One Thing Leads to Another

I thought we were finished with the kitchen.

I should have known better.

After I painted the breezeway a buttery yellow, the kitchen walls looked dingy. So we are in the process of painting the kitchen to match the breezeway. Sigh!

 Breezeway now.  The walls were dark brown panelling. Lots of cutting in during painting since the room has 5 doors and 2 windows! And a stone floor.

Tracking Hiram Waters

We have been out looking again at the houses Jane Radocchia took us to see earlier this week. One in particular, in North Bennington, looked certainly to have been built by our Hiram since the trim on the outside of the front door and on the corner pilasters looked so much like ours. As we drove by it again, we noticed that the garage door was open and a woman was inside.

Going on the "Nothing Ventured" premise, we stopped and told her of our interest in her house and why we thought it was probably build by "Uncle Hi." She invited us inside and VOILA! The exact trim as in our front room decorated her front room. Our first "discovery".

And the discovery became even more interesting when we learned that the owner is a painter, and a good one, who is involved with the plein air event held each year in North Bennington. Pat's ear's perked up at that news.

The top photo is of one of our windows. Notice the pyramid in the corners and the beveled pieces surrounding the window.  The lower one shows detail of the corner. This looks exactly like the molding in the house in North Bennington. 

Ha! We found the tracks of old Hiram for sure!

For those of you following our progress, I finished the write-up of the changes to our Dining Room. (Click here)

Shining Up the Tarnished Lady

Since we got to Bennington, our most frequent outings have been to Home Depot and Greenberg's Hardware. We have been trying to tame the dark kitchen and wildly wallpapered dining room and living room. See photos at the House Journal page.

By the time Amy Ness arrived driving our Volvo filled with paintings and dishes, we were ready to hang the paintings and fill the china cupboard with the Hadley pottery.

Pat has been working assiduously between rainstorms to improve the gardens around the house, rehoming plants we brought with us from White Wagon and adding sticker-shocking shrubs we've purchased from local nurseries.

We still need to do patching and painting to the exterior, replace the front porch and do something for the backporch area. We just don't know what, yet.

Along the way, we've learned a lot about the builder of the house (Hiram Waters) thanks to Tracy's exploring old diaries and deeds, and the extent of Hiram's skill thanks to Jane Griswold Radocchia, an architect with extensive knowledge of early Bennington. (see Jane's website: JGRArchitect.com )

Hiram Waters (1797 - 1890) in 1888. Take a look at those hands!

The more we look at other period houses, the more we learn about the architectural features of our old lady. And the more we learn about Hiram and his family, the more excited we are about having the opportunity to tend his legacy.

Leaving April, Arriving in March

After ten days of concerted packing of boxes, suitcases, the Pod, we were ready to depart full Spring in Little Rock and journey back in time to the early Spring of Bennington, Vermont.

But first, we had to take care of some business. Our realtor arrived early on departure day, bagels and offer in hand. We signed the acceptance for the sale of one of our river-view lots, gathered up the dogs and their paraphernalia, put in that last pair of shoes, and took to the Interstate System. Do we thank Eisenhower for this opportunity, or curse him?

I-40 to Memphis was not the lowest level of hell. The road construction only slowed us to about 50 mph. At about Jackson, TN, it started raining. And it didn't really stop for two days.

Our first night in Cookeville, TN, contained only a little sleep between crashing thunder and torrential rain. The drive through the last several thousand miles of Tennessee (or maybe it was only 200) was foggy, wet, knuckle-whitening. We cheered when we finally hit the Virginia line, but most of the normally lovely drive between the ranges of the Appalachians and the Blue Ridge, up the truck-heavy I-81, matched the horror of Tennessee.

Finally, weary and rattled from tense driving, we skipped across a few miles of West Virgina and lighted in Hagerstown, MD, where it rained. But Pat's niece, Tiana, was waiting for us at our hotel bearing gifts of coffee, tea, cookies, wine, etc. Dinner with her was a much-needed interlude.

Down to the home-stretch, we stayed on I-81 through Harrisburg, PA, then drove on I-78 east on the pot-hole pocked Pennsylvania stretch until we reached the relative Nirvana of smooth New Jersey roadway. There we swung North on I-787 until the New York Throughway (I-87) carried us to Albany, NY.

A right turn onto NY 7, led us to the Vermont line and VT 9. One more sprint, and we crossed Monument Ave just above our house. Whew! We made it!

During the trip we noticed that we moved in and out of Spring. Here in Bennington, the trees are just beginning to unfurl their leaves and the perennials are just pushing up their heads. We got here just in time!

Pat and Lacy arrive at our house.

First Photos

The house is bigger than it looks from the front. All together, it is about 4000 square feet

From left to right, 2 car garage, main house with 4 bedrooms and 2 full baths, then the "shop" (now rental unit) with 2 bedrooms and 2 baths.

Probably the rental unit is older than the main house, since much of the original main house burned in the 1830s. The rental unit was the carpentry and joinery shop of Hiram Waters. He apparently used it to display some of his talents since the architectural details are much fancier than those on his house.

Below is a closer look at the details of the shop. You can't see it through the storm door, but the old door is split in half. A "Dutch door" some call it, with beautiful early 19th century hardware.

A New Love

It started with an online search site. I know. I have done my share of making fun of all the dating and matchmaking sites. But this was different. As soon as Tracy found the photos, I started to get interested.

I googled and searched for more information then spent hours looking at pictures and dreaming. It was a crazy, heady feeling. And even crazier, Pat felt it, too. Both of us, falling for a house we'd never seen in a town we barely knew.

But that was the beginning of our new adventure with the Hiram Waters House in Bennington, Vermont.

Check out the House Journal tab above for more pictures and information about our new venture.

Ruth Welborne's Blog

Ruth Welborne, of Come Bye fame, has begun her own blog.  Click on her tab above, or visit her at www.hidden-in-plainview.com