needs to be replaced, it is located on the south end of the house. The other windows seemed to be in better shape. I snapped pictures as we moved from window to window. The end result of this informal little inspection was that the Director emailed one of the architects to ask for more information on the decision to replace the window sills.

The sill that is in definite need of replacement.

Another window sill slated for replacement.

And yet another.

I have no further plans to walk up the three flights of stairs to the attic for the rest of the week ‘cause it’s going to be a hot one. I would rather sit in my little office, pretending the wind from my desk fan is really an ocean breeze and my cushioned office chair is really a blanket spread on the sand. Now that’s what I call a good beach vacation.

An update from the Jersey Shore...

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 13:10:00 +0000

It turns out that even when I am on vacation I just can’t get the restoration project out of my head. So I’ve decided to post an entry from the Jersey Shore. But if I’m writing from the Jersey Shore I’ve got to do it right. You know what that means..well, actually you only know what that means if you have ever had the “privilege” of watching an episode of MTV’s Jersey Shore…but you’ll catch on quick. To look the part of a Jersey Shore-ite I’ve spent a lot of time under the gentle waves of a tanning bed so that my skin now looks and feels as smooth as a dried up piece of leather. The amount of hair products I have in my hair has allowed said hair to defy gravity in what I consider to be a very flattering hair style. And since the Jersey Shore is all about partying, I needed to make sure I was the ultimate party animal, dancing it up every night. The problem with that one is my husband wasn’t too keen on the idea of me staying out every night until 4am and then sleeping in until 1pm so we compromised and I have partied until 9pm dancing to my youngest child’s garbled rendition of “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” (minus the majority of the correct words of the song).

Being properly suited up to play the part of a person from the Jersey Shore, I can now continue. After my post from last week was written, #3 arrived back on the scene at the museum. In my excitement I rushed to give him a warm welcome but got hung up on the wire fencing surrounding the house and settled for a “How are you?” instead. I think it was probably the better way to go. #3 explained that he was on site to begin putting the siding back in place on the front of the house which we certainly find exciting as it will greatly improve the house’s outward appearance. One little problem quickly became apparent with the siding reinstallation – and that is that the mason’s enthusiasm for his craft resulted in him bricking over the location of where the mailbox is supposed to be in the wall. That makes it awfully tough for #3 to put the mailbox in. The brick will have to be removed so that the mailbox can go back in place.

Behind that patch of insulation is the location of the mailbox which was mistakenly bricked over.

#4 also made a reappearance, literally outside my office door. He came in last Friday to reinstall a restored window. I know, I know, I’ve written before that the basement windows have not been restored yet because they are in bad shape and need more work. It turns out that I was 75% correct – somehow #3 or #4 snuck in and removed the window directly outside of my office to bring back to the shop for restoration. It was the only window of the four basement windows on the front of the house that was in good condition. The other three windows are on hold because two of them need new frames and one needs a new sill. #4 showed me the lower sash of the restored window he was reinstalling, mainly because I was sitting, staring at him and it would have been rude not to. #4 said that the window was hand made and showed me the grooves for sash weights on the sides. The interesting thing here is that this window, in its current location in the basement, does not have the need for sash weights, leading #4 to conclude that the window itself was reused from some other location . I found that fascinating and called up the Curator on the phone hoping she could tell me all about the history of the window and where it was used before. She couldn’t. When the Historic Structure Report was done between 1979 and 1981, the windows were described and included in the floor plans but they were only evaluated based on what was visible without invasive approaches (i.e. no one yanked them out). We have no documentary evidence in the collection that can shed light on this question. We have the contract between Philip Van Rensselaer who built Cherry Hill and his builder, Isaac Packard. While the contract calls for reusing doors from the previous structure on the property, it does not call for reusing windows from any previous structure. This means one of two things either a) some later family member recycled the window from some unknown location or b) maybe Philip Van Rensselaer and/or the builder changed their minds but never noted it on the documents.

The newly restored and reinstalled window in question.

The view from that window to my office. #4 couldn't avoid me even if he wanted to (which he probably did).

That’s all I have for now – what do you want from me? I’m on vacation. I gotta go, I think my youngest child is getting ready to start tonight’s entertainment, I’m hoping I can persuade her to do her cover of “You Are My Sunshine.” That’s going to get the crowd going…the crowd being my three other children and my two nephews.

Communications Coordinator, Reporting for Duty Sir!

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 15:22:00 +0000

Summer is here! Back in January when I was having two frostbitten toes on my right foot amputated as a result of the cold working conditions at the museum, I dreamed of the hazy, lazy days of summer. Now those days are here and frankly, it’s just too nice out to work. Apparently #3 and #4 feel the same way because we haven’t seen hide nor hair of them for a couple of weeks now. With no restoration workers to approach and annoy, I’ve had to turn my attention back on the Director (you can imagine how thrilled that makes her). Right off the bat the Director let me know that #3 and #4 were not off enjoying the sun somewhere but were actually working on the windows at Western Restoration’s shop.

Half of the exterior storm frames are sitting here on the premises. I know this not just because the Director said it was so, but also because I walk by them everyday where they are stored in the south kitchen right outside my office. What I didn’t notice was that the stack of exterior storm window frames have been shrinking in number. As much as I would like to believe that #3 and #4 are highly trained ninjas who have mastered the skill of sneaking into a building and removing large rectangular objects shaped like windows with no detection, the truth is I’m not the most observant lookout in the crow’s nest. If I were on duty the night the Titanic hit the iceberg I probably wouldn’t have realized anything was amiss until I felt the icy Atlantic lapping at my toes. Those exterior storm window frames have been systematically removed and carried off to the shop where they are being finished and prepared for installation. The majority of the exterior frames still in the kitchen are painted already, and #3 and #4 have already fitted all of the exterior storm window frames to the openings of the windows. That’s not all, the shutters are also finished and apparently waiting at the shop for a visit from the Director.

In regard to interior windows: Overall, 30 of the 46 windows in the house have been removed, restored and reinstalled. The attic windows, removed over the past month or so, are in the process of being restored at the shop. The basement windows are a little bit more needy. Turns out given their condition, they will have to be rebuilt. Hey Jude would like to use a different wood than was originally called for in the specifications to rebuild the windows with which will involve a change of work order.

Since #3 and #4 aren’t actually off catching the sun’s rays anywhere and since it seems like someone ought to – I have made the ultimate sacrifice and offered to volunteer myself for this duty. So the week of July 9th I report for duty at Long Beach Island, NJ where I promise to do my best to soak up as much of the sun as I possibly can while taking breaks to eat fresh sea food and sleep. It’s a tough job. I hope I can handle it. I’ve given myself plenty of time to try. Wish me luck.

Moving Day

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 15:12:00 +0000

On Monday, May 23rd, it was moving day at Historic Cherry Hill. Instead of writing about it, I thought you might like to experience it first hand with my video post. Click on the link below (and if that doesn't work manually type the link in). Happy Viewing, and make sure your volume is turned up!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgp-29wTbbs

Who built the ark....Noah, Noah...Who built the ark....Brother Noah built the ark

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Mon, 23 May 2011 19:38:00 +0000

I don’t know about all of you but the staff here on The Hill have commenced with plans to build an ark to save us from the deluge of rain that has, well, rained down upon us like some biblical curse the past couple of days. Luckily the restoration workers have so many tools they can’t keep track of them so we’ve been secretly pilfering them and other building materials while we work on the ark. Of course stealing supplies from the restoration workers and building an ark has prevented me from writing a truly informative blog this week. No sill talk, no window talk. (Did I just hear somebody cheer?)

What I do have for you are two interesting finds that the staff has made as a result of the restoration work. The first find is not new to all of you. If you recall in an earlier post of mine, “An architect, an insulation guy and an insulation guy’s cousin walk into a museum…,” I mentioned that roman numeral numbers were visible on the wood beams at the attic ceiling level, however, when I tried to locate them I came up empty handed. Well I’ve got good news. Since #3 and #4 had to remove some of the planks of wood on the floor in the South Parlor to access the sill from the inside, they exposed the floor joists which run perpendicular to the sill. Lo and behold, there are roman numerals clearly visible, carved into the wood at the end of each joist. Hopefully you won't get motion sickness when you watch this!

And now the second find – which in my opinion is awesome! As I hope I’ve made pretty obvious in this blog, window restoration is being carried out on every window in the house. A couple of weeks ago the staff made an exciting find in the bathroom. (Let me take a moment to be clear, we weren’t all in the bathroom together at the time of this discovery because that would be weird.) The window coverings have been removed from the window in the bathroom, fully exposing it from top to bottom with nothing to block the view outside (which, as you can imagine, is awkward as it is the only functioning bathroom for the staff to use and it is located on the first floor of the house). It drew our attention solely because the bathroom was so much brighter without the coverings in place. That would have been the end of the story if not for the curiosity of one Education Director. The window is original to the 1787 construction of the house, a 12 over 12 paned beauty tucked away behind our supply cabinet in the bathroom.

Just behind the cabinet with cleaning goods on top....

...lurks one of only two of the original windows of the house.

The Education Director decided to take a closer look at the window itself and the yard beyond one day and we’re lucky that she did. Because she found a name scratched in the glass – “Eliza Van Renʃselaer.” Below the name is the failed attempt of said Van Rensselaer to write her name. When you watch the video be warned - it is difficult to see the signature clearly and it was impossible for me to get a good still photo of it.

This finding blew us all away as not a single staffer had been aware of the existence of the name on the window (this includes two staffers who have 30 years and almost 20 years under their respective belts as HCH staff). We think it belonged to Elizabeth Van Rensselaer, born in 1770, daughter of Philip and Maria Van Rensselaer. She was married in 1793 to Peter Elmendorf with whom she had two daughters, Sarah and Maria before her untimely death in 1798, only weeks before her father Philip died. A narrow stairway it is unknown if this stairway was original to the house) leading to the second floor once passed through this space only to be transformed into a “water closet,” or bathroom in the second half of the 19th century.

Hidden behind the pipes is a thin door which used to lead to the back staircase that once upon a time stood in what is now the bathroom.

In an 1852 inventory of the house the room was listed as a pantry. Its exact use in the 18th century is unknown as is whether the back staircase was present at the time of the house’ construction or was added in the early 19th century. But if we imagine for a moment that the staircase did exist, or that it was a simple pantry out of the way from the eyes of all but family and servants - you can just imagine a 17-year old Elizabeth Van Rensselaer scratching her name into the glass, leaving her permanent mark behind perhaps in a fit of teenage rebellion.

Now – it could be that Elizabeth didn’t scratch her name into the glass at all. Maybe an older or younger sibling was ticked off with her and decided the best way to get her in trouble would be to mark up Dad’s brand new window in his brand new house with their sister’s full name so she would get the blame. That’s probably what my kids would do.

Let There Be Light!

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Sun, 15 May 2011 02:00:00 +0000

I was distracted at work last Wednesday – distracted I tell you! It wasn’t because the Curator was drooling coffee out of the side of her mouth during morning coffee time (she blames the coffee drool on the lasting effects of Novocain from an early morning dental procedure but I have my doubts). And it wasn’t because of the numerous nameless, faceless painters constantly ringing the bell and marching (two by two, hurrah! hurrah!) through the house on their way to paint the windows and exterior storms. I was distracted by a strange light I noticed flooding into the South Kitchen just outside my office door. The strange, unexplainable light was everywhere. Was it some ghostly manifestation of Philip Van Rensselaer? Was I about to be touched by an angel? Was an alien trying to make contact with me? Or was it something much more fantastical and unbelievable. I got up to investigate and could not believe my eyes. The strange light was not celestial, supernatural or extraterrestrial in nature – it was plain old sunlight flooding into the room. For many, many moons now this particular window in the South Kitchen has been blocked by sheets of cardboard and a window shade for added measure. No light dared to push its way through. Walking through the South Kitchen is impossible unless every over head light is switched on or one runs the risk of disappearing under heaps of packing material never to be heard from again. But there that window stood, bare as the day it was born, nothing to stop the bright spring sun from shining on in.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the...outside world.

I was drawn to it like an insect to a death by electrical zapping. I stood in the warm rays of the sun, soaking up my quota of Vitamin D for the year. I felt an absurd desire to stretch my back and curl up with my tail wrapped around me in the rectangle of sun cast on the wood floor, but I couldn’t do that, A) because we were open for public tours that day and people might stare and B) I’m not a cat. For the rest of the day, every time I stepped out of my office, I took a moment to enjoy the light and warmth. But as I was leaving at the end of the work day (with big plans to get a tan in the South Kitchen the next day), I found that the window was boarded over. Goodbye sunshine, hello rickets.

Hey! Where'd my sunshine go?!

Why did this happen? I wanted answers. Luckily I was able to “take” #3 aside (I tied a loop in a nylon rope, whirled it over my head a couple of times and let it fly – lassoing #3 around his neck when he was getting out of his car and dragging him in through the door I had the foresight to remember to leave open), and ask for an explanation. Once I removed the rope from around his neck, #3 proved to be very cooperative in answering my questions.

Answering those questions involved an inspection of #3’s sill work outside…on the scaffolding, which is about 8 feet off the ground. Not high enough to kill or seriously maim one who falls off the scaffolding – but high enough to really hurt and humiliate a person. I played it cool, stepped from the relative security of the floating front staircase over a gap that could rival the Grand Canyon in width and onto the relative instability of the metal scaffolding. In stark contrast to my awkward movements, #3 scurried across the scaffolding, as lithe and mobile as a monkey in a tree. He was practically hanging upside down from his tail and working on the sill in the time it took me to put one foot on the scaffolding. Once I reached #3, (patiently eating a banana while he waited for me) I crouched down, trying to get my center of gravity as close to the ground as possible.

Sure, it doesn't look that high but wait till you're the one standing on top of it.

This is where I almost lost my life stepping from the floating staircase on the right to the scaffolding on the left. I'm not exaggerating!

The sight that met my eyes made me want to lay flat down and cry. That dirty rotten sill! Literally! #3 launched into a discussion of the sill which eventually lead to a (sort of) explanation of the South Kitchen window light. #3 has been very busy. In addition to fitting exterior storms to the windows in preparation for the safety glass to be installed back at the shop, he has been working steadily on the sill. The first thing I saw was the middle section of the sill on the southern half of the house. I could see the epoxy that #3 used to fill in the parts of the sill where he had cleared away the rotted wood.

You can see the layer of epoxy on the sill.

This is the epoxy that #3 uses in the sill repair.

