If you follow this blog, you'll know that on Monday evening the Lucas County Historical Society accepted a check for $6,000 from the South Central Iowa Community Foundation that was designated to pay half the cost of reroofing the Stephens House, centerpiece of our seven-building campus (thank you --- very much --- again).
On Tuesday, a huge dumpster was deposited on the north drive; and on Wednesday, a crew arrived to do the job --- or at least most of it. These guys move fast.
It would have been bitterly cold up there on the roof --- I'm glad they were doing the work and I was either sitting in the office watching or walking around the house to take these photos.
Actually, the project began last fall when we solicited bids for the roof, then moved ahead a week or so ago when SCICF informed us that our grant had been awarded. The board accepted a bid last Tuesday. A week later --- a new roof completed well before we open for the season on May 1.
Now --- if the concrete contractor will just get here so that new ramps leading into Otterbein Church and the east barn door, as well as replacements for deteriorated sidewalks connecting church and school, can be completed before 100 or more second-graders descend on us May 8.
Stephens House, built during 1911 by contractor Andrew Jackson Stephens for his family on what then was a bare hill in west Chariton, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places in part because of the relatively uncommon materials from which it is constructed --- a mixture of rusticated concrete block and brick of an identical shade.
Inside it's a fairly conventional plan of the period --- entrance hall, double parlors, dining room, kitchen, pantry and back hall downstairs; five bedrooms, a generous dressing room and a bath up. Lovely woodwork and all largely intact. And now it has a new roof, too.
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