unusual ornamental fret-sawn sill course salvaged from a chicago commercial building shortly before demolition

for years i would drive to work along grand avenue, and i always paid special attention to a heavily modified commercial building, which contained a remarkably intact fret-sawn ornamental pine wood sill or belt course panel that likely would have fallen to pieces if it weren't covered over sometime in the 1950's.

judging from the 19th century characteristics found at the storefront's street level, the building was likely two or possibly three stories in height when constructed between the 1870's or early 1880's. the extensive remuddling clearly and effectively destroyed or deformed the building's identity. at least they refrained from removing the exterior fret-sawn wood work (a rarity in present day chicago buildings of this era), and instead simply covered it with aluminum sheathing (if i recall correctly). thankfully, concealing the sillcourse protected it from the outdoor elements and thus prevented further deterioration, making it salvageable at the point when the building would be altered again or demolished outright.

a demolition permit was issued for this building and the ones surrounding it, but that notification did not land on my radar as i was in the midst of a highly anticipated vacation -- resting my body and mind from the continuous bombardment of one salvage or excavation after another. however, when i traveled down grand avenue shortly after returning to work, i noticed a green fence surrounding the buildings. although the excavator or backhoe wasn't onsite, i knew that the building's fate was sealed. it was now just a waiting game.

in the following weeks i closely monitored the building. i noticed the power lines were cut and the gas was shut off. then the excavator arrived. the very next day the machine had already pulled down the "coach house," garage (which according to an 1886 sanborn insurance map was formerly a stable), the wood framed house on the adjoining lot, and the residential section of the brick storefront. in other words, only a small portion of the building that interested me remained standing.

after taking it all in, i called the shop to inform my staff i would be running late. i pulled over and managed to get on the jobsite where i worked out a deal to salvage the woodwork. within 30 minutes the facade was down, but in the process the wrecker managed to pluck the entire sill course from its resting spot and carefully swing it around and off to the side for me to deconstruct as i saw fit.

on the ground, it was gargantuan in size. i chose to take a single section or "system", complete with all the ornament intact for the purpose of configuration and scale. the brackets and raised molding and/or applique were then carefully and painstaking removed since the wood was incredibly weathered, dry and delicate.

shortly after, the remainder of the building was brought down.  i was lucky enough to not only document the demolition of the facade in a sequential manner (see above), but catch a glimpse at the sill plates used in each of the four structures. interestingly, they were a combination of wood-framing and masonry. based on my observations of the materials and methodologies, the earliest structures may very well date to the 1860's - possibly residential transplants brought across the river from the downtown district as it quickly expelled or replaced most of the cottages with more and more brick commercial buildings.

perhaps i will glean further insight into date of construction when the lot these structures resided on is excavated.

to be continued...

update as of 11/10/2015:

any and all of the structures on the lots were demolished last week, but partial excavation of the basements below the house and storefront facing the street was done in order to clear the majority of existing wreckage debris. work will resume when permits are issued for a complete excavation of the lots. in the meantime, i managed to find time to drop by and document the foundation walls and so on. while doing so, i stumbled across bottles, bones, pottery and flint glass fabricated between the early 1860's through the late 1870's. remarkably, no digging was necessary since these artifacts were found fully exposed on the basement floor when a nearby wall collapsed.

since one of my primary digging interests pertains to early william hutchinson bottles, i was pleased to discover a quart-sized "black glass" ale bottle free from damage. the other "w.h.h." bottle i found resting nearby was a paneled or "mugbase" blob top soda bottle fabricated by the mccully glassworks, pittsburgh, pa. despite the latter being heavily damaged, it was still nice to find two of these bottles in close proximity. after i finished documenting the site, i brought back some of the finds to clean and photograph in the studio. i'm hoping that the excavation will yield several more bottles and/or artifacts left behind by the occupants of these non-extant buildings.