We have a circa 1900 money pit, I mean house. Well, the tax form says it was built in 1900 but a local historian says they've seen other records indicating it goes back to the 1860s.
When the house was first electrified, it was with knob and tube, and some of it was still in use when we purchased the house in 2010. What I did not know about knob and tube, or at least the way the original installer installed it in our case, was that the neutral return was often daisy chained for all circuits and the hot wire was home to the fuse box for each circuit. When we bought the house, the fuse box had been replaced with a circuit breaker panel and maybe three or four circuits remained on the knob and tube.
Before I got too deep into rewiring, I was just changing some switches and outlets here and there. I would switch off the circuit I was working on but would sometimes still get shocked by the return, because it was carrying return voltage from another circuit. You would think I would have learned my lesson and started switching the main off when I was working on anything. Another time I was slithering on my back under the house (crawlspace) and crossed over a hot exposed wire that was just lying in the sand. That one hurt like a MF, as I was in contact for a couple of seconds with a sweaty back before I could slither off of the wire. I think I was lucky that it was a small gauge wire and there was enough insulation on the wire to limit the surface area.
Now I always turn off the main if I'm near any of that stuff.
We've found old newspapers that were discussing JFK's assassination used as insulation in one of the later additions, and some old large format negatives that somehow ended up under the house. We also had an old dresser in the attic with a stuck drawers that we never really messed with. When we decided to try and open it last year we found about 10 VHS tape cases from 1980s adult films.
Some of the neater things uncovered at the hints you get of the history of what the house may have looked like in the past. We found evidence that two of the rooms had been a carport or porch at some point in their history. We found remnants of an old roof between the drop ceiling of a downstairs room and the room above it. We found evidence of an old stairway that we believe was part of the original house when it was just the center section.
Here is a shot of the house. We think the center section, minus the front porch and the giant columns was the original house. Just a big box with a gable roof. We think the kitchen, which is tucked in behind the little porch you see sticking out on the far left and would have stuck out from the "big box" was part of the original house as well, as there is a fireplace that used to be big enough to cook a cow in that has been bricked-in to insert size. The rest of the right side was added next, followed by the first section on the left (which we think was a carport) then the actual garage further to the left and the second floor above first section on the left (where the JFK papers were found). Somewhere among these additions they added the big columns and made an addition to the back as well. You can the order somewhat by the type of lumber. All the original stuff is rough sawn true dimension or oversized old growth pine that can catch on fire it you try to drill through it too fast. Later is S4S true dimension lumber, and later you start seeing smaller than true dimension lumber.
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