This post really belongs after the one below. (I know, I know...I got confused). Mind reading that first then coming back here? Thanks.
OK, We're back. The Grange might have been a cherished survivor, but everybody knew its location was lousy. Problem was when the subject of moving it came up, people in the neighborhood got nervous it would be taken away from them. In 2008, an ideal solution was found, right around the corner in the precincts of St. Nicholas Park. One wonders why it took them so long. Here's the old Grange jacked way up in the air on the first leg of its trip to the park. Presumably the reason it's up that high is in order to clear the curving porch of St. Luke's Episcopal. A portion of the church's roof is visible in the left background. The modern building in the distance on the right (no ornament to the neighborhood, I might add) stands on the southeast corner of Convent Avenue and 141st St. and is a part of City College. The long side of the Grange in this view was originally the back wall when the house was built. It became a side wall after the house was relocated to Convent Avenue. The brown strip along its right corner shows where it abutted the neighboring apartment house.
Now they've got the house into the middle of Convent Avenue, lowered it down, and it's ready to travel.
Here it comes onto the new foundation. The house will be pivoted counter-clockwise so that the to-be-restored front door in the middle of the facade on the right will face 141st Street. The bay window on the left facade, which faced Convent Avenue for over a century, will be in the center of one of the matching side porches.
The house is now in position and reconstruction of the entry porch is under way.
It's not done yet, but it sure is looking good. I can't wait to visit.
Although I am not usually a big fan of moving historic houses, this seems to be a good compomise since it had already been moved once before.
ReplyDeleteIt's happier here than it was on Convent Avenue.
ReplyDeleteI am not a fan of gratuitously moving houses, but, as in this case, give papal dispensation when it saves the house. It is looking marvelous indeed, and happy to have some air around it once again. I've been following the story from afar, and can't wait to see it.
ReplyDeletei am assuming great ceremony surrounded the cutting and burning of the 13 Colony trees? (yeah-right).
ReplyDeletei also suppose that my eyes shouldn't have popped out of my head when you said they divided 32 acres into 1000 lots, but they did. up here in the colonies, that still seems a little crowded where the min. lot size is (at least for this year) 1.86 acres.
a beauty of a house and thanks be that it survived and was brought back to probably better than its original splendour.
you really should get security words. DED makes them up, i think, even a computer couldn't come up with words that strange and they're so much fun to define.(see my posts on old long island.)oops - you have them but you can't see them until after you hit the post button so then you have to edit the comment in order to define the word. thanx.
security word def - "sunsanes" - archaic word for when every state and large city had a "mental institution" (nut house)and refers to a method thought to cure the insane by leaving them out in the sun. Not only did it not cure them but most of them wandered off and came here to Maine apparently and one became Governor. Many settled in DED's neighborhood but only in the summer.