UNADULTERATED OLD HOUSE IN SMALL TOWN

OLD ONE CAR GARAGE WITH NO TRESPASSING SIGN

A house in a very small town caught my  eye as I was driving down its main street. I instantly knew I wanted to find out more  about this place. I swung around and stopped in front of the house and noticed a sign attached to the  garage.  Sign said: NO TRESPASSING. Whoa, this stopped me dead in my tracks of going up to the door to introduce myself . I happened over to a nearby house and they told me the house was vacant --  and its owner was a lady in her eighties that was now living in a nursing home. 

FRONT OF THE HOUSE PORCH

With these few facts in hand I decided that I could take photos of the house from the street while searching  for clues about the the owner.

Initially, what attracted me to stop was the vernacular form of the house. But now I saw something else. -- it was the sitting porch standing as it probably stood when the elderly woman lived there. 

So, now I was looking at both the early architecture of the place and the front sitting porch. 


Based on the architecture, I put a date on the house as that of the early 1800s, It had not been restored, only preserved. It was an authentic example of a vernacular Federal/Greek Revival house.

So many questions swirled in my head:

--How long had she lived in the house?

--Was this a family home that had passed through several generations?

--Did she know who built the house or the garage or any of the outbuildings on the property?.

--Was it a large house because large families had lived in it?

Many other questions passed through my mind -- too many to write down here. 

OLD PORCH CHAIRS

Architecture aside, I turned to the sitting porch to seach for clues about the owner. It contained a little bit of interpretive material. 


The woman of eighty plus apparently liked plants as she had several planters sitting on the edge of the porch with remnants of former plants.

. 

She had some old metal chairs that appeared to be there for socializing.

OLD PORCH PLANT STANDS

Some old vintage plant stands stood empty on part of the porch. A chicken figure, that perhaps was a planter, sat on top of one of the stands. 

Together the architecture along with the materials on her porch seemed to tell me that over the years she made do with what she had. The house along with the porch artifacts  remained "as is" over the years.  "As is" meaning no changes. 

As an example of the remaining  "as is"  of the house architecture was the original weather-board siding, a few old outbuildings, old tin roof, original six over six  window panes (also called lights), column pilasters on the porch, and a fan light over the front door. 

My conclusion about the elderly lady was that she liked to socialize, loved plants, and liked things to remain as they were.

SIDE YARD WITH OUTBUILDINGS ON TOWN LOT

The over-all ambiance of the property gives one the ability to glance at a "real" historic setting -- not one that has been adulterated with the clean and sterile look of many museums.  The overall place is in context to its landscape -- a small town in Kentucky.

Its like an archaeological dig -- trying to interpret fragments into a viable story. Humans invariably leave debris when they have lived somewhere for any length of time.  The interpretation may not be entirely accurate but is usually fairly close to reality.

BEAUTIFUL IN AGING

Vernacular Romanesque Revival Arched window with dental molding over door on old bank
Found in Kirksville, Madison County, Kentucky
Unoccupied building with original exterior. 

Old architecture is beautiful in aging. John Ruskin (1819-1900), English art critic and social thinker gave his thoughts to this idea. He thought age was the most important aspect of historic preservation. He had a deep respect for old buildings in general:

"For, indeed, the greatest glory of a building is not in its stones, not in its gold. Its glory is in its Age, and in that deep sense of voicefulness, of stern watching, of mysterious sympathy, nay, even of approval or condemnation, which we feel in walls that have long been washed by the passing waves of humanity."

The photo above is an example of Romanesque Revival (1870-1900) architecture only on a vernacular scale. Ruskin's influence helped popularize this style. 

The above and below photos, of the old small Kirksville  bank building, at one time served the locals but now stands empty. The building borrowed some Romanesque features to dress up a rather plain facade. It stands untouched by restoration.

Restoration is insensitive renovation of historic buildings. Preservation seeks to conserve and protect them. To paraphrase Ruskin's words that advocates preservation, where one can feel . . . in the walls . . . the passing waves of humanity. Only when you preserve not restore will you have beauty in aging. 

Old Kirksville bank with some Romanesque windows and doors that reflect strength. 
Boarded windows and a locked door reflect its emptiness..

OLD SCHOOL -- SMALL TOWN -- COMMUNITY MEMORIES -- RESTORE

FRONT VIEW OF PAINT LICK SCHOOL

FRONT INTERIOR ENTRANCE

WORK SITE

Paint Lick was considered a modern school in 1912 when the original four rooms were built to accommodate grades k-12 in the small town of Paint Lick, Kentucky. Constructed of brick in the latest two story school style it soon became too small, so over the years a few additions were added -- like the gym that was built in two sections. It served the community well over those years – until 1994. 

The high school grades part were moved to the nearby town of Lancaster in 1964. Then a beautiful school was built at the edge of town for the lower grades. The old school that sat in town joined the ranks of many of the old schools across the nation that were closed in the last several decades. 

As they closed,  these lovely old neighborhood schools became deteriorated  eyesores. For others, good fortune rained down on them as they were resurrected into living apartments, office structures, community centers and even turned into private schools. Towns found that restored schools with such uses contributed to the local economies.

