Was reading an article by a carpenter who does some demolition work on old New England houses. Sometimes he’ll salvage chunks of hardwood and make something new from them. Occasionally, he finds coins in walls too … no big hoards, just one or two now and then. A recent project was to make a storage box from American chestnut which was recovered from an 18th century house. Most American chestnut trees were killed in the early 20th century by an imported fungus. 4 billion trees died … 25% of old eastern forests. The box has a sliding lid with a finger hole. At the bottom of the hole, he put a 1902 Barber half … very cool! See the pic. Cal
My Dad's two youngest sisters still live in the family home, built around 1900. I think there's a big chestnut beam in the barn, and I wouldn't be surprised if there's chestnut in the house construction. I also wouldn't be surprised if there are lost coins here and there, but not many -- the family never had a lot of money to spare. I wish I could go back inside and look around, but my aunts have turned more and more reclusive with age, and I don't think they've let anybody else in the house for years.
When my dad retired, he bought a house in the country. It was built in 1840. He took down the old barn. The main beam in the barn was the keel of a Keel Boat. And, when we remodeled inside, we found an envelope with a stamp and postmark of 1853. Fun to be around old buildings.
I love working with old wood but it's a bit tough on blades and other cutting tools. It's not safe to use anything that is not sharp or not running at the proper speed. My lumber room is filled with old wood I would hate to pay for today. It's tough to come up with a project that is worthy of using it on.
The prices of wood today is getting out of hand especially old growth wood that was found fairly easy 20-40 years ago. Is mostly non existent unless you want to pay a fortune.
I spent years doing woodwork projects for folks. Cradles, rocking horses, most anything really…. Just something I had a knack for. I always would recess a shiny new cent in an inconspicuous place to mark the year I made the piece for somebody. I was recently shown a cherry rocking cradle that I made for a friends baby that was now a young lady that was getting married. I immediately turned the piece over and the 1995 cent was still there and shiny under several layers of lacquer.