He explained that after the initial layer of epoxy, he would sand down the surface and then go over the whole section again with a clear coat of epoxy, after which he will take long timbers to sandwich against the sill. Following this, more epoxy will be added and final white oak facings will be placed against the sill to ensure that the sill’s width is built back out to where it originally was once upon a time before dry rot set in. Also long bolts will be screwed into the wood layers for extra reinforcement. The long pieces of timber used for this part of the work are the infamous white oak featured in a post last fall. This white oak, as all of you avid readers may recall, has to have a low moisture content. The white oak to be used at HCH has a moisture content below 15%. #3 explained that one cannot epoxy wood with a moisture content above 18%.

The wood pieces shown here above the stone foundation (and in between the clampy thing) are the subsequent layers of wood added to epoxy layers over the repaired sill.

This large piece of timber shown here will be another layer in the epoxy sandwich that will build out the sill to where it is supposed to be.

This is one of the bolts that will be used to stabilize the sill.

The section of sill located closest to the southeast corner of the house was mostly gone. #3 was clearing out the area located directly above the stone foundation as a mason was due to arrive the next day to create a level foundation surface upon which the sill could be built back up.

Just beyond #3's leg you can see the southeast corner where most of the original sill is gone.

A close up of the southeast corner. #3 was to clean out the debris to prepare for the arrival of a mason who would level off the top of the stone foundation.

This left us with the section of sill located in between the two aforementioned sections. This section of sill was much worse than previously believed. On the surface, the sill appears to be in good shape. It seems viable and solid. It was only when #3 took some core samples of said viable, solid sill that the truth became known. When #3 drilled into the sill, he discovered that certain sections were completely rotten deep inside. The rot is much further in the wood than was expected. #3 will have to chisel out the rot in the wood, then dutchman repair it with epoxy, and add newer pieces of wood in the manner described above

Drill baby, drill! #3 drills for core samples.

This is a piece of the sill that #3 picked up for a little demonstration. Now you see it (kind of, I know, I know, it's blurry)...

...Now you don't! Ta-daaaa! No, #3 does not have Superhero powers. He just has the ability to crumble rotted wood with his fingers. (Or does he have superhero powers? He's like any old "Clark Kent Restoration Worker" with his hard hat and glasses on, but when he removes them he seems like a completely different person, doesn't that make him a superhero by default?)

While this sill work is being carried out – the weight of the nogging and posts rest upon a stabilized wind brace which is attached to the c-beam anchored parallel along the front façade of the house. A tension rod is affixed to the wind brace and is holding up the weight of a ton of bricks while sill work is carried out.

This is the wind brace that is helping to keep the nogging, etc. from falling on #3's head.

All of these repairs to the sill are done with the expected outcome of stabilizing the sill and making it viable to bear the weight of the post and beam structure once more. Up to this point, as you may recall, the interior posts have been carrying the weight as the sill has withered away from rot. Viewing the sill from inside the South Parlor is particularly fascinating as #3 and #4 have removed the floor boards that abut the front wall of the house. You can see almost an inch of separation between the floor joists (which run perpendicular to the sill) and the sill. Because of the sills deterioration, it started to turn out and pull away from the joists. #3 explained that the effort to bring the sill flush against the floor joists again would involve a LOT of work, invasive work, and instead the gap will be left as is.

The gap between the joist and the sill is almost an inch in length!

But what does this all have to do with the window and the sunlight? In order for #3 to access the middle section of sill I just described, he had to remove the top frame of this particular basement window. With that wood removed, I got a very good look at the condition of the window. There was a whole lot of rotting going on. The same for the bottom frame under the window. That brief afternoon of sunshine was only while the window was removed and the space was boarded up to protect the interior of the house. It doesn’t seem fair that my moment in the sun was all too brief. But I guess if I was really feeling sun deprived I could always walk outside to get my solar fix or convince the Director to purchase me a sun lamp for my office.

You were my sunshine, my only sunshine, you made me happy, for about a day....

Stop Pulleying My Leg....

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Mon, 02 May 2011 16:54:00 +0000

The past couple of weeks I have been a lady of leisure, traveling around this great country to see how the little people live. That might be stretching the truth just a bit. I haven’t traveled all around the country just to Western New York and then to the Gulf Coast of Florida. However if you count all the states I flew over between Newark Airport and Tampa Airport then you can see why I made the claim that I did. It’s not important where I traveled or why I traveled. What’s important is what was constantly on my mind while I traveled. Some of you may have just hazarded a guess - ‘Freedom from the four kids.’ You will be surprised to find out that, no, that wasn’t the thought constantly on my mind. No more guesses? Boy, you’re really going to kick yourself when I tell you the answer...window pulleys.

The secret is out. While I have not posted anything in the past few weeks, I have been thinking constantly about window pulleys which are the topic of this week’s post. As you are all aware, the restoration workers, #3 and #4, have been steadily working on reinstalling restored windows in the house and thus far, almost all of the windows in the house are back where they are supposed to be. As of last week, they were preparing the exterior storms for installation. Lots of wonderful window work going on. So what’s the big deal with window pulleys? Nothing much I have to admit, except that the window restoration work has allowed all and sundry to take a look at the existing pulleys before they are covered back up with the windows, not to be seen again until the next time the museum undertakes a restoration project. Which will hopefully be a lifetime or two from now. This post is just to take a moment and smell the roses, or, more appropriately, view the pulleys, before I dive into exterior storm installation and sill work for my blog post next week.

#3 and #4 have come across three different types of window pulleys in use in the windows at Cherry Hill. The first type is a wood pulley. The pulley mechanism which the cord for the sash weight winds around is made of wood. The wooden pulleys are the oldest found in any of the windows at the museum and are most likely the original pulleys.

Okay - so this is not a picture of a wooden pulley. It is a picture of a string attached to a wooden pulley that is no longer visible now that the restored window has been reinstalled.

Another type of pulley found in the HCH windows is iron. This is probably stating the obvious but the pulley mechanism is made of…wait for it….iron.

An example of iron pulleys.

The third type of pulley is the strap pulley. #3, in trying to help my simple mind understand, compared this pulley to a measuring tape. The strap is pulled out from the pulley mechanism like measuring tape is pulled out. And while it might not snap back into place as fast as a measuring tape can, the strap does retract back into the pulley.

The small hinge for the strap is just visible in this picture.

A more easily recognizable stra.p pulley

This is a window in the dining room. The original pulleys were removed and replaced with "newer" salvaged pulleys.

This is one of the pulleys removed from the dining room window. You can just make out that the label notes this pulley is "For Upper Sash."

The other pulley removed from the dining room window with its strap pulled out. Note the resemblance to a tape measure. What you can't see are the grease marks these pulleys leave in the acid free tissue wrap. There is a distinct odor of some sort of mechanical grease.

One of the dining room window pulleys. As you can see - it's patent date of October 30, 1888 gives us a rough estimate of when this pulley was probably installed by the family.

#3 and #4 will be using whichever pulley system is already in place when they reinstall the restored windows.

And when you’re talking about window pulleys, you can’t forget about the sash weights. (Actually I did, until just now.) Basic window mechanics work on a weight and pulley system – you just never get to see the objects themselves. #3 showed me one of the older sash weights used in the windows. When I asked him, (with stars in my eyes, impressed with his seemingly magical knowledge), how he knew its relative age, he explained that he could guess the age of the lead sash weight given its crudely shaped, rough edged appearance. No machinery used to produce that weight my friends!

Lead sash weight

Obviously the different pulley systems represent different points in the house’s history when window work was undertaken by the family. It’s neat to see, for instance, the window in the Director’s office which has the iron pulley system as well as the strap pulley system in place.

It's a little difficult to make out but in addition to the strap pulley, there is also an iron pulley towards the top of the picture.

When I was looking at that particular window it reminded me of my husband's home improvement projects at my own house. He occasionally comes across something that makes him pause, scratch his head and ask, “Why did they do that?” For a moment looking at the window in the Director’s office, I wished that I could part the veil of time that separates the present from the past and ask those ghosts of Cherry Hill past the really important questions like, “Why didn’t you remove the old pulley system before putting in a new one?” And of course, “Where did you bury the money, the Director really wants to know.”

Look in the sky - it's a bird! it's a plane! it's supercooled air!

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:26:00 +0000

On March 11th Landmark Facilities Group, “the guys” for environmental control systems (as described by the Director), came to poke around the museum. “The guys” have done work at Lyndhurst, Martin Van Buren National Historic Site, Darwin Martin House and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Whether they are “the guys” or not, one thing is clear – they sure do get around. I sat down in the Director’s office with a pen and a piece of paper (scrounged from the top of the Business Manager’s desk) to take notes about the March 11th visit. I noticed as I asked my first question that the Director was instantly absorbed by something on her computer screen. I snuck a quick glance over her shoulder and realized that the only thing she could possibly be looking at on her computer was her screen saver bouncing around the monitor. Surely that wasn’t such a compelling thing to watch. Then the thought occurred to me…she was avoiding me. Or more specifically, she was avoiding my request for a summary of “the guys” visit. When I pressed her again with my question, she looked away from her computer and stared blankly at me, as if she had not only forgotten my question but also who I was. But I wasn’t falling for that trick…again.

Squirming uncomfortably in her comfortable chair as I stared her down, she finally confessed the truth. She couldn’t really remember what “the guys” told her on the 11th. She stressed that their visit had almost entirely excluded her presence. They were looking around and taking notes. They recapped their findings to her at the end of the visit but it was “all a haze” for the Director. The bitter taste of disappointment filled my mouth. What was I going to write about this week? Hanging my head and slumping my shoulders, I started to leave the Director’s office in search of #3 wondering if there was anything more exciting I could get out of him regarding the window restoration. (FYI – #3 and his companion, #4, have almost all of the first floor restored windows reinstalled and were hoping to start on the second floor windows this week.) The Director (most reluctantly I might add) called out my name to stop me from exiting her office. Perhaps her pity for the Communications Coordinator whose blog posting plans she had so callously crushed under her heel moments before motivated the next sentence out of her mouth. More likely she knew she could not postpone the inevitable – that I would return to badger her for information at some unknown future date. Whatever her reasons (and honestly, who can understand the mind of a Buffalo Sabres fan?), she said, “There was a phone call.”

Like a Labrador puppy whose feet are too big for its body, I stumbled over myself in my eagerness and excitement to hear about the phone call. A call came in on March 18th from “the guys” during which they explained their drawings and recommendations for Historic Cherry Hill’s environmental control plans.

Hold on to your hat, this might get a little bumpy. First of all they proposed two zones within the house. The first would be the Collections Area Zone. The second would be the Human Comfort Zone. Two separate air handler units would be installed in separate locations in the house to maintain the appropriate environmental conditions for these two different zones. The air handler unit for the Collections Area zone would be installed in what is now our main furnace room. The main furnace room is tucked right next to the bottom of the basement steps. Opening the door one is immediately faced with an enormous furnace - really, it’s something I imagine the first computer to look like.
This enormous furnace takes up almost the entire space, except for a little nook around the corner from the door where some collection is being housed (much to the surprise of the Curator). The enormous furnace is probably collection. It may date back to the Rankin era. This enormous furnace/potential collection piece would ultimately be removed and (gulp) stored at the collections building. In its place a new heating unit would be installed. “The guys” believe that existing ducts and registers could be used to control the spaces on the 1st and 2nd floors for the Collections Area Zone.

The Furnace Room - Where Bad Communications Coordinators are sent never to be heard from again. Around the corner to the right is the hidden surprise full of, among other things, collection pieces.

So what do these needy objects in the collection require in the way of temperature? With this proposed system, the temperature could potentially get as high as 80˚F in the summer. Apparently the warmer the temperature is, the less humidity in the air. It’s an inverse relationship thing– the hotter the air, the drier the air. In the winter time the temperature could go as low as possible. Wait. Stop. Stop trying to understand what you just read. I really wanted to explain this part in my own words but what I just wrote doesn’t make any sense. I will instead share with you the Curator’s superior knowledge and understanding of relative humidity and a delicious ice cold glass of Coca-Cola on a hot summer day:

Everyone will find this confusing bc everyone knows that in the summer, when it’s HOT, it’s also more humid. So, what’s with this inverse relationship???

Here’s the thing: RH refers to how much moisture is in the air compared to how much moisture that air can hold. (That’s why it’s “relative” humidity.) Warmer air can hold more moisture than cooler air. That’s why in the summer when moist air hits your glass of cold soda, the air drops its moisture as it suddenly cools—the air around your glass has cooled, so it just can’t hold as much moisture anymore—so you get condensation on your glass.

Now…in winter, let’s say that humidity outside is 50%. You bring that 50% humidity air inside, and you heat it up. You now have warmer air that could hold more moisture than before, but you haven’t added any moisture to the air. So your relative humidity has dropped. In a sense, the warmer air wants to hold more moisture, and the people and things in the room respond by giving up their own moisture. People get itchy skin and furniture shrinks and cracks. By letting the collections areas of the house go cold in the winter—by not heating up the air too much—we will keep the RH a bit higher. So instead of 15% RH, hopefully we can keep it in the 30s. And we will also save money.

Now doesn’t everyone feel better, and just a little bit smarter? (Honestly, I don’t feel smarter. I just feel thankful that the Curator exists.)

The Human Comfort Zone is a different matter entirely. This zone would encompass the Director’s Office and the bathroom on the first floor and the entire basement.

The Director's Office would be located in the "Human Zone" though it might not look like there is room for a human to sit behind that desk.

"The guys” propose placing an air handler unit for this zone (and a gas-fired boiler which will provide hot water to both zones of the house) in the ladder room which is a storage space built into the basement level of the house but only accessible from the outside. A circulating pump will distribute hot water (from the boiler) to heating coils in each air handler unit.

This the door to the ladder room. I can't show you the inside of the ladder room because, well...apparently...I lost the keys to it.

The use of this space for the heating equipment would have some minor impact on the appearance of the exterior. A small vent, (6” in diameter) would be placed on the ladder room walls which would be visible from the outside, especially when releasing steam. And while we are on the subject of exterior impact, “the guys” also proposed placing the three condensing units (which would be located outside) underneath the front porch of the house to minimize their visibility. These proposed external elements would have to be approved by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation as Historic Cherry Hill is on the National Register of Historic Places and we are receiving public funds for the project.

I needed further definition of human comfort (considering the subjective nature of the concept) and asked the Director to oblige me by explaining what it meant for our proposed HVAC system. “Nice & toasty,” she answered. Not as illuminating an answer as I had hoped. One person’s nice and toasty is another person’s ice box. “Between 68˚ and 72˚ F,” was the further clarification from the Director and the Curator. Hold the phone people! Between 68˚and 72˚? My first thought was ‘Will Child Protective Services take my children away?’ because at my house we keep the thermometer at the apparently subarctic temperature range of 63˚ to 65˚. 68˚ to 72˚? My next thought was ‘Would the Director and the rest of the staff notice if I moved my family into the museum during the winter months?’

