Wednesday, April 24, 2024

April 16 - The Campfire Trail - House Building Legacy Update

April 16, 2024

Day 928 of the Adventure

A couple days ago I was on a rant about how so few people seem to have the confidence or the ambition to take on the project of building their own home. I grew up living in a couple of houses that my dad had built. I was even old enough at about 13 to help with the last one he built. The first house my dad built was very similar in appearance to the one pictured on this page. It was before I was born and, like many people now, he had his struggles with establishing home ownership. I spoke with him this week to get the story of how he got started. Not having any savings to speak of, he sold some livestock that he had been raising in a small farming operation. This provided funds to purchase a lot in town and at least get that part of the project taken care of. To save money on building materials, he traveled from central Iowa to northern Minnesota when one of his brothers lived for the lumber. The two of them arranged to cut spruce trees and get them milled into dimension lumber for construction. upon compiling building materials, he still came up a little short financially. He approached the bank the family had been doing business with their entire lives. The bank refused a small loan to provide the remaining funds needed to do the project. They declared that if he wanted to build in the same town as the bank, it would be fine. Having bought a lot in the next town over, the deal was dead. Dad approached a bank in the town where he the owned the lot, and they were happy to oblige. The house was built, likely with the help of friends, and the legacy was set. 

All of the homes dad built were modest in size and simple in design. I think mom had a lot to do with that. She always wanted something that was easy to understand and maintain. This resulted in a product that was also not complicated to build. Dad had never built a house until the first one. After building two and renovating one, he actually took up home building for a couple of years as a trade. That occurred when I was about 11 years old and ended a couple years later. During that time, I learned to swing a hammer, measure boards and run a Skilsaw. Not much more than that. Those basic skills provided a very small foundation that I had no interest in at the time. Over the coming years, I added to that knowledge in shop class, helping dad build the final, family home, and eventually taking on home repair and renovation jobs of my own. I never had the opportunity to build my own home but ended up renovating somewhere near fifty of them during my adult life. 

A couple of our treehouse cabins ended up being my first "Start to Finish" building from scratch projects. Our cabin in the woods became our first building project that we've lived in full time. There's still one house left in me I believe and at 63, I'll still have the fire inside to tackle that one. House-building has seemingly become another one of those skills that the general public feels that's "Better left to the Professionals".  I'm afraid that I will always disagree with that. My stand will always be, if it makes the difference between building and owning vs wishing and hoping, rolling up the sleeves, gaining some skills and getting dirty should always triumph!

Carry On

Adventure Quote:  "When in doubt, just figure it out!" ~ Martin Teig

Base Camp Coffee of the Day: Highlander Grogg - Butterscotch/Rum flavors

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