Sept. 7 – Storage area removed.  The storage area beneath the rear porch was not original to the house.  By removing it, the beauty of the stone foundation is newly revealed and the natural symmetry of the house is restored.  Structural support work and new masonry will follow to improve safety and historic integrity.

Sept. 8 – Driveway oilstone applied.   The blacktop driveway, which was installed in July, required time to cure.  One month later, oil was applied to the surface of the blacktop to provide adhesion for the thick layer of crushed, native fieldstone that was rolled onto it next.  The result is a driveway that has the durability of asphalt but conveys the more aesthetically pleasing, vintage look of gravel.

Sept. 8 – Stone retaining wall built. A non-original, stone landing was removed and reconfigured into a stone retaining wall to better manage a steep grade near the house’s rear, southeast corner. The non-original staircase, which once led from the rear porch to that landing, will be redesigned and installed later.
 

Sept. 10 – Gutter installation begins.  The historic photo of Emily standing on her front porch clearly showed that the house originally had copper gutters.  The poorly performing aluminum gutters were replaced with copper to replicate the originals as they appeared in that photo.  Additionally, a new drainage system was designed to disperse rainwater.  
 

Sept. 11 – Kitchen pantry re-do & clapboard flashing installation.  General Contractor, Bill Dohme of Westport, applies his carpentry skills both inside and out.  The left photo shows a tiny pantry located off the kitchen being rehabilitated.  The right photo shows Bill installing a protective flashing over the sill on the front elevation.  Damaged clapboards had been removed and will be replaced with new cedar siding.

Sept. 15 – Shutters installed.  Though shutters had long been absent from the exterior, the existence of old pintels (left photo) proved that they had once hung on either side of the lowermost, front windows.  HeadHouse Square (of Spring City, PA) kindly donated finely crafted, custom-made shutters and hardware to the project.  Since the look of the original shutters was unknown, the design was based on the style of the house’s existing, original front door.

Sept. 18 – The four-column entryway restored.  Decades ago, two of the four original, tapered, wooden columns were removed from the front entrance (reason unknown).  To restore the classically inspired look of the original entrance, two new columns were handcrafted using the two remaining originals.  In the left photo, the two columns on the right are the originals and the two on the left are the reproductions.  The photo on the right shows all four columns, two old and two new, installed in their original locations.  This paired-column entrance is one of the McLaury House’s defining features.  The door and columns will be painted later.

Late September  – New structural support for rear porch.  In the left photo, framer Carl Sirois of Westport is shown removing former structural reinforcements to implement a new, fully engineered structural system for the porch.  The photo on the right shows his new supportive framework beneath the porch deck and new posts holding up the porch structure.  Earlier, masons had poured new concrete piers for the posts to sit on.  Decorative finish carpentry and additional masonry work will come later.
 

Late September – New mailbox and lamppost installed. No mailbox existed at the house so two members of the McLaury House Committee donated a new, copper mailbox and cedar post. To provide exterior lighting for the driveway and front porch, a beautiful, reproduction copper lamp was purchased. They perfectly complement the house and landscape. The copper will develop a natural, duller patina with time.

Late September – Floor repair. A worker from Double D Wood Floors is shown here using fir boards salvaged from the kitchen floor to repair a section of flooring in the living room. The salvaged boards were carefully knitted into the existing, original floor so that the repair was unnoticeable. A similar process was used in one of the upstairs bedrooms. Next, the floors will be refinished.

Late September – Floor refinishing.  The fir floors throughout the house were in very good structural shape but their finish had long deteriorated or had been painted over.  To restore them, they were first sanded down to the original wood, then stained and finally finished with three coats of polyurethane.  The photo on the left shows the upper hallway during the sanding process.  The gray paint that had once covered the hall floor is still visible on the right side of the photo.  The photo on the right shows the stain color used throughout the house, called English Chestnut.
 

Late September  – Linoleum installed in kitchen and bath. Linoleum was invented in England in 1860 and grew in popularity thereafter with brief setbacks during each world war. Evidence of old linoleum flooring was found in the McLaury House’s kitchen and bath (a checkered tile pattern popular in the 1920s). Today, linoleum is again gaining in popularity because it is a natural, green product that is extremely durable and reasonably priced. The left photo shows workers from Carpet-Right (a Fairfield company) installing Armstrong Holly Green linoleum in the kitchen. The right photo shows the new Armstrong Delft Blue linoleum in the bathroom.