The Bathroom - part of the "Human Zone." I'm confident that I could fit at least three of my kids in that bathtub and there is probably enough room on the floor for the rest of us.

To create this Human Comfort Zone throughout the entire basement, HVAC people would have to cut a few holes in the walls to run ducts and put in registers. This is how the museum can allow the building to go cold in the winter…which is how we would keep relative humidity up in the winter without introducing humidification…which would be expensive and could also have a negative impact on the wood structure in the form of condensation on wooden members and possible rot.

This system proposed for the collection areas of the house-- A "split, direct expansion, air conditioner with a hot gas reheat coil" -- is more expensive than other options. ‘Oh, well that seems like a good idea,’ you might be saying sarcastically to yourself. (If you did say that sarcastically to yourself you might want to take a break from reading this blog. I don’t want to be responsible for turning my readers into cynics.) Although there is a bigger upfront investment with this option, in the long run the museum would save money on utility costs. This system would operate more efficiently. Most HVAC systems dehumidify by supercooling – they use a refrigeration process to make the air so cold that water literally falls out of it (because cold air can hold less moisture than hot air). Then they use more energy to reheat the air to a comfortable temperature. This process is inefficient. The HVAC system we are considering would be different in that it would use the waste heat generated during the cooling process to reheat the air. Just think of your air conditioner and the waste heat that you vent out the window—we’d be capturing that waste heat and using it to raise the temperature of the “supercooled” air. Bottom line, it is the more efficient, cheaper, and greener option. There – now I’ve properly confused you all. You are welcome.

One of the rooms in the Collections Area Zone

In addition the museum will also need to purchase some fans to circulate the air on the second floor (the Collections Area Zone) as some rooms on that floor, the Master Bedroom, for instance, have no registers. Because they are less invasive by nature, fans would be preferable to running new ducts and putting in a new register in any of the rooms. Why put holes in perfectly good walls when you could just buy a fan to do the work for you?

This is a room in the Collections Area Zone which does not have a register or ducts in place and would therefore benefit from the use of fans to circulate the air.

The most important point I took from my conversation with the Director is that the proposed environmental control system, once in place, would mean one thing – FAREWELL ELECTRIC HEATER.

So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu!

An architect, an insulation guy and an insulation guy's cousin walk into a museum...

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 17:27:00 +0000

Somehow Daylights Savings Torture crept up on me again this year. The obvious thought here is that I should be able to keep track of a bi-annual event all by my big girl self. But I can’t...because I won’t. I prefer to live in denial, ruthlessly shutting down the rare occasion that reality seeks to intrude itself, like for example, the whole turning the clocks forward and back. Denial is such a powerful mindset for me that I will, for days afterwards, read the time as it used to be before daylight savings struck. It’s only being blessed with a short attention span and the passage of time, that I begin to accept the new reality of the clock’s time.

Denial is a really lovely place to live. I rarely venture outside of its borders.

Example: A grocery shopping trip with all four of my children.

Denial – I practically float on air as I push the cart around the store followed by my well-mannered, docile children who follow my every command without comment, and intuitively know the items I need from the shelves before I ask for them.

Reality – I shop with shoulders hunched, avoiding eye contact with fellow shoppers as I speed race my way through the grocery aisles, pausing periodically to locate my wandering 5 and 7-year olds, pick up my 2-year old’s shoes (which she has thrown into a display of crackers during a tantrum) and tell my 3-year old to stop gnawing on the corner of a cereal box.

I’m the President, Vice-President, Secretary and Treasurer of Denial and I welcome all within its comforting confines. And since I find denial so useful in my personal life, I’ve decided to include it in my work life. Take the Restoration project. No really, take it ‘cause I am sick of it. But since I already know that there are no takers anywhere for a project of this scope in this financial climate, I will instead retreat into denial.

About a week ago, the Director had some visitors to the museum: one of our architects, an insulation guy, and the insulation guy’s cousin. (I have no idea why the insulation guy’s cousin was there. I also feel like that was a setup for a joke, you know - An architect, an insulation guy and an insulation guy's cousin walk into a museum.)

“Insulation did you say?” I said...when the Director sat down at the table in the Volunteer Room (aka my winter office) to give me the recap.

“Don’t get excited.” She warned.

Too late! I live in denial and by her mere utterance of the word “insulation”, my mind quickly became convinced that the restoration project is poised to begin the last part of phase 2. No matter if we’re still waiting for phase 1 to finish up and the first part of phase 2 (window restoration) to be completed. No matter that the Director tried to explain the reason for the visit was to get an estimate of how much the proposed insulation work will cost when it is time to put that phase of the work out to bid. No matter, no matter, no matter. I guess I just don’t have the appreciation for reality that so-called intellectuals have. Reality to me is the Debbie Downer of life. The only reality I am interested in is reality television thank you very much (MTV and Bravo). I don’t need any doses of it in my real life.

Despite the Director’s best efforts, it was a foregone conclusion that I was going to interpret everything she told me as an explanation of how the restoration project is moving right along and approaching the beginning of phase 3. So like any sensible Director, she drank two cups of coffee, sighed a lot and then proceeded to fill me in on the visit.

As I mentioned before, the Director claims that the visit was only to give the architects and the museum an idea of the cost of the insulation work ahead of us. That information will be useful during the bidding process for that phase. Whatever. I was much more interested to hear what the architect and the insulation guy had to say. (Not so much with the insulation guy’s cousin.) They went all through the house, checking it out and giving their opinion. Starting in the attic or garret as we call it, the insulation guy debated over the options for where the thermal barrier (insulation) could be placed. He initially suggested that the museum could get by with insulating the floor of the garret and not the ceiling. I was confused because in my mind I was envisioning rolls of that pink cotton-candy looking insulation lining the floor of the attic. That would make the space unusable I thought. The next words out of the Director’s mouth were to that effect. Insulating the floor of the garret would make the space unusable and also very cold. But it would save the museum money because insulating the floor of the garret would require less square footage of insulation than insulating the ceiling would. That made sense for about a moment until I began to factor in the other rooms of the attic.

[Quick explanation here of the museum’s attic. It isn’t one big open loft. It has been divided into about three main rooms with two smaller side rooms off one of the main rooms. The biggest room is the main garret room. It is the greatest in height of all the attic spaces and it is unfinished. You can still see the roman numerals the builders marked the timber with 224 years ago. The two other main rooms are much smaller in size and height and they were finished to function as bedrooms for family members.]
As soon as the insulation guy went into these other rooms and saw the plaster and wallpaper on the walls he realized that the plan for insulating the floor would become complicated.

A view of one of the three main rooms.

A view of another one of the main rooms.

One of the two smaller side rooms.

Therefore he went back to the idea of insulating the roof. The museum is no stranger to this as at least the main garret currently has fiber glass insulation installed at the roof line. A visitor to this room today can see the big pink cotton-candy insulation hanging down from the ceiling. The bummer is that if the new insulation is installed at the roof line, most of the cool architectural details of the roof would be obscured. The insulation guy did suggest that a section of the roof line could be boxed out to keep an example of the architectural details exposed. Insulating at the roof line would be less complicated and allow for a more flexible use of the attic space in the future.

It's every cotton candy lovers dream!

This picture was taken up at the roofline of the main garret room. It's a little crawl space that you reach by a ladder staircase. This is where the insulation guy found roman numerals written on the wood. I tried to locate an example to show you all however a combination of a mild fear of heights and bad lighting made it hard to locate any roman numerals. Trust me - the space only appears well-lit because of the camera's flash.

Oh, and whether we were to insulate the roof or the floor – everything in the attic must be removed before work can be carried out. E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G. And that’s a whole lot of things. Lots and lots of objects still remain in the attic despite the prodigious efforts of the past and present curators. (Hey Curator, you should definitely move in to denial with me. I guarantee you’ll enjoy life a lot more in here than out there.)

Oodles...

and oodles of objects to be removed.

As for the first and second floors of the house, the insulation guy felt that blowing dense pack cellulose insulation up and down in the walls by room and floor would work. He originally was concerned that the brick nogging in the walls would take in a lot of moisture which would have a negative impact on the insulation. However his concerns were alleviated when he noted that the house has wood siding. The wood siding will serve as a barrier between the elements (like wind driven rain) and the brick. Some of the walls on the first and second floors (for example, the north wall in the north parlor) have double layers of brick in the walls – which would make it impossible to blow in insulation. In cases where the double layers of brick exist, areas of air flow would be identified and insulation applied to obstruct the air flow.

The north wall of North Parlor.

As for the basement – they didn’t need too long to look around before delivering the verdict that it would not be worthwhile to try and insulate the basement. Why? I’m not sure, but maybe the fact that it would be impossible to access the walls in many locations is the reason. The Orientation Room’s wall mounted exhibit would be damaged if it had to be removed to provide access to the wall behind it. The south kitchen has bead board walls and ceiling which, again, would be damaged by any attempts to get to the walls behind. As for the Furnace Room, Volunteer Room and Paper Storage Room (in which no paper is stored) – maybe they’re just too cramped and creepy to bother trying to insulate.

Paper Storage Room
(Shout out to the Program Assistant/Facilities Support Assistant who has worked tirelessly on cleaning and organizing this space and who also said that since the space does not actually hold paper, perhaps it would be a good idea to think of a different name for it. Good luck with that catching on with the rest of the staff!)

Volunteer Room (/my winter office/staff library/coffee time location/kitchen/etc.)

Many would laud the Director for her foresight and commitment to careful, thorough planning by having this pre-meeting to get an idea of what the costs will be for the work to be done. I prefer to interpret the results of her meeting as an official announcement that insulation work will begin in the next week or so and everyone in the house will once again be able to feel the tips of their fingers and toes.

It’s a beautiful day in de-ni-a-al, a beautiful day in de-ni-a-al…won’t you be my neighbor? (I’m talking to you Curator.)

I'll have an epoxy sandwich, with a little 18th century sill on the side...

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 02:27:00 +0000

First of all let me apologize for the spotty nature of my blog posts over the past couple of months. And being the mature adult that I am, I am going to shift the blame to someone else. Actually, something else. The Restoration Project itself. (Did I just blow your mind? I’m blaming the Restoration Project for the fact that I am not posting weekly on the Restoration Project. Trippy!) Allow me to elaborate. I’ve learned that as time has gone on in this restoration project, the restoration project and I are becoming one entity. The following examples illustrate my point – the project is behind deadline, I myself am consistently missing all of my deadlines. The project has been hampered by the weather, my work has been hampered by weather that has forced me to vacate my office. The restoration has lost Big D, and Joe the Hammer from the project, I’m pretty sure that I have misplaced one or two kids during the course of this project (not to fear though, I still have a couple more at home so I’m good). Work does not occur on the project every week, I do not write posts for the blog every week. So you can obviously see that the restoration project is to blame. Nothing at all, whatsoever, to do with me or my time management skills. (As an aside, I also learned very quickly during my freshman year that philosophy was a discipline for me.)

Now that that bit of business is out of the way – I will bring you the latest. As I mentioned above, Joe the Hammer is no longer working on this project. We the staff have learned to deal with his loss as best we can. I myself am particularly upset at The Hammer’s departure because, while he may have thought I was in need of medication or, conversely, medicating too heavily, he was used to my presence and my (many) questions. I had lost my embarrassed shuffle when approaching Joe with a request for clarification on something. But now I find myself starting all over again and sadly, I am no longer the eager young blogger, full of energy and enthusiasm. Now I am a jaded version of that naïve little chit from last summer. I understand now that during a restoration project there is one thing a person can count on, and that is that there is nothing a person can count on. That goes for workers. So for The Hammer’s replacement, I can only call him Worker #3 (#3 for short). Anything else would expose my poor little heart to more disappointment. While this may be unfair to Worker #3, it is easier this way and in the long run, he’ll thank me. (Who am I kidding? He’s thanking me right now that he didn’t get pinned with some ridiculous nickname.)

So far, things are good with #3. The Curator and I took the opportunity recently (read – ambushed him) to have an open dialogue with #3 about the specifics concerning the south sill repair work (read – pepper him at a rate of 3 questions per 30 second increment of time). It was a great learning experience and a way to welcome #3 to the Cherry Hill family (read – a way to terrify and make him second guess his current employment status). During this “conversation” the Curator and I were working off a sketch that outlined the projected sill work. (I have no wish to mislead the reader, this sketch was lifted off an email sent from (Hey) to the architects which the Curator printed a copy of and which we had spent some time trying to decipher ourselves.) Looking at (Hey)’s sketch made things immediately clear for me – I had no idea what the heck Western was proposing to do with the sill. Getting that realization out of the way made things so much easier when we talked with #3, I was coming at the topic with a completely open, empty mind.

It doesn't matter if you can't see this image that well - it's still not going to make sense.

First things first, #3 provided us with a mini-sketch that helped me immensely. He explained that the badly rotted sill which must be removed, will be done so using plain old fashioned hand tools, like a slick. (So take that Bob Villa – we don’t need no stinkin’ electric power tools.) A slick is a large chisel, characterized by a wide, heavy blade and a long, frequently slender, socketed handle. In practice, the slick is pushed, not struck and it is used to make fine paring cuts. Slicks are used typically by shipwrights and timber framers. And no I don’t store information about hand tools like a slick in my brain for moments just like this, that is what the Internet is for (thank you wikipedia.com).

A drawing of a slick

In case the drawing was not enough - an actual image of a slick

Using chisels like a slick, #3 will carve out the rotted portion of the sill in preparation for the new oak. But before all the sill work can begin in earnest, #3 explained that the floor boards in the South Parlor will have to be removed – which can be a tricky process because the goal is to pry up the floor boards with the nails still inside, without the nails themselves ripping out of the boards. Sometimes that proves too difficult a task to accomplish so a second option would be to drive the nails down through the wood boards to remove them. When the flooring is removed safely the sill work can commence.

#3's drawing of a portion of the original sill. The dotted line indicates the area where rotted wood will be carved out with the slick.

In my last post I threw around the words “epoxy” and “laminated wood two-bys”, like a child throwing knives around pretending to be a juggler. I didn’t know what I was doing, and my lack of knowledge was dangerous. (Consider this my public service announcement for the month – Do not encourage a child’s dream to be a circus performer who juggles knives. No good can come of that for anyone involved.) Thanks to #3’s sketch I now have the confidence I lacked before, not only to throw around knives, but to talk about the work to be done on the sill. After the rotten part of the wood is removed by hand, step one of the sill repair includes the application of an epoxy-like consolident, (a kind of glorified wood hardener), to the old sill and the new oak wood will be fit in to the space where the old, rotted wood was carved out, (as demonstrated in the sketches below). The consolident will bond with the wood and strengthen it.

