Someone Painted the Wood Floor On My Porch

[Seacrest]

Someone also left the cake out in the rain, but you don't see me carrying on about it.

[Thrift Store Scott]

Black wrote:
The light blue color is in some ways more "authentic" to the original period than restored bare wood. Are you sure it's worth the effort?

There is a medium epoxy grey color that's frequently referred to as "Porch Grey" that's pretty much the standard color for porch floorboards on houses of that era. Under certain lighting conditions it does have a blue-ish cast to it.

If the house is a 1920's bungalow, there's a 95% chance it's a mail-order "kit" house. That's not a bad thing; it makes researching the original materials a lot easier. The trick is to find out whether it was ordered from Sears, Montgomery-Ward, Gordon-Van Tine, Aladdin, or one of several other lesser companies that offered kit houses during that period.

I did a little research, and it appears that Sears provided either Western Hemlock or Douglas Fir floorboards for their porches, while Gordon-Van Tine provided Washington Fir floorboards for theirs.

Reproductions of select original pre-cut (kit) home catalogs from Sears, Montgomery-Ward, Gordon-Van Tine, Aladdin, and others are available from Dover Publications at very reasonable prices.

[Black]

I'm with you on the rest, but:

If the house is a 1920's bungalow, there's a 95% chance it's a mail-order "kit" house.

Did you mean to write 95%? I'd think 5-10%, maybe.

[Thrift Store Scott]

Black wrote:
I'm with you on the rest, but:

If the house is a 1920's bungalow, there's a 95% chance it's a mail-order "kit" house.

Did you mean to write 95%? I'd think 5-10%, maybe.

I did indeed. While that number may vary by area, most of the 1920's bungalows I've seen in various parts of the country were originally mail-order "kit" houses, particularly those in neighborhoods that are one bungalow after another. And in the teens and twenties, it made perfect sense to order one's house by mail: You got the whole house made of top-grade lumber, pre-cut and ready to build, complete with doors, windows, trim, hardware, paint, and plumbing, delivered to your lot; all you had to do was provide the finished foundation.

[AllGold]

I didn't realize many of the bungalows were kit houses. I only knew about the faux victorians, ala Bloom County.

Seacrest wrote:
Someone also left the cake out in the rain, but you don't see me carrying on about it.

LOL, I wonder how many got that reference.

[rgG]

AllGold wrote:
I didn't realize many of the bungalows were kit houses. I only knew about the faux victorians, ala Bloom County.

[quote=Seacrest]
Someone also left the cake out in the rain, but you don't see me carrying on about it.

LOL, I wonder how many got that reference.
Richard Harris would have.