LEFT OVERS FROM THE PAST IN OLD ALCOVE

GHOSTLY SCHEDULE OF THE PAST

ORIGINAL WOOD STAIRCASE
1912

In Paint Lick the old school was sold to a private individual and became sort of a flea market for about 12 years. Then a man stepped forward about four years ago -- to buy the school with a vision for studio apartments. He had previous experience in resurrecting a small office building to its former glory in the town of Berea, Kentucky. Jay, not his real name, has fire in his heart for old buildings and feels that we need them to know our roots. He follows all the National Register guidelines in rehabilitating buildings.

SHADOW WEAR MARKS FROM FORMER STUDENTS
ON OLD WOOD STAIRCASE

CLASSROOM  VIEW

I stepped into the old school last Saturday. The interior was in the throes of restoration. It’s a large building that requires slow deliberate work, much of what one cannot see like asbestos abatement.  Many of the old school interior elements were still hanging on. There were school secrets around every corner. Vintage school colors were still apparent on many surfaces. Wood floors, some refinished were eye popping in the multi -windowed classrooms. Histories of footsteps were pronounced on the old wood stair treads. Even one small blackboard still had class notes from long ago.

VINTAGE BLUE COLOR ON DOOR WITH
OLD AND NEW LOCKS

WORK IN PROGRESS

This school wraps up a man’s vision, student memories, town history and possibly in the future a new beginning for the Paint Lick school. 

AFRICAN AMERICAN SLAVE AND EUROPEAN WHITE GRAVEYARD

AFRICAN AMERICAN SLAVE GRAVE SECTION

My son and I made a visit this summer to find a slave graveyard that was reported to be located on a recently developed Civil War Battlefield Park which involves several sites in Madison County, Kentucky.  The site we were headed for was a homestead called the Pleasant View House and Farm. Nothing in its published flyer indicated that there was a slave graveyard on site.

What the flyer did say was that Joseph Barnett built the present house on the property in 1825 and at that time he owed 20 slaves. And, he also owned 578 acres. This information was a good base to help us understand the spatial pattern of the graveyard. So off we went toward a rise on the land, a distance back of the old house, to find the slave graveyard.

The first thing we noticed when we spotted the graveyard was that it was divided into two sections – African American slave on one side and European white pioneer family on the other. 

EUROPEAN WHITE GRAVE SECTION

 It was a small graveyard and according to a sign posted by it, it had been in a deteriorated state for a long time previous to a recent restoration. There were approximately fourteen or so grave-markers on the white side and about six or so on the slave side.


The white side consisted of two types of grave-markers; the ledger type and the head and foot marker type. The African American slave side of the graveyard had two types of grave markers. One being head stone and foot stone type made by a stone cutter and the second type -- some head stones and foot stones --  being simply a field stone to mark the head and one also to mark the foot.

MY SON MAKING RUBBINGS OF THE LEDGER INSCRIPTIONS

The ledger types were large flat one-piece stones covering the grave, similar to the cover of a tablet, and placed on a raised limestone foundation. The inscription was on the ledger’s topside. Most of the ledger grave-markers were difficult to read – exposure to weather and the type of local stone used had blurred or erased much of the writing. 


My son came up with the idea of doing rubbings to determine what information we could obtain about the deceased. This method did help some in deciphering some of the names and dates. 


The ledger style was expensive in its time and is believed to have been used by the wealthy.  Historically, they are believed to be a British tradition.  

HEAD STONE IN SLAVE SECTION

The head stones in both the slave and white sections of the plot, if made by a stone cutter, carried the name and date of the deceased. The foot stone simply had the initial of the deceased.

Southern folk grave-markers are simple and unadorned. None of the grave –markers had adornment such as flowers, birds etc. The graveyard was on a rise, which is a southern thing -- this tradition is older than  Christianity. The front side of the head stone is smooth while the sides and back have chisel marks – a sign of back country grave stone-cutters

FOOT STONE OF EMILY'S HEADSTONE -- PHOTO ABOVE

The earliest deceased date that we found was 1806 and the latest was  1851 -- pre-Civil War times. These dates definitely indicate back country living for this region of Kentucky. Also, I would consider this graveyard a folk one due to its dates, arrangement and back country location.

SLAVE HEAD STONE WITH FOOT STONE

Grave stone-cutters in the backcountry during the above dates were involved in other artisan trades along with stone cutting. Many grave stone-cutters were itinerate and travelled over large regions.

SLAVE HEAD STONE INSCRIPTION
In Memory
Joshua  Servant of
Jos Barnett Jr born
1798 & died by a
stroke of Lightning
July 1827

In the early 1800s, markers were not always placed on the grave site at the time of death. This was due to time spent sending away for a grave-marker and then having it delivered by wagon. This could take up to a year or so.
The spatial arrangement of the plot is similar to early Scots-Irish traditions – linear rows. The slave side was also dictated by this pattern.

CLOSE-UP OF JOSHUA HEAD STONE (PHOTO ABOVE)

This graveyard in all probability has many more secrets to unveil through its material culture.  My son and I made two trips to the plot and feel we still missed some of the clues to its history.

CHISEL MARKS ON BACK SIDE OF HEAD STONE

For sources to check out about folk graveyards – see below. I never thought that graveyards could be so culturally fascinating but now I know I will be on the lookout for more of the same.

SOURCES:

Books

Texas Graveyards: A Cultural Legacy by Terry G. Jordan

Sticks and Stones: Three Centuries of North Carolina Gravemarkers by M. Ruth Little

Ghosts along the Cumberland by William Lynwood Montell

Historic Property

Civil War Battlefield Park 

Richmond, Kentucky