This is about when things began to make sense to me.

In step two, another piece of new oak will be epoxied to the sill where step one left off and bolted to the original sill. This second step is kind of like an epoxy sandwich for the sill. This type of repair will be carried out in the different areas of the sill where, as indicated in the sketch, repairs are necessary. The entire process will make the sill load bearing once more. Confused? Questions? Then I’ve done my job well.

Is a caption here really necessary?

But what about the charred wood you ask? I’m glad you brought it up. Turns out that little puzzle, which truly had the Curator and I stumped – may not be a puzzle after all. Speaking with #3, and taking into account a previous guess made by The Hammer, that “charred” looking wood probably isn’t “charred” at all. A fire in that location of the house has been pretty much ruled out based on the lack of documentary and physical evidence. If a fire had raged there, the mortar work would show residual signs of damage, and there are none. As to the possibility of a charred sill being recycled into the construction of the house – the closest the house’s builder probably got to the “green” movement, was standing next to a tree with green leaves rustling in the wind. #3 has hypothesized that the “charred” appearance is just the result of badly rotted wood. He explained that the wood is completely normal in appearance under the surface of the “charred” part. The Hammer had hypothesized that perhaps during an earlier repair to the sill in the museum’s history, some agent was sprayed on the sill to retard wood rot that may have been detected. The real reason for the appearance of the sill may not be known exactly but all signs point to something other than a fire.

There we have it folks – a plan for repairs on the southern sill in the east façade, and a probable explanation for a "charred"-looking sill!

A Meeting of the Minds

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 03:33:00 +0000

I attended my very first Pow Wow on Tuesday morning, February 8th. Maybe it wasn’t a Pow Wow. Maybe my idea of a Pow Wow more closely resembles the scene in Disney’s Peter Pan when Peter, Wendy, John, Michael and the Lost Boys celebrate Tiger Lily’s rescue from Captain Hook with Tiger Lily’s tribe. Maybe given my idea of a Pow Wow, the meeting which took place last Tuesday, that I am comparing to a Pow Wow, is nothing like a Pow Wow at all. Maybe I have used the term Pow Wow more times in this one paragraph than I ever have in my life, to date. Maybe I should just move on.

That's me on the left, the chubby one dressed like a bear.

We had a meeting on Tuesday, February 8th, among the staff, the architects, Western Building Restoration, and a number of New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Sites (Parks) representatives including the people responsible for processing grant applications and distribution of funds for the museum. Needless to say those of the staff in attendance were on our best behavior. We wanted to make a good impression on the powers that be, because they’re the powers that be keepin’ our restoration project agoin’.

In light of this desire to put our best foot forward (properly booted for winter weather of course), I arrived promptly five minutes after the meeting was supposed to start. The good news was that I wasn’t the only one who was late. Upon my entrance, a round of introductions ensued – I was introduced to 3 Parks employees – they were grants people. I then proceeded to lurk in the background while the Director did that thing she does – captivate an audience with all things Cherry Hill. Shortly afterwards the bell rang and our architectural team arrived. Another round of introductions followed. Everyone settled into folding chairs gathered around a folding table, huddled together for warmth, exchanging pleasantries, when the bell rang a third time and in entered the Historic Sites Restoration Coordinator for Parks. Again, introductions were given, space was “made” at the table, (I was relegated to a chair off to the side) and the architect began to describe the steps that were involved in deciding the course of the current restoration project. Interestingly enough when architects first came to the museum to investigate the buckling plaster walls several years ago, they had no idea that there was a bigger structural issue at play here. The original scope of the project included window restoration, repairs to interior finishes and addressing water entry into the structure but they quickly realized that there were structural issues that needed to be addressed first. Prior repairs to the sill on the north end of the eastern façade – where the original sill was removed and replaced with stacked pressure treated wood – didn’t address rotted posts. This caused the brick nogging between the studs to become load bearing all of which resulted in the settling of the building which presented itself in buckling walls and turned floor boards. As engrossed as we all were, the door bell rang again and in walked (Hey) Jude. By now you know the drill – a round of introductions were followed by more shuffling of chairs to accommodate the latest arrival.

With the arrival of the construction arm of the project, the talk turned to the existing sill in place in the south end of the eastern façade. A brief summary of the condition of said sill is as follows: Yikes. Translation: The 9x12 sill is partially rotted, a section of it is cleaved off and another section looks like it was charred by a fire. (That last point is especially puzzling as the southeast corner of the house where the charred section is located is an odd section for a fire…none of the house’ fireplaces are located near it.)

A view of the charred sill.

Another view of the charred wood.

Yet another view of the charred wood.

There are two two-bys which are laminated to the current sill but the ends of the two-bys have started to roll out. The original fear in regard to the southern section of the sill was that the entire sill would have to be replaced and that would be a fair amount of work. The problem with total replacement is that the interior studs of that section of the house are tenoned (see my previous post) into the sill and if Western were to replace the sill entirely, they would have to cut off all of the tenoned pieces. The architects think instead of replacing the whole thing it would be better to make it structurally sound by leaving the usable remnant of the sill in place and working with the missing or damaged parts. At that point in the meeting I was unclear as to how one “worked” with missing or damaged parts of a sill.

Before my brain became more pained with all of the thinking and writing I was doing, the bell rang again. Honest to goodness it did, if I’m lying may God strike me dead. This time the addition was the Shade Lady. Round of introductions, shuffling of chairs, resumption of conversation.

The window work was talked about. Mainly, it was mentioned that the windows were being worked on at Western’s shop. Two basement windows are rotted beyond repair and it was noted that work change orders were necessary because wholesale window replacement was not part of the original work order. Issues regarding the use of storms was brought up. The Curator briefed all present on the museum’s current plan to eliminate (as much as possible) UV light entering the museum and also reduce the visible light amounts as low as possible that would still allow for visitors to see in the full spectrum. The museum will use untinted, UV screening exterior storms made of safety glass. The Shade Lady weighed in with her thoughts on how best to mount blackout shades to ensure that all visible light is prevented from entering the window.

After all of the basics had been covered the class (no longer the Pow Wow) moved upstairs into the two parlors on the east side of the house. It was kind of funny to see everyone remembering to put on their coats to go upstairs, as opposed to go outside. Kind of funny in a very unfunny way. Upstairs the architect and (Hey) Jude explained the work that had been done and the Parks people were able to see the work with their own eyes for the first time. Then the gang (no longer the class) prepared to go back downstairs and, horror of horrors, outside to inspect the sill at the southern end of the front of the house. I, wisely, snuck down the stairs ahead of the group to pilfer a delicious looking muffin which had sat on a plate on the folding table, just out of polite reach from me. Standing in the volunteer room I broke off bits of the muffin like a starved rat and crammed them into my mouth. I was startled by the early appearance of one of the Parks people who came downstairs to also have a quick bite. I thought I had successfully hidden the evidence of my meal but realized afterwards that the crumbs clinging to my chin and my hair probably gave me away.

Outside we all journeyed to the front of the building. The gate was open for us, and an employee from Western had already removed the thermal blanket from the south end of the house. However the large amount of snow resting on the ground, oh and the freezing temperatures, held most of the Parks people, and I am sorry to say the Director, away from the house during the initial inspection. It wasn’t until the Parks grant people admitted defeat and ran inside to the “warmth” of the house that the Director came in for a closer look. The architect, (Hey) Jude, and the Parks Historic Sites Restoration Coordinator scrambled up onto the scaffolding while the Curator and I edged in for a closer view of the exposed sill. Amazingly the a section of the sill appeared to have been charred but we (Cherry Hill staff) were unable to come up with a satisfactory reason for its appearance. There were no documented fires, or any other evidence of fire on the posts and walls of the house. The best we could come up with was maybe Philip Van Rensselaer was into eco-construction and had decided to reuse old, burned building material when constructing Cherry Hill.

After the exclamations over the charred wood died down, the three people on the scaffolding drifted further away from our little spot in the snow and thus it was difficult to hear their conversation. We took up a new position on the detached staircase to try and get a better look and listen at what the professionals were talking about. It didn’t work. And when they came closer and (Hey) Jude described what they were discussing in terms of repairing the sill it still didn’t make sense. I even tried to copy the diagram that (Hey) Jude made but it still did not compute. Luckily the Curator and I were able to ambush him by the museum’s potting shed door and with some “gentle” “persuasion” we got (Hey) to draw exactly what they were planning on doing with the sill.

Still didn't help. What I can tell you is that there are sections of the sill that are either missing or are damaged, charred wood. The plan is to remove the charred parts of the wood, and to use epoxy and 2 pieces of laminated two-bys in some magical way that will render the sill structurally sound and viable again. (Clearly the process itself will have to be the topic of a future blog post!)

After the delightful field trip in the sub-zero weather, we all went back inside. I was nursing a frozen right hand (my writing hand – oh the things I do for my reading public), and several people were waiting for their vocal cords to defrost. The Director led the majority of the Parks people up the stairs for a tour of the house. The architects, Western and the Parks Historic Sites Restoration Coordinator went outside to view the foundation of the southwest corner of the house. By the time the Curator and I donned our jackets and trudged through the meeting-made snow path to listen, the curiosity of the professionals had been satisfied and they were headed back inside.

The Director rejoined the discussion in time to view the storm window sample from Western. I don’t want to suggest that the professionals aren’t qualified but as they examined the storm window sample they seemed to overlook the fact that there wasn’t any glass in the frame. Here I am thinking we want glass in our windows and they’re only interested in how the frame will fit in the crooked window openings. Sometimes the professionals can be so obtuse! (I kid you! Or do I?) Setting aside the absence of glass, the architects and the Parks restoration coordinator were well pleased with the sample. They reiterated the necessity of trimming the frames to fit, but to not fit too tightly. Since Western will be using a window template when doing the work, the others cautioned that in the cases of really crooked window frames, that adjustments would have to be made to align the exterior storm with the opening.

I think the quality of this photo speaks volumes as to my natural ability as a photographer. Oh and, this is a shot of the exterior storm sample that Western provided.

I thought this would serve as an excellent example of a "really crooked window frame" but it doesn't translate so well in this photograph. But trust me - this window is an excellent example of a really crooked window frame and Western will have to make the appropriate adjustments to the exterior storm that is installed there.

(Hey) Jude promised to get moving on the sill work and also stated that March would be a good time to complete the painting of the shutters and installation of the storms.

Then the Director pulled a fast one on unsuspecting, little ol’ me. She ditched me. She took off to join the Curator and the Parks employees at the storage building leaving me to follow the architects, (Hey) and Restoration Coordinator around the house like a mute puppy.

They were mostly interested in viewing the windows and talking some more about what needed to be done in terms of installation of restored windows. A lively debate on all things window-related followed: weather stripping (to be avoided if at all possible, except for those windows where evidence exists that it was used); dealing with the gap at the meeting rails which poses a big risk of heat loss (exterior storms should help a lot , also making sure the surfaces where the sash is raised is as smooth as possible and the window hardware should help on that end); upper sash of the windows are to remain fixed in place (as they originally were); acknowledgment that given the varying conditions of each individual window – different steps will have to be taken to ensure that all variables are accounted for (as (Hey) Jude said – each window will be a dance). And here I thought a window restoration was easy peasy compared to sill repair.

It was a good meeting overall – Parks people got to put a face to the name Historic Cherry Hill that so often crosses their desk on paperwork, a decision was made on how to handle the sill repair on the south end, the storm sample was approved and different contingencies were discussed in terms of reinstallation of restored windows. And I not only got to eat the muffin I snatched during the meeting, but also the rest of the muffins left over from the meeting. Aaah, life is good.

Cloudy, with a chance of snow....

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 19:05:00 +0000

I can’t think of a better winter season to undergo a massive restoration project – can you? What are the delays in work that massive amounts of snow, sleet, freezing rain and subzero temperatures cause compared to the satisfaction of conquering a challenge (or in the case of this past month, the multiple challenges) Mother Nature has thrown our way? Sure it’s cold at the house and we find ourselves making ridiculous excuses to sit in the bathroom (which just happens to be the warmest room in the house at this point – no kidding it’s sauna-like), but that doesn’t mean we aren’t enjoying ourselves.

But those delays are annoying. The meeting that was supposed to take place last Wednesday amongst the Director, Curator, Western Building Restoration, the architectural team, our Parks (New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Sites) contact and Shade Lady did not happen. Bad weather to the south forced the cancellation of the meeting and clearly there hasn’t been an opportunity to reschedule given the combined hysteria of local and national weather forecasters when there is any precipitation headed our way. So structural work is pretty much at a standstill.

The last time I checked in with Joe the Hammer, about a week and a half ago, I was surprised to find out how busy he had been. For starters he had removed the front porch stairs from the house in order to access the sill located under the front door.

The Great Divide

A Close-up of the Great Divide

At some point in the museum’s past, sill repair had been made at this section (under the front door) but unfortunately those previous repairs were not well done. There was no overlap between the boards used for the previous sill (meaning that the sections of wood used for the sill had gaps in between), and none of the exterior posts were sitting on the sill, they were hanging in the air.

Warning - This is an photo of the old sill that has already been replaced on the northern side of the east facade. I'm using it to illustrate what a sill with some overlap looks like - as you can see there are gaps in between the pieces of timber where there is no overlap. Now imagine an old sill with no overlap at all and that is apparently what the sill looked like under the front door before The Hammer replaced it.

The Hammer replaced the old sill with 3ft and 4ft sections of wood to create the new sill.

Partial view of the new wood used to replace the old sill under the front door.

He also had been busy constructing scaffolding at the southern end of the front of the house, including inserting the needle beams into the house (anchored to lally columns on the ground), all in preparation for sill work on the southern end. The meeting that never happened, once it does happen, will be critical to determining how to move forward with sill work on the south end. The sill looks bad to me, like it would take buckets of epoxy to make it structurally sound again – but then again, mine is the untrained eye. I think a crack in the plaster wall in my bedroom portends a disaster of epic proportions in the making, but my husband tells me to stop wearing his hockey helmet to bed and accept that it is just a side effect of the settling of the house. Clearly I’m not the right person to decide what looks bad or not.

