I’ve been wanting to get out to MD’s house for the longest, ever since i first heard about it. We’d heard that he’d taken the family homeplace and parred it down to suit his needs, not that we have any such plans, but the idea is obviously intriguing in a time when we waver between wanting to preserve buildings that are, though we love them, unfit for our current use. Often these homes built for large families and sometimes servants combined, are simply too large for us today, especially when we’re considering them second homes. Mom was equally interested in MD’s house since i’d given her the run-down so after the 5th Sunday Sing at X-Prairie we attended May 30th, she managed to invite ourselves over. M was party to it as well and we couldn’t've done it without her.
The house used to be a dogtrot log cabin which is evident in the retelling. However, when MD was growing up here it had already been covered with siding and interior walls i suppose, a common practice in upgrading one’s domicile from the rustic log look. A second story was added too to complete what i imagine was a basic 2/2 structure.
It was 1981 when MD and his wife renovated the Douglas homestead. The second story came down leaving only a tiny loft for kids and grandkids, and the width was narrowed by several feet on each end. Stained glass windows from a home near Cooksville were salvaged and surround the large headboard in the bedroom to the right of the hall entrance and a variety of windows flank the chimney at the opposite end of the cabin (for it is back to that status now) reaching up the tall wall of a lofted room. The kitchen is tiny, almost a kitchenette tucked off the living room in the center of the house. Family and antique wardrobes and chests provide storage the way closets do today, and in general the pieces of furniture in the house fit and fill each place. The very original logs are exposed in the entrance hall which has kept the front door of the larger home to make for a very interesting juxtaposition that i love. It is cozy in a wonderfully good way. One could feel like Thoreau out on his pond there.
