This Old House

The House had Great Bones!

It was built in the early nineteen-thirty's, around the time when Depression swept the country. Yet Ada, with its oil boom, was on a happier note. 
The original owner was an attorney, possibly dealt with oil people. May be he was in oil business himself? The quality of the building materials was superb.
Mr. Chambers and his mother lived in this big house for a number of years. The house was later sold to a young couple with several children. Their marriage did not last. The couple divorced, and the house was rented for a while. It was vacant when we bought it.

After we scrubbed down the layers of dirt and grim, we discovered gleaming sweet-gum wood-paneling, crystal chandeliers, wrought iron andirons, and much more.

The house had been rented to a family with five children and a monkey. Ugh!
We found toys and dried up fruits in the vents, marbles and rubber balls in the chandeliers, unknown objects in hidden corners . . .
One of the upstairs bedroom window panes were painted Black. It took me many hours to remove the dried-up paint.

Neither S.C. nor I were handy, but we could at least clean and paint. 
He did try to be a plumber. 
I thought he was going to drive the hardware salesman crazy with his endless questions of What To Do With What? He made many, many trips to the hardware store. It was a good thing that the store was only minutes away from our house.

His philosophy was that the average plumber did not have as much intelligence as a scientist. He had a Master's degree in Science. Therefore, he should be able to do what the plumber could do. He forgot the factors, "training" and "experience." Somehow, he did manage to do some minor plumbing work. 
But he certainly was no carpenter.

My philosophy was, I do what I can, let the experts do what they can!

I could paint - painting the walls, I mean. So I did paint most of the walls. He did some painting, reluctantly - painting walls was not his thing. He probably was thinking that he could have spent those hours hunting or fishing.

And, Thank Goodness, we had enough sense not to paint over the wonderful Sweet-Gum Wood!

The Living-room had a high vaulted ceiling with sweat-gum beams and an impressive wood-burning fireplace. The dining-room had an interesting tray-ceiling. 

There were not any huge closets as those we have now-a-days, but there were quite a number of good-sized cedar-lined closets, and a large attic.

However, whoever had chosen the tiles in the bathroom, failed the aesthetic test. The fixtures were of excellent quality. There were a separate tub and a shower. Must be something in those days!
But the COLORS! - Fuchsia Pink and Turquoise. 

What were they thinking?

Was that really the Fashion?

Nothing could tone down the Shouting colors any!
I tried everything!
The best I could do was to hang some little white curtains at the window, and use white towels. 
We try not to let the colors blind us when we were in the bathroom.

The kitchen was adequate, if you didn't mind olive green appliances.

The furniture which we brought to the U.S. from HK with us in 1959, and some we bought on my trip back to HK in 1966 (mostly teakwood and rosewood with Chinese design and silk cushions) looked at home in the house. 
Our visitors would ask if we bought all new furniture. We said, "Oh, no. We have had them for a while."

We put up the many Chinese Scrolls (Chinese brush paintings that belonged to S.C.'s grandfather) on the walls. I did a large oil painting of Peonies for the space over the mantel in the living room. 

The girls had the large upstairs to themselves, with their own bath.

S.C. had a place for all his Toys in the basement! There was even a place for him to clean his fish in the utility room.

We were Home!