Although no work can go forward on the sill, The Hammer made Dutchman repairs to the exterior posts with an eye towards the impending sill work to come, meaning that although the sill may have to be replaced, his repairs are removable in order to accommodate the future sill work. The Dutchman repairs can be unbolted and removed if necessary. The Dutchman repair has a tenon, or projection at the end of the wood post, for insertion into a mortise joint. A mortise is a cavity cut into wood to receive a tenon. If the sill needs to be replaced, a mortise joint will be cut into the new sill timber for each tenon on the repaired posts to sit in.

Picture shows some of the exterior post repairs that Joe the Hammer has completed.

Joe the Hammer is holding wood pieces that will be used in the Dutchman repair of one of the original posts. The tenon is the piece that extends at the bottom.

In addition to the work Joe the Hammer has done on the exterior of the house, he also was able to put the lath back up on the wall in the north parlor. All that remains is for the walls to be plastered and then the interior work in the north parlor will be done. Since he has done all of the sill work that can be done at the present, The Hammer has turned his sights to removing more windows from the house to take to Western’s workshop for restoration work.

The lath is back!!

Beyond that – the restoration work awaits a lull in the storm systems to hold that much anticipated meeting which will decide the fate of the sill on the southern side of the east façade. Until then, the staff plans to stock up on carbs to outlast the bitter cold. Luckily we have a ready supply of carbs at Uncle Dan’s Diner located down the block from the museum. It’s not an easy job, shoveling food into our mouths as if we’re preparing for hibernation, but it is necessary if we want to make it through the cold weather to the spring. Of course, with the types of carbs we’re ingesting, we don’t have any idea what we’re going to look like when springtime rolls around (mmm, rolls…) - but as my favorite hoop-skirted southern belle Scarlett O’Hara said, “I can’t think about this now. I’ll go crazy if I do. I’ll think about it tomorrow.”

As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again! Especially if my carbs are smothered in cheese.

We laughed, we cried, we allegedly committed murder....

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 17:03:00 +0000

I had no idea when I agreed to go on a road trip with the Director and the Curator two weeks ago, that the trip would begin at the Police Station, continue with a hit and run, and end in Mexico.

Thursday morning, January 13th, started out pleasantly enough – I was super excited about the prospect of a peppermint hot chocolate from Starbucks (with whipped cream thank you very much sir, do you really need to ask?). In comparison, I may have been slightly less excited about the window sight-seeing tour we were about to embark on but then again I have never made secret my delight in all things edible and unhealthy. As our departure time was a bit fluid, and as the Director hadn’t arrived yet, I sat down at my desk to get in a little bit of work before we left. Reflecting smugly on my productivity and work ethic, I answered the ringing phone in my most friendly and engaging voice, albeit in a voice register somewhere between that of a pre-adolescent choir boy and Minnie Mouse.

Me: “Good Morning, Historic Cherry Hill. How may I help you?”

Caller: “You’re not going to believe this.”

Me: “Director?”

The Director formerly known as Caller: “My car has been towed. There was snow emergency parking last night and when I came out this morning my car was gone!”

Me: [Silence while an internal battle raged to suppress any unsympathetic sniggers or giggles]

The Director: [Panicked breathing]

Me: “Do you know where your car is?”

The Director: “No! I have to call the city…maybe we could rent a car for the drive.”

Me [slightly offended that the Director would rather rent a car and drive then let me drive us all in my minivan]: “We can take my car.”

The Director: [Long Pause] “I’ll call the city. Can you guys come and pick me up at my place.”

Me: “Okay.”

About twenty minutes later the Curator and I pulled up to the side of the road to pick up a very annoyed Director. The Director climbed into the van (whose “high-tech” handle proved too difficult for her to master on her first try) and directed me to our next destination. THE POLICE STATION!

As I parked the car in THE POLICE STATION! parking lot, the Curator and I eagerly exited the car and practically skipped to accompany our fearless leader inside the citadel of justice. The Director didn’t seem to appreciate our show of support, particularly because the support was offered with barely suppressed glee. We walked into THE POLICE STATION! with our Director leading the way like we were a couple of overexcited puppies she was trying to control. While she attempted to communicate (communicate = shout back and forth) through a tiny hole in a glass window with an officer in blue on the other side, the Curator and I sized up the space, eagerly watching as more miserable Albanians shuffled in, a rag tag group of snow emergency parking victims and…others. Unfortunately we were only there for a very short time, but it was long enough for The Director to sign some paperwork, obtain the location of the tow-company that took her beloved car, and weasel her way out of some overdue parking tickets Officer O’Malley discovered she owed during the whole process. I don’t think she was enjoying the experience as much as we were. I high-fived a man resembling Grizzly Adams on the way out the door, and shouted "Power to the People!" before we emerged into the sunlight to sniff the sweet smell of freedom, a heady mix of car exhaust and stale urine.

We hopped back into the van and made our way to free the Director’s car. We had to go inside the tow-company’s office where the Director once again “communicated” with someone through a tiny hole in a glass window and then paid the cost of the tow before being gifted with the location of her car - something along the lines of “It’s in the lot at the back of the building.” Into the car we piled again and I drove the director to the lot at the back of the building which we found to be filled with cars in varying degrees of burial under the snow. For a moment it looked like the Director’s bad luck was going to hold and we would have to play a game of Marco Polo with her car using the panic button on her keychain, but much to the disappointment of both the Curator and I, the Director located her car quickly.

So the road trip was on – but first we had to go back to the museum to drop off my car and climb into the newly recovered car of the Director. But once we climbed in – the road trip was on! To the first rest stop on the Thruway heading south where coffee and hot chocolate was purchased. But after that – the road trip was on!

We traveled to Katonah, NY to visit Stepping Stones, a historic house museum. The house was the home of Bill Wilson, co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, and his wife Lois, co-founder of Al-Anon Family Groups. The Executive Director of Stepping Stones greeted us, winter hat on head and guided us along a snow covered path, approximately the width of a single human foot, from the office building to the historic house. As I attempted to place one foot in front of the other on the path across what in my mind seemed more akin to a frozen tundra in northern Russia than a yard in Westchester County, I reflected for the 17th time in my life that my sense of balance was more suited to a one-legged clown than a two-legged Communications Coordinator.

Stepping Stones has recently installed exterior storm windows similar to the ones we are planning to install at Historic Cherry Hill. Our trek through the snow afforded us a lovely view of the house and its exterior windows. I dutifully snapped pictures while the museum professionals talked about UV filtration, window installation and things of that nature.

The exterior storm windows seen here at Stepping Stones are similar to what Historic Cherry Hill will install.

Close up of an exterior storm window at Stepping Stones

What did grab my attention after looking around the first floor of the house, (once again while the real professionals conversed), were the measurement instruments the Executive Director of Stepping Stones brought along to take some measurements with. She had both a visible light measure and a UV light measure. The Curator was instantly drawn to the measurement devices like a Communications Coordinator is drawn to cheese fries – picking up the visible light meter, she began figuring out how the device worked. It took some time to understand what the readings meant in terms of measurement of light (lux) but eventually she clued us in on the following:

Level A: 0-1999

x1 lux

Level B: 2000-19999

x10 lux

Level C: 20,000-50,000

x100 lux

The visible light meter - I will confess I was a little disappointed to find that the light meter was not similar in any way, shape or form to the lightsabers from the Star Wars movies.

These readings may not mean anything at all to anyone who isn’t holding the instruction booklet to the light meter in their hands, and even then, if you’re like me, it still won’t mean anything to you. However I was lucky enough to have the Curator with me and she being, (I think), a direct descendant of Mr. Wizard, was able to talk me through the process. We took visible light measurements in one particularly sunny room and were amazed at the difference in light measurement when a window was covered with sheer curtains versus when a window was devoid of window treatments. The amount of visible light that traveled through a bare window was reduced by almost 57% with just the addition of the sheer vurtains.

Because visible light poses such a danger to collections, museums in general strive to keep lux levels low but in such a way that a visitor can still enjoy the full color of the objects they are looking at. In the best circumstances, a person needs a minimum of 50 lux to still be able to see - it is a level that museums aim for. Now, the lux requirement will go up depending on the conditions of the room and the needs of people viewing the room. For example, one would multiply 50 lux by 3 to accommodate the vision of an elderly person; one would multiply 50 lux by 3 if looking at a low contrast object in the room; one would multiply by 3 if there are dark paintings on view; one would multiply by 3 if there was fine detail on an object on view. So if an older person came into a room to look at a dark painting and also examine the fine detail of the painting’s picture frame – you would multiply 50 lux by 3, by 3, by 3 to get a necessary lux measurement of 1350 lux which a musuem would need for that older visitor to comfortably view the painting and all its detail.

Moving on to the next gadget: the UV light meter. The Curator took some measurements which I dutifully recorded. We took the UV light measurements in several different spots in the house. Since we weren’t as confident in our understanding of what the UV light measurements meant, i.e. what UV range was acceptable in a museum environment, we took the measurements home to analyze another day. We want to understand how effective the UV filter in the exterior storms is as we are relying on that to filter out UV light in our museum.

This picture of the Curator holding the UV light meter is going in her hand-modeling portfolio - we're hoping it will be her lucky break.

This is an example of an ancient Greek scroll...wait a minute, no...my mistake, that's got something to do with the UV light sensor.

We left Stepping Stones to head to our next destination, Olana State Historic Site, in Hudson, NY. Our plan was to check out the “screeney blinds” Olana used on their windows, to see what our opinion was of them. Instead of taking the Thruway north we made our way to the Taconic State Parkway, deeming that the faster route. Little did we know what horror awaited us halfway to our destination. Driving along, the Director and the Curator in the front seat, myself in the back, things seemed to be going well. We were a little bit ahead of schedule and congratulating ourselves on that feat. Only another hour or so and we would be to Olana. Then the unthinkable happened. A blur in the sky, a thump on the front bumper of the car. The Director kept driving while I sat in the back seat, gasping in horror, my eyes wide with the realization that I had just witnessed a hit and run. Leaning forward, trembling hands clasped as if in supplication to the almighty Director to “say it ain’t so”, I stammered out the question – “Did you just hit a bird?” to which the Director replied, “Yeah….I did.” And there the three of us sat, all guilty of taking the life of a harmless little bird. The weight of our guilt weighed heavily on us for a couple of seconds, but then the Director said, “I think I just stunned it.” And, call me crazy, but I believed her – sure we were going over 60 mph and the thing took a kamikaze dive into the hood of the Director’s car but gosh darn it, yes, I agree, the Director probably just stunned it.

R.I.P.
2010-2011

Arriving at Olana, after taking a solemn blood oath to never breathe a word of our heinous deed to anyone on pain of immediate termination of employment (the Director’s idea), we were greeted by Olana’s curator who brought us into the house to view the “screeney blinds,” although she just called them solar shades. The thing about Olana, in case you aren’t aware, is that this house was built for the views out its windows, and those views are stunning. I was skeptical, thinking that the “screeney blinds” would intrude too much into my personal enjoyment of those views. I was pleasantly surprised to realize that it wasn’t as bad as I imagined. Of course nothing can compare to an unimpeded view of the Hudson River from Olana’s hilltop perch but the view through the “screeney blinds” was acceptable. We left Olana rethinking our previous stance on the “screeney blinds” question and took a quick drive across the Rip Van Winkle bridge to take a look at Thomas Cole House which had the same “screeney blinds” but in white to see the different options available to us.

Olana State Historic Site - it sits on a magical hill that has flowers and blue skies even in the middle of January (at least that's what I am pretending, having lifted this picture off its website)

After all of the “site”-seeing ( a little historic house humor for you) we were ravenous as we hadn’t stopped for lunch and it was about 5pm, so we crossed the Rip Van Winkle bridge one more time and took the road to Mexico. To be a little more precise – to Mexican Radio a great Mexican restaurant in Hudson, NY which incidentally serves phenomenal pitchers of raspberry/blackberry margaritas – not that I know that from first hand experience – a little birdie (recovering from severe head trauma as the result of a car accident) told me.

People whose conscience weighs heavily on them for some crime they have committed will often turn to drink. I know when an evil deed has stained my soul I prefer to drink something fruity and colorful.

Thus ended our road trip, although the Director and the Curator went on another trip the next day to The Hyde Collection in Glens Falls, NY to take a look at what that site did with their window restoration. They used tinted Plexiglas on the interior which they covered with sheer curtains that made the tint practically invisible. The Light Guru created a complicated and extensive artificial lighting system in their rooms that was so genius it is difficult for a visitor to tell where the light in the room comes from.

As of now, taking in all of the observations made on the trips to different sites as well as the opinions of different experts in the field, the Curator is leaning heavily toward blocking the visible light in our museum with shades. There is a meeting scheduled for this Wednesday with our architectural team and a “Shade Lady” after which a final decision will be made as to how we want to tackle the issue of visible light.

The visible light is so bright....I gotta wear shades (or tinted Plexiglas or fiber mesh screens, or...)

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 19:07:00 +0000

And here I thought tinting glass was just for the cars of male teenagers and diplomatic envoys - turns out I was mistaken. Apparently tinted windows are all the rage in the museum world. I found out more than I ever wanted to know about light filtration options for windows this past week.

But I’m confusing you – let me start from the beginning. I talked with the Hammer last week for updates on the progress of the restoration work. He has been working on shoring up the south side of the house – C channels, needle beams are in, most of nogging is out. Hey (Jude) was expected on site to take pictures of the exposed sill to share them with the architectural team so that they can make a determination about what type of sill and post repair is most appropriate. Until the architectural team makes that determination, no sill or post work can be done. Hey (Jude) was also supposed to bring a storm window mock-up for the architects’ approval as well.

View of the South Parlor - site of the next phase of structural work.

Scaffolding in place, check!

C-beams and needle beams in place, check!

Exposed sill in need of some type of repair or replacement the extent of which is not known at this point, check!

I figured – ‘Whew! This is going to be a short and sweet blog this week!’ Had I talked with The Hammer alone it would have been, and I would have remained blissfully ignorant of The Great Glass Dilemma of ’11. However the Curator accompanied me on my fact-finding mission and when The Hammer mentioned storm windows, she began to ask questions. The questions revolved around the advisability of tinting windows. But the bigger story is UV A, UV B and visible light. I’m well aware of UVA and UVB – they are the reasons that when at the beach I slather on the SPF 107 sunscreen, wear a sweat suit under my bathing suit, and make my children walk around in their snowsuits while they build castles in the sand. Visible light – not as afraid of, mostly because it allows me to see. But visible light is not the innocent little range of electromagnetic radiation that can be detected by the human eye it tries to make itself out to be. While it is true UV A and UV B light causes degradation of material, visible light does its fair share of damage – it fades things.

