LITTLE ANTIQUE CAPE, LOST AND FOUND Part 1

THE LITTLE HOUSE THAT COULD

"This house has more miles on it than my 26 year old Saab Convertible!"

These were the words spoken by someone who had just heard the story of this old house for the first time. You will also be dumbfounded by the strange odyssey endured by this tired house, so quaint and charming; that had stood for so many decades by the side of a country road, with its big chimney in the middle until so-called progress intervened.  The incredible journey of the house goes like this.

Tiny antique cape that formerly stood on a large lot of
land at 107 Tenney Street in Georgetown, way out in the country.

In the 1970's and into the 1980s an old man lived with his dog in the little house according to a friend who lived nearby.  She used to stop to talk to the old man but was never inside his house.

By 1985, the owner, assumed not to be the old man, no longer wanted it and the house had to go.  Enter Mark Phillips.

Mark Phillips was a fire fighter in West Peabody but with plenty of time off and with a passion for old building materials he roamed the countryside looking for run down, empty houses where he could get salvage rights to the old material.

Mark discovered the old house on Tenney St. in Georgetown, MA and obtained the rights to the house only, not the land.  I'm not sure how long Mark Phillips tried to sell the entire house himself but eventually he listed the house with me, a Realtor, in nearby Ipswich who specialized in selling historical or antique houses.  This all happened in 1985 so the details are a little fuzzy after more than thirty years.

This ad for the old house must have appeared
somewhere but I don't know where.  Perhaps
it was in the Maine Antique Digest.

The house was shabby but had some integrity as an antique with a large center chimney and three fireplaces, one of which was a fairly large cooking fireplace with a bake oven.  It appeared to have all of its original pieces and parts but in a sad condition.  From one of the photos it appears to have had a small building behind it that looks like a "ten footer". It had already been torn down by the time I got there. 

Ten by ten (or similar) shoe shops dotted this neighborhood in the Georgetown and surrounding area where people in outlying neighborhoods supplemented their incomes by working on shoes for the Lynn shoe industry especially in the winter.  In fact, my friend who lived around the corner had a ten footer in her yard which was taken and saved by the local historical society.  By the time I saw the house there were no outbuildings remaining.  They had already been demolished.

(If you love old building take a look at these ten footers that dotted the landscape in Essex County, Massachusetts.) 
  
http://primaryresearch.org/ten-footer-shoe-shops-of-essex-county/

So the salvage man advertised the house with no results before he listed it with me.  It was just prior to the summer of 1985.

I was known for being the broker more interested in saving old houses than looking for the big commissions so I took the listing for this house.  I don't remember the price but it was well under $10,000.  I certainly didn't list it in anticipation of a big pay day.

When buyer brokerage first came into New England a broker in my office said, "Pru doesn't work for the buyer or the seller.  She works for the house."  I guess there was a kernel of truth in that because I sold the oldest, the shabbiest and most interesting houses finding satisfaction researching their history, giving them an identity and in locating a buyer who would breath life back into these old wrecks.  

Along came Peter Kenyon from Gloucester.  He had a house lot in a beautiful spot in the Annisquam section of Gloucester on which he dreamed of re-erecting the old cape.  He would spend the summer dismantling the house with the help of his family especially his school aged sons.

The sale took place and the Kenyons proceeded with the task of taking down the house. with a deadline of August 30th to have the house removed.  It was a family project.

The Bill of Sale for the house in lieu of a Deed because there was no
land involved in the transaction.  It became personal property.

Because they were buying just the house with no land it required a Bill of Sale for personal property rather than a deed.  It was legally the Kenyon's house now and had to be removed by them.

They worked diligently on the project carefully identifying and numbering each and every piece of the house which they removed.  I have no memory of where they stored the pieces and parts of the house but the following photos will give a idea of what went on and how they identified the pieces of  the house with their floor plan to assist when it was re-erected.

Peter Kenyon working on the house.

From time to time I would swing by in my travels to see how the work was progressing.  On some of these visits I dug up old peonies and Solomon's Seal that were growing in the yard, evidence of better days when someone cared about the house.  I still have those perennials.

The job was completed and I didn't hear anything for perhaps a couple of years.  That is when I learned that the Gloucester building inspector refused to give the Kenyons  a building permit for building a house with old material.  They were shot down!  They had a lovely lot and a quaint house but the dream of the antique house on this piece of land was never to be.

The Kenyons did what was about the only thing they could do.  They built a new post and beam cape on the lot.  It had a central chimney and 9 over 6 windows.  It was also much larger than the antique cape but not what they had planned.

They gave me a tour of the new house and there in the new basement, high, dry and safe were the pieces and parts of the old cape.  That was the last time I ever saw the house.

They later told me that they planned to take it to Maine where they could rebuild it without facing the problems they faced in Gloucester.

Plan of the antique cape formerly at 107 Tenney St., Georgetown, MA. You can see the labels on every piece to correspond
with the labeling on the actual piece so that the house could easily be put back up with every piece accounted for.

Near the entrance door you can see the debris fromoutbuildings that were demolished and not saved.
It looks as though a ten footer shoe or cordwainer's shop was lost in the demolition. 
(I just noticed the old knife box on the right, or is it a box for carpenter's tools?)

Here is a view of one of the front rooms after it was stripped or as we usually say, "gutted".

This mess is, I believe, the kitchen cooking fireplace with evidence of a bake over on the right.

A year or so ago I joined a private Facebook group called Colonial Home Owners.  Many people post stories about working on their own antique houses, seeking advice or calling attention to great houses for sale.  

Recently a member of Colonial Home Owners from Maine submitted information about part of her old house reconstructed from an old cape from Georgetown, MA.  I quickly contacted her saying that I thought it probably was the house I had sold thirty two years ago.  She was doubtful that it was the same house but would search for the photos and documents she had saved.

After she located her old saved photos and documents there was no question.  It was the little cape taken down in Georgetown so many years ago.

A sheathed partition interior wall separating rooms.

This view, probably the old parlor shows that it had
wainscoting  in addition to a wide mop board.

Continuing this strange odyssey of the traveling house, it turns out that the Kenyons had packed the pieces of the house in an empty school bus and drove the house to Northport, Maine. Here Peter Kenyon began de-nailing and cataloging the house until suddenly interrupted when Ann Kenyon developed health problems.  The project was abandoned.

From wherever it was at that point it was now moved to a barn in Falmouth, Maine where it remained until seen by our Colonial Home Owners member, Cheryl Wilson Callahan.  Why did it need to be rescued right at that time?  Believe it or not it was in danger of being taken to Ohio.

Another bizarre twist to the story of the house is how  Cheryl, the present owner discovered it?  Are you ready for this?  It was listed on Craig's List, of all places, under "Salvage!"  and purchased from a middle man named Tom Farmer.

Thanks to the present owners the poor old thing was spared the insult of being uprooted to the mid West and has remained on New England soil where it belongs!

Now you know why another Colonial Home Owners member was moved to say,  "This little house has more miles on it than my 26 year old Saab Convertible!"   

To which I responded, "No kidding!"  Who else can say their house was salvage on Craig's List?

Like the "The Little Engine That Could" if these walls could talk they would be saying, "I think I can.  I think I can."

The story of the house now moves on to the final chapter in the hands of its new owners.




I hope, with the help of the present owner, I will be able to post again perhaps with photos and a story or two from the owners that rescued it.  Here is what Cheryl, the owner, said about the house,
"Unfortunately some parts were gone so it was not practical to put it back in its entirety... but it is still loved today!"

To be continued as a new post or a post script!

Thanks for reading,

Pru