mobile icon
Toggle Nav
My Cart
Close
  • Menu
  • Setting

demolition of heavily modified 1885 chicago brick worker's cottage well underway

late in the afternoon we arrived at the site of a chicago worker's brick cottage constructed in 1885. the exterior had been substantially altered or remodeled over its lifespan, so there wasn't much to salvage in terms of architectural artifacts - both in terms of the interior and exterior.

however, the building materials and methodologies were of great interest to me, as i continue to populate my photographic database, containing a vast array of images pertaining to "raw" building materials used in chicago residential and commercial structures constructed during 1850-1880. prior posts have touched upon this subject time and again.

the gabled roof "shotgun style" brick cottage had been mostly been reduced to a pile of rubble with the exception of two structural or exterior brick walls supporting gargantuan solid douglas fir notched wood sill plates. the exposed framing consisted of several closely spaced horizontal white pine wood floor joists held together by mortise and tenon joints, with the sill plates containing the notches that supported the tenons found on each end of the joists (see images below). the four surrounding sill plates were interlocked in a similar fashion, only on much larger scale. square or "cut" nails were used for added reinforcement.

in addition to retrieving samples and/or sections of the sill plates and joists, we managed to find a few studs that had not been terribly mangled for documenting wood type, dimensions and saw markings. wide pine wood plank tongue-and-groove flooring was also recovered from the pile. upon closer examination, it appears that the flooring was originally treated with a faux wood grain finish that was later covered over at some point with orange paint (see gallery below).

finally, an open cavity within one of the intact walls contained a blue-aqua "blobtop" hutchinson type soda bottle left by one of the brick layers when the house was being constructed. remnants of mortar were attached to the bottle's shoulder (since removed) and against the stopper found within the bottle. the mouth-blown molded bottle is consistent with the age of the house.

our wrecker was kind enough to pull a few of the buried artifacts from the pile and then transport any additional collected materials directly into the bed of our work truck with the use of his bucket. from there, we left the site and headed back to the shop where i then prepared the recovered artifacts for the photo shoot later this evening. a sampling of images from the shoot are found in the gallery below.

 



Some Of Our Clientele

WORDLWIDE SHIPPING

If required, please contact an Urban Remains sales associate.

NEW PRODUCTS DAILY

Check back daily as we are constantly adding new products.

PREMIUM SUPPORT

We're here to help answer any question. Contact us anytime!

SALES & PROMOTIONS

Join our newsletter to get the latest information

Close