According to the Curator because we do not need UVA or UVB light to see it can be eliminated almost entirely (hence the SPF 107 and the sweat suit under my bathing suit – my family thinks it’s overkill, I think it is a safe way to enjoy the sun). However we need visible light because without it we can’t see. The museum’s goal then is to reduce the amount of visible light that enters through the windows into the house to the minimum levels necessary to see. The good news is that it seems like any glass will block UV B radiation while applied filters will block UV A. But what to do about that pesky visible light?

Well, what are the options? Aaaah…ha ha – if only that were an easy question to answer. One option is to apply a tint to the exterior glazing of the window to filter out visible light. The percentage of visible light filtration you want dictates the amount of tinting necessary. And don’t think there is only one tinting option out there for glass – there are more, for example, bronze tinting or gray tinting – and I have no idea what either of those two things would look like. Tinted glazing for controlling visible light is usually done in the museum world on interior storms made out of Plexiglas. But the museum is not mounting interior storms, it is mounting exterior storms. And regular glass will not be used in the exterior storm windows – instead the exterior storms will be made with safety glass. The reasoning behind this is simple – we want to protect the historic fabric of the house that we are currently spending mucho dinero to restore. In other words we don’t want a thousand black birds to fall from the sky dead and have a portion of those dead black birds crash through our windows damaging any of the historic material of the house. (Actually we don’t want a thousand black birds falling dead from the sky period – that’s a little too end-of-times for me) Safety glass will break but it won’t shatter all over the place. Besides, the Plexiglas is easily scratched – that’s okay when it’s on the inside, but it would start to look pretty bad on the outside what with its exposure to dead birds falling from the sky, etc.

Darn those Mayans and their calendar!

One of our concerns with tinted exterior storms is the way the house will look with all of that visible light reflecting back off. Sunglasses can make movie stars look cool, or State Troopers look intimidating, but in the case of Cherry Hill it will only succeed in blinding anybody who looks at the house on a bright, sunny day. Rule number one in the Dummies Guide to Historic House Museum Interactions with the Public – do not blind the public. The Curator did wonder if there was an option of applying an anti-reflective coating to exterior tinted storm windows that would reduce the amount of reflection/potential blinding of passerby.

Long after the interrogation of Joe the Hammer had ended, the glass discussion carried on (and on…and on, I’m not kidding – like for the rest of the week). The Director and the Curator mentioned that there are fiber mesh shades that can be mounted on the interior of the window to reduce visible light. Actually, in the interest of full disclosure and since this is supposed to be a helpful and informative blog, the Curator and the Director used their “official” name for these shades: “screeney blinds.” The plus of the “screeney blinds” is that they will block visible light in a non-permanent way; the negative is that they provide a less clear view out of the window they are mounted on. Some staff members (the Curator) were open to the idea of exploring the option, other staff members (the Director) were vehemently opposed and then there were the staff members (the Communications Coordinator) who were stumped over how to spell “screeney” - (“Do I put the third ‘e’ in or do I leave it out?”).

The other option is to continue the method currently in use at the house - blackout shades and UV shades that staff members have to remember to raise for a tour and then lower after tours are over. A little more manual effort certainly but it does the job, once again in a non-permanent way.

Just when we thought we would continue to wander in a forest of UV and visible light uncertainty we found enlightenment. The Curator contacted The Light Guru. The Light Guru answered her questions and gave her a sense of calm where before there had been only a tinting tizzy. The Light Guru is a private conservator who happened to design the HVAC system for the museum’s collections center. The Light Guru explained that the tinting levels we would need might not be available in laminated glass. He explained that if we wanted to go the tinted route that we should get Plexiglas tinted to whatever percentage of filtration we wanted and install that between the historic glass and the exterior storm – the thought being that the exterior windows might look better this way. He suggested that the museum measure the light levels of the windows using a footcandle sensor device or a light meter. (Light is measured in footcandles or lux.) Once we know what amounts of visible light we are dealing with, we will be able to make a better informed decision.

But not to be outdone by the Curator’s window nirvana, the Director pulled a card from up her sleeve and contacted another conservator who has worked with the museum before, via a mini-teleconference (in the interest of protecting her privacy we will refer to her as the Conservator Extraordinaire). The Conservator Extraordinaire actually suggested we contact The Light Guru in the first place and when we talked with her after The Light Guru’s enlightenment, she gave us some food for thought – she suggested the use of tinted Plexiglas on the interior which would lower the amount of light coming in the window, make window treatments last a lot longer and prevent an Apocalypse Now (unless you are a black bird in Arkansas) if a staff member happens to forget to shut any of the blinds or shutters. It is an option of continuous protection that takes the manual labor associated with the UV and blackout shades option out of the equation, and lowers the baseline of visible light that enters a given window.

The Curator, whiz kid that she is, is currently thinking about a different approach to visible light management. The museum could use pull-down blackout shades when it is not open, and when it is open to tours (an optimal time to let visitors have some visible light so they can appreciate their surroundings) the blackout shade would be fully raised. But what about the visible light and the UV A light?!?! Never fear – in addition to the blackout shade would be a fully closed semi-translucent shade which would allow light to enter the room more evenly but in a reduced amount. The museum would use reproduced historic window treatments or adaptations of them for further reduction of light. But just to complicate what seems like a simple straight forward method to deal with visible light, the Curator will explore different options in different rooms of the house. Perhaps in one room, like our Guest Bedroom where the view out the window is part of the tour – maybe tinted Plexiglas would be installed there. All those light measurements The Light Guru suggested will come in handy making these decisions.

After all of the talking and after the advice of the conservators, it became painfully clear to the Director and the Curator what needed to be done……..Road Trip!!! Obviously in order to make the most informed decision possible, in addition to light measurements and advice from the experts, we need to see how these different options look in the real world, or at least the real world of historic house museums. And we also need to buy some snacks for the road. I’m thinking Slim Jims and Cheetos. But no coffee – can you imagine how many bathroom breaks the Director and Curator would have to take on a road trip where they were given coffee in the car? To this end the Director and the Curator have set up some visits to sites this week to help with their research. I have been invited on the trip, and if weather and childcare conditions allow, I will go along for the ride. The only thing I have left to say is “SHOTGUN!” (Sorry Curator but it’s an unspoken rule of the road – whoever shouts SHOTGUN first gets the front passenger seat.)

***Updated Information – We have since found out that it is possible to get laminated glass that is tinted dark enough. The catch is that the extra layer of tinting to the laminated glass “sandwich” may not look well and it may end up being too thick to be physically feasible for the museum’s particular windows.***

When it snows, ain't it thrillin'...

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 19:07:00 +0000

Unless that snow is accompanied by blowing winds and sub-zero temperatures, and a death-defying (at least in my mind) ride down I-90 and 787 on highway roads that were of the “Make-Your-Own-Car-Lane” variety.

Monday, December 27th – a day that will live on in infamy, (once again, at least in my mind). It began at 6am when my husband roused me gently from sleep (with a shove to the side and a growled “Get up! The alarm went off!”). It took me a few moments to open my eyes and remember where I was. But once I did I bounced out of bed, fingers and toes crossed in the hopes that either the snow was sooooo bad that nobody would ever venture out in it or that the weather forecasters had once again made a mountain out of a couple inches of snow. Neither hope won out. The snow was not so bad that nobody would ever venture out in it and the forecasters had been pretty accurate in their predictions. My husband obligingly got out of bed and dressed, as did I, in preparation for snow shoveling. Never fear concerned readers, my mother-in-law, moved to action by my pathetic admission of bootlessness in my last post, gifted me with a pair of bona fide boots for Christmas. That was the one highlight of my morning – slipping my feet in to nice warm boots and having said footsies stay dry while I got a cardio workout shoveling snow. The snow wasn’t too heavy but there was a lot of it. A lot of it. I paused for a moment in wonder as a backhoe made a third trip around my street to clear it of snow. A backhoe? Things must be bad out there.

By 7am the driveway had been shoveled and the cars cleared of snow. Mother Nature had thoughtfully deposited another ½ inch of snow on the space already cleared. I walked back inside, checked weather reports one more time, praying for some statement prepared by the Government of New York State advising New Yorkers in general, but Historic Cherry Hill’s Communications Coordinator in particular, to stay off the roads. A call from the Director came and like a child waiting breathlessly for news that school was cancelled, I leaped at the sound and answered. No such luck. Apparently in the real world, people with jobs are expected to go to work. Crazy, crazy notion. The word from the Boss was that Joe the Hammer was coming in to work. Since I had foolishly volunteered to take the early shift for once (of course on the first major snowfall of the year) it looked like the restoration project, like the postal service, would be stopped by nothing - I was heading for work. My husband, stood with concern, watching my departure. Or at least I thought it was concern until I realized he was putting together the new snow rake he had just got and that his back was actually to me.

The roads were delightful, and I maintained a bare-knuckled grip on the steering wheel all the way to work. Once I arrived, after driving at a breakneck 30 mph on the highway I found that although the driveway had been plowed at some point, it was buried once again and that the city’s plows had blocked up both entrances. Luckily I had the foresight to carry a shovel with me, more because I thought for sure I would need it to dig myself out of a ditch, but happy to use it in a less dire situation. As I stood at the base of the driveway, shoveling out a big enough space to pull my car off of South Pearl Street, Joe the Hammer came driving up. With his window down he shouted across the road to me “We only got 1 ½ inches of snow where I live.” Which apparently is on the equator. With The Hammer’s arrival as my relief pitcher, so to speak, he took over the shoveling for me while I waded up the driveway and dug out the door to the museum to get inside and find another snow shovel. By the time I had located one in the outside ladder room, The Hammer had finished shoveling and he moved my car into the parking lot.

The Hammer’s inspection of the windows found that snow blew in around one of the temporary windows located at the back of the house. He cleaned up the mess and packed that window as well as other temporary windows with foam, (sealed with tape in some cases), to prevent a repeat occurrence in another room of the house. His plan for the day had been to work outside setting up the scaffolding on the south side of the east façade, in preparation for sill work! Joyous news. But for now, because of the wind and super cold temperatures outside, that work will be put off until weather conditions improve.

If you look closely, you can see some of the foam Joe the Hammer used to fill in space on either side of the window.

A close-up of the foam

Tape used to cover a gap.

The only temporary window which the snow was able to breach.

The south side of the east facade and the future site of scaffolding.

An example of how the blowing snow covered everything! This is the screen door of the entrance into the museum.

The Hammer's car made it up the Hill but my poor little minivan didn't stand a chance.

Working in a winter wonderland...

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 16:36:00 +0000

It’s cold outside. It’s really cold inside. As I type, I am sitting huddled in my chair at the computer with my electric heater blasting and my sneakers sitting on top of it drying out. I don’t know if this is a fire hazard and quite frankly, I would welcome some flames just to thaw out the top portion of each of my toes. I know what you’re thinking – it’s winter, there’s snow on the ground, why are you wearing sneakers? If you must know I have no boots. There I said it. My name is Mary, I live in upstate New York, it is winter time, and I don’t own a pair of boots (not unless you count my bright yellow and blue rain boots which I do not because they offer no traction in the snow). Maybe some of you haven’t seen the video I made recently for Historic Cherry Hill’s End-of-Times, wait that was a typo, End-Of-Year Appeal on facebook. If you haven’t, let me just say my lack of winter boots is the least of my family’s worries.

If you watched the video, then you may be feeling sufficiently sympathetic towards me to not hold the “no snow boots” thing against me. By this time you must be able to tell that I’m not the brightest light bulb on the Christmas tree (I’m more along the lines of the one that blinks on and off randomly, you know, the one that you tighten, and it seems to light up nicely, but the next time you come into the room it’s off again), and maybe you’ll forgive me for lacking wintertime essentials. Any who – I was taking a long time to explain that it is cold. Period. Whether you are outside or inside the museum.

And because it is cold, I may have taken a perverse delight in the meeting that was held here at the museum last Wednesday. It was a meeting attended by the architectural team, Western Building, and Cherry Hill. Here’s where the perverse delight comes in – it was very cold that day, and all of the foreign dignitaries at the site had to suffer in the cold while they inspected the work. I acknowledge that at the end of the day they got to go back to their heated offices and wait for the feeling to return to their fingers, so it was really only a temporary discomfort to them, but still - they suffered. If I wanted to be fair I should say that the only heated place The Hammer gets to go on his workday is his car and that he is the only one who actually has to work outdoors and in the unheated section of the house, but I don’t feel like being fair. I bet his car is a lot warmer than my cave with its electric heater that even a caveman would turn his nose up at.

But where was I? I’m sorry, I’ve noticed that my memory is not what it used to be since the sensory receptors in my brain have frozen solid. Ah yes, the meeting at the Arctic Circle. I was not present for it (much to the relief of all involved as they knew: a) they wouldn’t have to repeat things in a slow and distinct voice; and b) they wouldn’t fear that any of their comments would appear in the blog) - I relied instead on the stellar recall of the Director and the Curator. Let’s just say that the basement windows aren’t the only thing affected by dry rot. (That’s just a little restoration humor – I know the architectural team and Joe the Hammer totally got that joke!) For all of you lay people, I was making a humorous comparison, implying that the recall ability of the Director and the Curator has been affected by dry rot as have the museum’s basement windows…but I kid. They were able to recall in stunning detail how cold it was outside.

A meeting of the Polar Bear Club...just without the water

And some other things.

First things first – the architectural team approved all of the work that had been done thus far. Joe the Hammer received praise for the quality of his workmanship. (If only poor Joe could have heard their compliments but alas, the exposure to the elements had frozen his ear drums rendering him deaf.) The options for heating the inside of the house for work purposes was brought up. I may not have mentioned this but it’s cold in the house and cold outside. For the mason to put the nogging back in place requires mortar, which requires above-freezing temperatures to spread properly. Western will be using a 110-amp electric heater inside the house to provide heat in the North Parlor while work is done on the nogging and also for the window painting that needs to take place inside the house. There is still some talk about needing higher heat temps on the outside of the house to continue restoration work. The idea of a tent and a blower using 220 amps for heat was tossed around making the Director a little nervous as she considered that just running the vacuum cleaner inside the house tends to trip the breakers. Western will be bringing an electrician by to evaluate the museum’s electrical capacity before using the blower.

110-amp heater in the north parlor whose sole purpose is to keep the room warm enough for mortar work to be done.

Mortar work done in the north parlor, courtesy of the heating power of the 110-amp heater.

Mortar work waiting to be done. You can see the original nogging in this picture, waiting patiently for its turn.

