Childhood homes

What a treat I had this morning! Gin & Jim left about 7, Margaret about 8. John went back to bed for a quick nap, and then went to the boathouse. About 10:30 there was a knock on the door. The man there said "You don't know me, but I use to live in this house when I was a child."

I was delighted - and told him that John and I had visited childhood homes in Duluth, Pittsburg, St. Louis, and Houston. He and his family were traveling in TN, and he wanted to see if he could find this house. I insisted that they come in to look around. I told him that we knew the house had been changed a lot, and that it had always been a mystery - trying to figure out how it had been originally. So I got some direct information about the "birth" of the house!

He was excited to see all the changes that had been made and compare them to what he remembered. We exchanged cards, and he is going to e-mail me some "before" photos of the house. This was really special.

His family was the first owner of the house, and they moved in in 1962, when he was 7, and moved away in (I think) 1964. There was no basement - only a 3' crawl space. There was a deck off the kitchen/den, but his father added a staircase off the deck. We had deduced that our living room was originally the carport. And assumed that the dining room extension had been added. That was the case - there was a living room with a big picture window. And he remembers the "Charlie Chip man" coming to the kitchen door (which is now the door from the LR into the kitchen).

DAMN! I forgot to ask him if possibly they had planted the Xmas tree in the front. I know John will have some questions, too, and I'm sure I'll be e-mailing him about that and other questions as we think of them.

The house where I grew up in Houston is gone. We moved into it new in 1946, and Pink sold it in 1972. This photo is of the house that is on that lot now.