Both the architectural team and the restoration workers were in agreement that exterior painting would have to be postponed until the spring. We will now have to approach the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (Parks) with the plea to allow us to run two EPF grants at the same time because if we push back the painting to spring, and if Parks does not allow us to use two grants simultaneously, then we’re going to be sitting back looking pretty and incidentally looking at a nice long delay in the restoration project as we wait for the spring thaw.

But put a check mark in the good news column because it sounds like (try and follow this) the south post in the north parlor located to the right of the front door (if you're facing the house), may not be in the terrible condition it was previously believed to be in. Yes it is floating in air - definitely not good, but the architectural team was pleasantly surprised to learn that the damage didn’t extend too far upwards in the post. Because of this the post may not need a dutchman repair with the white oak. It may be able to scrape by with an epoxy repair, specifically a structural epoxy, which when dry will be as strong as the beam of wood. The bonus with the epoxy repair would be less of a loss (say that five times fast) of the original wood. The group looked at the southwest corner post of the house. Once again there was hope that that post is not in as bad shape as was previously thought. Western and the architectural team will be looking at the report from the bore testing that was done previous to the start of the restoration project to reevaluate that particular post.

The Director is hoping that by having been a good girl all year, Santa might give her a southwest post in better shape than previousy thought.

Taking a break from the bitter cold outside, the group sought refuge in the bitter cold inside and inspected interior work. On their journey through the house they stopped to discuss a couple of windows that showed a serious degree of wood rot caused by water entry. As professionals are wont to do, they stood and discussed the various causes for the wood rot including the possibility that wind-driven rain may be responsible or that the way the window sill was constructed may be to blame ultimately concluding that they didn’t know the answer. After that illuminating conversation, the architectural team and Western teased the hopeful heart of the Director by mentioning once again that the south side of the east sill may be in better shape than previously expected. (Wow, that feels like déjà vu – I have the feeling that I have written a sentence like that before - about structural elements being in better shape than previously thought.) Work in the north parlor is still continuing. The mason has mortared some of the nogging back in place. Once the nogging work is finished, and The Hammer gets some lath nails he is waiting on, he will be able to finish the work on the interior wall in the north parlor.

As exciting as inspecting work in the bitter cold can be, the group then got in their warm vehicles and took a trip to Western’s workshop where the window restoration work is being done. The Director and the Curator met the Window Fellows who are carrying out the restoration work on our windows. We know that the basement windows of the house are in pretty terrible shape due to dry rot, and it is questionable as to whether or not it is advisable to try and restore them. A decision must be made whether to restore them or not. If the decision is to not restore but build new ones it might seem obvious that we would restore them to be as authentic as possible – basically new exact copies of the original. While that is the obvious option there is still another option which we have to take into account when making this decision. The option behind door number 2 is to document and retain the existing window and construct a window that is authentic in the elements that will actually be exposed – but is not operable and thus has no pockets (which would not be visible once the window was installed).

It wasn’t all blissful heat and thawing out of the extremities for The Director and the Curator. They were faced with some tough questions concerning the exterior window hardware. You tell me if you could answer, on the spot, what color to make the hinge attached to the shutter, the hinge attached to the window frame and the shutter dogs. Not so easy is it? But like true Jeopardy champions, the Director and the Curator were able to pull it off under pressure and answer in the form of a question - What are three examples of the type of detail one must consider during a window restoration project? This is not an easy question to answer. First of all, the Director and the Curator were actually aware of this question as it was emailed to them a couple of weeks ago and they had been discussing it for some time, so I guess that although that makes them Jeopardy Cheaters, it also makes them responsible museum staff. Ideally a paint analysis would be undertaken to verify the historically accurate paint color; however the cost of the paint analysis is prohibitive for the museum at this point. The Curator and the Director had to decide on a different course that would be a responsible alternative. The Window Fellows verified that the existing paint on the hardware was stable enough to prevent the destruction of the original fabric of the hardware, thus preserving the historical evidence for future paint analysis. In the meantime, the hardware would retain its current colors. The hinge attached to the shutter will remain the same color as the shutter, the hinge attached to the window frame will remain the same color as the frame and the shutter dogs will remain black.

Original windows from Cherry Hill awaiting work.

Pieces of original framingfrom some of the museum's windows.

Example of restored shutter

Box o' hinges - parts of window hinges

Piece of sash lock with model no. stamped in it.

Other side of sash lock.

That is a brief summary of the meeting that took place last Wednesday. Oh I forgot, Western has provided us with some new benchmarks. (I stopped listening to the Director after I heard the word February.) I don’t much care about benchmarks anymore, I just want to stay warm while at work – and judging from the smell of burning rubber wafting from the location of my sneakers laying on the electric heater, I just might get that fire I was hoping for.

Sneakerss roasting on an open fire caused by an electric heater, jack frost nipping at my finger tips, nose, toes, ears....

Twas the Nightmare Before Christmas

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 17:51:00 +0000

The view from the meeting room at the architecture firm we employ is pretty cool. I know this because a) I attended a meeting at said architecture firm last Thursday in said meeting room, and b) I spent a lot of time looking out those windows during the meeting at said architecture firm in said meeting room. In fact, not just the meeting room is awesome, but the entire firm is exactly what I thought an architectural firm should look like – by the way, I never knew I had preconceived notions about what an architectural firm should look like either.

Perhaps my focus was on the view out of the windows all around me, because the conversation taking place within the meeting room at times was beyond my limited understanding of grant administration. In my last entry I may have mentioned that the museum was the recipient of a $300,000 EPF grant (Ignore the sound of a horn tooting, it’s just me).

**Warning – some background information on EPFs coming up, you may need a sip of coffee or other caffeinated beverage before you continue reading**

An EPF grant is a grant from the Environmental Protection Fund. Makes sense right? That a historic site would receive an Environmental Protection Fund grant. Of course it doesn’t. Not unless you know that there is a Historic Preservation Category for the Environmental Protection Fund. As the fund apparently is its very own entity, unrelated to any state agency, the grants are administered by the appropriate agency for relating to the category of the fund. In our case, since we received an EPF grant in the Historic Preservation Category, our grant is administered by the NYS Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (herein referred to as Parks).

The Director called a meeting with the architects to discuss how the restoration project would proceed especially in light of this unexpected early EPF Christmas gift. After a road trip down the Thruway (by the way - Starbucks has an awesome peppermint hot chocolate available for this holiday season) the Director, the Curator and I arrived at the firm’s office and proceeded upstairs to the pretty cool/awesome meeting room. We were greeted with a plate of pastries, water and coffee – all things guaranteed to put us in a jolly mood. But this Communications Coordinator’s belly stopped shaking like a bowl full of jelly once talk began of 3:1 ratios, managing fees as a portion of grant money, and the rules determining how many EPF grants can be administered at any given time for one project.

Despite feeling a little out of my element, I took my pen in hand and began scribbling down phrases and incomplete sentences as fast as they flew out of the mouths surrounding me. And here I sit, looking at my several pages of scrawl determined to glean some type of knowledge from the chicken scratch I call my (panicked) note-taking.

Clearly note-taking may not be my thing.

The only complete sentence I see in my notes is a question about whether it is reasonable to expect to be able to complete the first two phases of restoration work with the funds we have thus far secured. There is no answer to that question. Instead there is a list of things that must be completed to consider the first two phases well and truly finished: attic and basement insulation, perimeter wall insulation, roof inspection and flashing repairs, drainage on west side of house. Then follows in my notes a helter-skelter of squiggles, arrows and misspelled words as the architects the Director and Curator talked about what those things would entail. For example, discussion was held on how the walls would be insulated – blown in through the cedar shingles on the back of the house where there isn’t nogging blocking the way, or blown in through the interior walls in each stud bay? And then there are my illegible notes about issues of condensation followed by the final word that nothing can be decided until the architects create a thermal model of the wall showing temperature and humidity levels which will help them decide the best course to take concerning insulation for the house.

A decision has to be made regarding when environmental work (heating and humidity control) will be done. Apparently it might be more practical to use a chunk of money for the environmental work to be carried out separate from the EPF money to be used for insulation and roof work. Speaking of roof work, there was conversation about when the initial roof inspection would be carried out. Could that be part of the pre-development work so that the roof inspector could have an estimate for the work before the actual work phase of the roof work begins? (Apparently there are three phases to grant money - pre-development, administration, and actual work). Something to think about. Or if you are me, to write down and then forget about.

Oh and by the way, due to regulations tied to state monies, if the architect’s fees go above a certain monetary amount for a project, then we have to go back to bid for architectural services. There is a real possibility that when we begin the next phase of restoration work we will first have to put the architectural work out to bid – a whole process that will inevitably delay the start of the next phase of work.

Parks usually prefers that when EPF funds are being used, that one EPF grant be used up completely before another EPF grant is administered. Cherry Hill is in the position of having two EPF grants which would mean that we should finish using our first grant before we tap into the funds from our latest $300,000 EPF. The problem with that in this case is that the work we will use both grants to pay for are rather symbiotic in nature. It would make more sense to do the work simultaneously. Because of this, we may have to make a case and present it to Parks.

Confused? Well then you feel like my notes look …and my brain works. So lets move on to things that make a little more sense to me.

I had a chit chat (not over tea and scones) with The Hammer to get caught up to speed on what work he had accomplished over the past two weeks (my children and their nasty stomach bug held me prisoner in my home for a while thus my need for an update). The Hammer said, with minimal pomp and circumstance and by minimal I mean he pulled the ear bud from his iPod out of his ear, something to the effect that the sill and post repairs are done on the north end of the east façade. Now imagine a cartoon character with her eye balls popping out of her head and her tongue rolling out of her mouth to hit the floor. There, you just imagined what I looked like upon hearing the news (and you also know why I didn’t have many dates in high school).

Sill work is finished on the north end of the house?! Posts have been repaired?! That’s a big deal right? I thought so which is why it struck me as odd that The Hammer wasn’t jumping up and down and squealing in delight with me (besides the obvious fact that he isn’t a little school girl). Either he was too cool for school, I was not cool enough or I was missing something.

As usual...I was missing something. Or rather a series of somethings. Namely, yes the sill work and post repairs were finished on the north end but there was still more work to be done before The Hammer could put a fork in this part of the structural work and declare it done.

Accomplished:

• Pressure treated 4x6s had been installed to replace the previous sill.

• White oak was used to repair the exterior posts.

To Be Done:

• Masonry workers have to come and mortar the original nogging back in place, as well as repoint parts of the foundation wall.

• The original lath and plaster have to go back up on the interior wall in the North Parlor.

Once those two things have been accomplished then the structural work on the north end of the house will be finished.

Kind of.

That leaves out the work that still needs to be done on the posts located at either side of the front entrance, as well as the sill currently covered by the remnants of the front porch. That particular bit of work depends on when the front porch will come down. When I asked what factors go into making that decision, The Hammer explained the rather obvious matter of egress from the building. Temporary stairs will need to be put in place. So until that remaining section of porch comes down, no post or sill work can occur in that area.

Once this remaining piece of front porch is removed, The Hammer will be able to evaluate what repairs are needed to the sill and the posts.

Where East Berlin and West Berlin meet (East Berlin being the old sill and West Berlin being the new sill)

The whole south end of the house still needs to be opened up and structural repairs made (as needed, and we’re really hoping the sill is in better shape than expected on that end).

An example of The Hammer's handiwork - he had to label all new wood with the words "New Wood 2010"for future reference.

I got The Hammer’s point – maybe the jumping and squealing is a bit premature. Especially considering the bad news we just got – looks like it’s too cold outside to paint exterior windows. That part of the work will have to be postponed until the spring. Did I mention we’ve been luxuriating in 20-odd degree weather here in Albany the past couple of days? You can imagine how pleasant it is inside the house! And if you can’t, go stand outside and answer the phone or pretend to type on an imaginary computer and you will soon get the picture. (Maybe the fact that I’ve decided to break out the skirts and heels in blithe disregard of the thermometer reading is contributing to the freezing cold feeling I’ve had huddled in my office against my circa 1983 space heater every day of this week.)

Any way you slice it – it’s cold, and while the sill is toasty warm snuggled behind its thermal blanket, we the staff are forced to fight over the chair closest to the furnace in our volunteer room during morning coffee time…the kibosh has been put on all squealing.

While the sill is nestled all snug in its Thermal Blanket bed with visions of sugar plums dancing in its head....

Mama in her kerchief is clearly not settled down for her long winter's nap (although she is wearing several layers of clothes to keep warm while she works).

Love Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 17:43:00 +0000

The honeymoon is officially over. My fairytale romance with the Restoration Project has come to a screeching halt. When my relationship with the Restoration began back in August, like a pre-teen girl with her first crush, I was blinded by my emotions (and by the reflective glare of my braces whenever I happened to pass a mirror). I fooled myself into thinking that the Restoration Project, with its shiny tools and mysterious terminology (C-beams, lally columns, plaster and lath) was some kind of God. It could do no wrong. It was saving the house. Yes siree, I walked along hand in hand with the Restoration Project, convinced that this was true love. Sure I “knew” the path ahead would be bumpy and maybe even a little frustrating but as a well-respected 80s hair band once sang – every rose has its thorn.

Well – our relationship is no longer shiny and new and the bloom has definitely left this rose. We’re at that point that all couples eventually reach - we spend way too much time together and know way too much about each other. What went wrong between us? Did I alienate the Restoration in some way? Make it feel like it wasn’t important enough? How had things gone downhill so quickly? Hurt and self-doubt turned to bitterness and a wistful yearning for yesterdays when I thought the Restoration hung the moon.

Prime example of knowing way too much about each other.

What has sparked this lovers spat? Well, according to the original construction schedule, today was supposed to be the last day of phase one restoration work. Western Building would have been going over the “punch list” making sure everything was done that was supposed to be done. But a funny thing happened on the way to the end date, namely – work was delayed. So now there is a newly updated construction schedule which puts completion of phase one as January 28, 2011 – and somehow, it feels like the Restoration has forgotten a very important anniversary for us and tried to make up for it by presenting me with a bunch of dyed-orange carnations it got for half-off from a Price Chopper trying to get rid of its leftover Halloween themed product. What went wrong?

Luckily The Hammer is a certified Restoration Relationship Counselor and he was able to sit down with me (actually, we stood up on scaffolding) and he talked me through some of the underlying issues that were ruining my relationship with the Restoration. First of all he explained that this was just typical Restoration behavior and it was something I had to accept as a natural part of the Restoration. That was a huge step. I already knew about the delay with the search for the white oak and I was able to come to terms with that fact and stop blaming the Restoration for it. Once I learned to accept these things and then move on, I found it easy to listen (and really hear) the rest of what Counselor Hammer had to say.

It turns out the north sill of the east façade is in worse shape than was originally thought. This sill was replaced, probably sometime in the 1980s. It’s not so much that the wood itself is compromised, but more that the way the wood sill was installed was problematic. The sections were shorter than they should have been, and end sections were not lined up to meet each other. Also, there was little done in the way of leveling off the area where the sill was to rest. The end result is, that the northeast corner post is actually floating in air as the sill upon which it is supposed to rest is instead busy curving down trying to reach the stone foundation upon which it is supposed to rest. Counselor Hammer showed me that it wasn’t right to blame the Restoration for something that happened way before we ever got together. A lot of bad things came out of the 80s and I had to understand that this was just another one of those things.

The black arrows in the above picture point to the exposed north sill in the east facade of the house (the layers of wood just above the stone foundation).

The space between the top of sill (the five layer of wood you see in the picture) and the bottom of the northeast corner post is a problem - namely there should be no space there.

Example of where the end pieces of the wood, which makes up the original north sill, do not meet.

Western will be correcting the problems that are currently affecting the sill and then they will turn their eyes and hammers to the south end of the east façade and begin the project all over again. The good news is that the architectural firm that we employ and Western both feel that the south sill may be in better shape than was anticipated and therefore it may not be necessary to replace the entire sill.

I was never one who put much stock in couples therapy but having gone through the restoration counseling that we did, I can now honestly say that it really works. After reaching a place in our relationship where I could accept the Restoration’s honesty without blaming it, my newfound understanding was put to the test. In addition to the sill replacement that was necessary, the wood frame for the basement windows on the north end need to be replaced as well. The wood frames have fallen victim to dry rot. In the past I would have been very upset and blamed the Restoration for not predicting this, but in my new place of light and love I am able to listen to the Restoration’s explanation, and then…accept it.

Earlier photo of the two basement windows.

Dry rot has deteriorated the wood above the window.

In case you missed it the first time - another photo of the rotted wood above one of the basement windows.

Yesterday, the Director received a letter notifying the museum that we have been reserved a matching grant of $300,000 from the Environmental Protection Fund (EPF) “for the restoration project.” It was like the Restoration wrote me a love letter and gave me a gift that is more precious than roses, or candy, or jewelry – it gave me the promise of cold hard cash.

Coming from this place of light and love, I will cherish the time I have left with phase one of the Restoration and not count down the days until January 28th. After reaching this new level of understanding and renewed commitment to the Restoration, I have closed the chapter on the Glenn Close side of me that was sharpening my knives and boiling my water in anger. I just hope that as the end date draws closer, after a couple of months spent greasing myself with animal fat in a desperate attempt to retain body heat as the cold weather begins in earnest, that my love for the Restoration doesn’t morph back in to Fatal Attraction-I’ll-cook-your-rabbit-in-a-pot anger again. No relationship can survive rabbit stew…or greasy animal fat.

The Mystery of the White Oak

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 13:56:00 +0000

The guys are still working inside. Even though the Noah’s ark-like deluge we suffered the past couple of weeks is over. So I said to myself, says I, what are a couple of big, tough restoration workers doing inside during these last sunny, pleasant days of fall? Why aren’t they taking advantage of the “warm” weather and working like crazy outside? The anticipated completion date for this phase and a half of the restoration work is sometime in November. I smelled a mystery…well, it was either a mystery or the forgotten tuna salad sandwich I found shoved into the bottom of my bag. Either way – something smelled fishy. I did what any curious Communications Coordinator would do-- picked up my magnifying glass, dusted off my copy of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and went straight to the Director to get the answer to my question.

The following is a dramatized version of the conversation that ensued:

CC - “Why aren’t the guys working outside?”

D - “They’re waiting on lumber.”

CC - “Oh.”

D - “They need wood with a certain moisture content.”

CC - “What exactly does that mean?”

D - Silence

CC – Silence

D – More Silence

CC – Throat clearing.

D – “Oh are you still there?”

CC – “Yes.”

D – “That’s a good question for our architects. Why don’t you email them with it?”

Clearly the Director wasn’t talking. There was obviously more to this mystery than she was willing (or able) to fill me in on. It became painfully obvious to me that I needed to (actually) do some work. So I composed an email and sent it off to the Preservation Assistant at Tilly Architects, I’ll call her Agent L (L stands for Laura, I’ve mentioned her once before in the blog – I can’t believe I just told you that! It’s because I am the Communications Coordinator, and I just feel a need to communicate information all the time. Curse this gift of gab!). I sent her a deceptively innocent email, basically asking what moisture content was and why it was an important factor for the type of lumber used in our restoration. The truth is, I felt I was on to a much bigger plot – a planned sabotage, if you would, of the restoration project. I had a hunch (my mother never made me walk with a stack of books on my head like the other moms did – hence the hunch). I also had a suspicion something more nefarious was afoot at the Hill and I was determined to get to the bottom of it.

Agent L tried to pull the wool over my eyes by giving me some “legitimate” answer to my questions: “To answer your questions, Western is working to locate the specified lumber, White Oak, No. 2 with 19% moisture content. Finding lumber with the right moisture content for restoration projects is extremely important. Wood with too high or too low moisture content can be either too wet or too dry, causing the wood to shrink or swell. Since we are repairing the structural posts and studs and eventually the sill, we want to avoid a large amount of movement (swelling or shrinking) of the wood elements.” Sure it sounded believable and apparently is technically true, but I didn’t buy it. Especially not when I read her next line: “Because the required lumber sizes are big (8.5x8.5, 4x4), finding certified white oak with the necessary moisture content has proven tricky.” Right there! Did you read it? Finding the right kind of wood has proven tricky. My spider senses were tingling, something seemed a little off here…her answer was too smooth, too professional, too factual to take at face value. So I began to look deeper.

Who would benefit by extending the length of time it took to complete the first phase of work and part of the second? Would the architects? Would Western? Then it occurred to me, what if this was an inside job? What if one of our own was behind this scheme? Could it be the Director or the Curator? Maybe they had taken a sudden liking to being at the house by 7am in the morning, maybe they discovered how much more work they accomplished after having seven cups of coffee in a three hour time period instead of their regular four. Or was it the Education Director? She hasn’t made an appearance yet in this blog which is already suspicious. Maybe she was enjoying the break from all of those fourth and fifth grade classes whose yearly pilgrimages to the museum have been suspended due to the restoration work – maybe enjoying it a little too much. That made much more sense. But as I know from having read a mystery tale or two in the past, sometimes the suspect is someone who appears to be above reproach, who seems to have an unassailable, airtight alibi. Who would that be in this case?......

The List of Suspects:

Western - is their absence a sign of guilt?

This question mark symbolizes Agent L and her cohorts at Stephen Tilly, Architect - nameless, faceless - guilty?

Maybe a certain Director has been hitting the mug a little too frequently and thinks a delay in restoration work will fuel her habit?

The classic signs of a coffee junkie are evident in this picture - but does it mean the Curator is guilty?

Perhaps someone doesn't want to interrupt her beauty sleep with real work - is the Education Director the likely culprit?

OMG, it’s me! I’m the sinister, scheming suspect; the dastardly, daring dilettante; the maniacal, menacing….mom.

Public Enemy Number 1

Of course, it all makes sense now. Who would benefit the most if this restoration project was delayed? ME!! Because I am the blogger. I’m the one basking in the adoration of my readers, I’m the one with all of the fame and glory. It’s so simple, and uncomplicated and genius…just….like…me!! How did I not see this before? And what do I do about it now that I know the truth? Stash myself in some tiny little cell as punishment? – oh wait, already in one-- it’s called my office. Put myself at the mercy of some warden? – that position’s filled, she’s called the Director. No, I’ll just sit at my computer and bide my time – let the rest of the staff, the architects, and Western think all is well, I won’t clue them in to the discovery I made about me. Then when the opportunity presents itself – I’ll flee this little popsicle stand I call Albany, cut the husband and kids loose, and head someplace where nobody will ever find me. Someplace where the sun is always shining…I’m thinking Vegas baby, I’ve always had a hankering for sequins and slot machines.
Nooooo! The Director just received word from Agent L – Hey (Jude) has located some reclaimed white oak just the size we need. The moisture content of this wood is on the low side of what we need, between 7 and 8%, but by wetting the wood, Western will be able to raise the moisture content. The architects will accept anything within a range of 15 to 24%. Drat!! My scheme to delay the restoration has been foiled! So long Vegas dreams, at least until another underhanded plot is conceived and carried out. Hopefully I will be smart enough to catch my next double-cross - as a wise president once said, ‘Fool me once...shame on...shame on you......you fool me, you can't get fooled again.’

A River Runs Through It

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Sat, 02 Oct 2010 15:31:00 +0000

You know what’s no fun? Bulk mailings. Bulk mailings are no fun, as I learned this past week. Especially when you have to mail out 1700 pieces of mail. Maybe some of you out there think that that’s small potatoes, and maybe you’re right. Or maybe you’re being a little judgmental and should take some time to reevaluate how you view the world. All I know is that stuffing 1700 flyers into 1700 envelopes, stamping 1700 envelopes 1700 times with the museum’s permit number, printing out 1700 return address labels, and 1700 address labels, and then putting those 1700 return address labels and 1700 address labels onto the 1700 envelopes, and gluing 1700 envelopes shut and putting 1700 envelopes into zip code order seemed like a lot of work to me. I say seemed because I approached the bulk mailing less as the person who physically was doing the work and more as the person coordinating other people who did the work (including a bunch of volunteers and pretty much all of the staff) - I’m not doing that work by myself, that’s just crazy! But from my vantage point (the floor underneath my desk where I hid so no one could find me) it seemed like a lot of work.

You know what else is a lot of work and absolutely no fun? Cleaning up after Mother Nature. In case any of you have missed the rain that poured down outside your window almost every day this past week, we at Historic Cherry Hill can tell you all about it. We can tell you that restoration workers don’t work outside in the rain. (Talk about a bunch of sissies). Luckily Joe The Hammer was able to spend a day inside measuring the windows, but unsurprisingly not a lot of exterior work can be done in a downpour. We can also tell you the sound water makes when it flows along a needle beam right into the north parlor of the house. It sounds like water coming from a low-running faucet, and it looks like water coming from a low-running faucet, and it leaves a mess behind like water coming from a low-running faucet would when it is running into a historic house and onto the historic wood floors. In case I haven’t been clear enough, earlier this week some rain decided to take a journey following the route provided by a downward-angled needle beam (downward meaning the exterior end of the needle beam was higher than the interior end of the needle beam) right into our north parlor. Now a situation like this is already the stuff of nightmares but what gave this mini-disaster a particularly Wes Craven-Freddy Krueger-Nightmare on Elm Street type of feel was the way in which the running water was discovered –

By the Director…

while conducting….

a special tour…

to a group of graduate students from SUNY’s Public History Program.

They say you can tell a lot about a person by the way they react in a crisis. When the Director discovered during her tour that HCH had its very own Niagara Falls, she tried to pretend that it wasn’t really happening while she continued the tour, and then at her first opportunity she went back to plug up the leak. Interesting approach. Probably better than what mine would have been – acting the part of the little Dutch Boy with my finger in the dam (except instead of using my finger I would have been using my cupped palms to try to catch the water) while I laughed nervously and turned fifteen shades of red.

The Director was able to temporarily stop the influx of rain water into the parlor. Towels and a fan were used to clean up the mess and there was no lasting damage done to the floor. The next day the Director purchased a large amount of plastic sheeting and attempted to temporarily correct the problem on the outside of the house until the project manager from Western, named Jude (I like to call him Hey), arrived to deal with the problem permanently. The permanent solution also involved rerouting the gutter that previously was dumping water right onto the naughty needle beam to instead dump its water in a more appropriate place, namely the ground.

There you have it, straight from the Communications Coordinator’s mouth – bulk mailings and downward-angled needle beams are a lot of work and no, I repeat, no fun.

(And to Big D and The Hammer, in case you guys are reading this, I was totally joking about the whole “sissies” comment. No disrespect meant. Really, please believe me. You guys are very strong, and your nicknames make you sound like a couple of hit men or bald-headed bouncers at a biker bar, or pro-wrestlers, and I just want to make sure you understand that I do NOT think you are sissies. I’m very attached to my knee caps, and I don’t like swimming with amphibians of any kind. Just so we’re clear.)

The river ran through here.

Between the red arrows you may notice a section of the gutter missing which contributed to the amount of water that flowed into the house.

This view better shows the Director's temporary fix until reinforcements could arrive. She may be no Bob the Builder, but she got the job done.

The professionals came and fixed the problem. The shiny metal you see in the picture filled the gap in the gutter. Also notice the absence of the plastic sheeting. A nicer look all around.

This picture may be difficult to view, but if you can look past the chain link fencing in the foreground you will see the bottom of the gutter where, thanks to the shiny metal piece shown in the previous picture, the water can now flow to the ground...instead of into the north parlor.

More of the Same

noreply@blogger.com (Communications Coordinator) — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 17:38:00 +0000

It’s probably not a good sign when I approach Big D and The Hammer for a work update and they scurry for cover. And let me tell you, these guys tower over me and I’m about 5’9” - it’s not easy for them to scurry (and it’s also pretty obvious when they try and hide behind one of the posts of the deck). They probably view my weekly visit as something akin to a root canal – painful. Not only do they have to put up with my vapid smiles and vacant stares, they have to try and explain things to me with crayon drawings because real construction plans are too advanced for my simple eyes. It’s not easy for me either, you can imagine my own feelings of trepidation when I walk out the door of the museum and around the corner to interrupt their work and ask my questions. At least they’re good-natured about it (once it’s clear they can’t escape)…when Big D spied me through the chain link fence Wednesday morning he greeted me with a deadpan “Not you again!” He was joking, I think, although, he didn’t really smile afterwards and he did pantomime hanging himself to The Hammer when he thought I wasn’t looking. Thankfully they didn’t have to explain any new concepts to me this week – it was just more of the same work. They’re still working on shoring up the east façade of the house to conduct their repairs to the exterior posts and studs. I forgot to specify something last week. All of the interior repairs they have completed thus far as well as the shoring and planned exterior repairs they are working on now are on the north side of the east facade at this point. There is still the south side of the east façade to get to, and when they do, they will be starting the process all over again! And there are still those darn windows to restore, all 49 of them. But that’s another tale, for another day.

Oh where, oh where has our little porch gone?

Oh where, oh where can it be?

Oh, there it is, neatly stacked.

These are called lally columns.

The needle beams (shown here perpendicular to the house) are anchored to the lally columns.

Interior view from the north parlor showing where the end of the needle beam pokes into the room.