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Take a look at our new inventory and see if you can find some great deals! Your purchase from Buffalo ReUse diverts material from landfills and supports our effort to rebuild, recycle, and revitalize Buffalo!+EBNZqdvKbn!~~_2.JPG?set_id=880000500F) |
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Winter is a difficult time at Buffalo ReUse. If you haven’t noticed our store is cold. But our incredible staff and crew are tough and hardy and do a yeoman’s job under these hard conditions. Winter is also a difficult time financially for ReUse. The pace of deconstruction and salvage slow. Lower volumes of stuff come in and it’s hard to entice people to visit us when it is 10 degrees in the store.
Thus we are issuing this appeal to let you know you can help support Buffalo ReUse’s missions by donating old scrap metal items. It doesn’t have to be large amounts of metal either. The old rusty baking sheet in the pantry, that cigar box of little wire clippings grandpa saved years ago, the obsolete valve the furnace guy replaced when you switched to modern heating and you can’t throw away because it is metal, that pile of aluminum pie tins and take-out containers under the sink, Grandma’s pair of broken scissors . . . I think you get the idea.
Of course you could take these items to the metal recyclers but at 15 cents a pound for steel you might get 25 cents for that rusty old baking sheet. And you’d have to wait in a long line of menacing trucks to wait your turn to pull up on the scale – it’s pretty intimidating. However for us old bits of scrap metal add up and help Buffalo ReUse push through the slow seasons.
But if that weren’t reason enough consider this, your pantry will be clutter free and you will be helping the environment as well. Environmentally metals have and still do exact a very heavy environmental toll. In America the legacy of our industrial past has left many terrible and toxic scars across the land. From mountains of waste rock destroying vast ecosystems and flooded mines and pits producing acidic mine drainage into water supplies, to increased concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide and other emissions from the fuels used to mine and produce metal, and thousands of former industrial sites badly poisoned with everything from solvents to PCBS to toxic metals. This only mentions a few of the problems. Nowadays much of this work is done in places like Africa, Asia, and South America and is introducing industrial-scale environmental ruin to these places and their people.
A particularly bad recent example is the toxic red mudslide that occurred in Hungary. That mudslide occurred when a levee containing a lake of chemical wastes from aluminum mining and processing failed and the reddish colored mud/toxic waste flooded over the land. Tributaries of the Danube and miles of land were poisoned and will not be safe for generations. Aluminum is an especially troublesome metal because it requires approximately four tons of bauxite to obtain 1 ton of aluminum. It also requires millions of gallons of water and tons of caustic chemicals and huge amounts of electricity to refine it. Aluminum is one of the most environmentally damaging metals despite being one of the easiest to recycle. Recycled aluminum uses one-third of the energy virgin aluminum does and recycled aluminum does not require mining or produce toxic red lakes.
So please bring your scrap metal to Buffalo ReUse at 298 Northampton Street, Buffalo NY 14208, any time we’re open (Tues-Sat 10-6, Sun 12-4, closed Monday), and we’ll gladly accept your donation. If you have a lot of scrap, we can come pick it up – just call us at 716-882-2800 and we’ll see what we can do to take it off your hands. Metals may be old, rusty, twisted and bent but we ask you follow the guidelines below.
We cannot accept or dispose of the following:
Finally, no processing (e.g. removing glass) can be done at Buffalo ReUse and we cannot dispose of ANY non-metal items that are not acceptable. We reserve the right to reject any metals for any reason. So if in doubt or you have extremely large loads please call ahead, 716-882-2800.
Comments (1) :: Environment, Fund Raising, Fundraising, Store, Sustainability
I’m finally free of classes for the semester and am able to write again. I felt that I also had to write something about the ongoing Gulf of Mexico oil spill because it demonstrates exactly why we need to live more sustainably; use less, recycle more, and live in sustainable communities.
First, I recently heard an old song that reminded me that the first and ultimate tragedy is the loss of life of the workers, and energy miners everywhere. This accident is a poignant reminder that every electron that charges our cell phone, every old carpet we throw away, etc… contains energy and there are people at the bottom of this chain.
The midnight, the morning, or the middle of day, 
Is the same to the miner who labors away.
Where the demons of death often come by surprise,
One fall of the slate and you’re buried alive.
It’s dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew,
Where danger is double and pleasures are few,
Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines
It’s dark as a dungeon way down in the mine.
“Dark as Dungeon”
Merle Travis, 1946
Concerning the environment, It’s been 22 days (April 20) since the rig “Deepwater Horizon” burned and sunk. The leak is estimated spout about 200,000 gallons a day, but that number seems to be a guestimate at best. Using that number I calculate that 4,400,000 (four and a half million) gallons have been spilled so far. For perspective, the Exxon Valdez was estimated to have spilled 10,000,000 (ten million) gallons. Despite the best efforts the Gulf leak shows no sign of being stopped soon.
The leak… well maybe leak is too light a word, since oil is blowing out at about 180 gallons per minute. Fire hoses put out about 200 gallons per minute. In the two minutes of writing here that was 400 gallons of oil.
The leak is 5000 feet below the sea. This is an alien environment where the water pressure is a crushing 2200 psi (pounds per square inch). If an average human male has about 2900 square inches of skin, he would experience a total of 6,500,000 pounds (about 7 elephants) pushing on him.
The temperature is just above freezing. The cold and extreme pressure causes methane gas in the oil to freeze as it emerges. It is like a tar slushy and it won’t flow through pipes. This is why the recent attempt to cap it with a giant container to funnel the oil to ships failed.
Crude oil itself has many consistencies, often likened to chocolate chocolate mousse. It is composed of a soup of millions of chemicals , it is full of gases, mud and other debris. In the cold many globs solidify and sink to the bottom. Larger globs coalesce from the slick and sink back down to the bottom.
The lighter hydrocarbons (eg gasoline [properly: hexanes, octanes, heptanes] ) and fluffy stuff float on the top where they drift to shore. Sunlight, oxygen, combined with waves “weather” the oil, emulsifying it and making it more soluble – much like a well-shaken Italian salad-dressing. This complicates oil removal as this oil cannot be easily skimmed. Some of the lighter hydrocarbons (e.g. propane or butane) evaporate into the atmosphere. Read the rest of this entry »
Do you have a box of inch-long remnants of copper pipe from that kitchen remodel back in 
1970? How about a couple of bent and burnt aluminum pots that just couldn’t cook one more can of cream of mushroom soup? Or how about one of my favorites; an old tire rim cut and bent into the shape of a flower? I believe the artists intentions were good but I always thought they looked like Audrey II or a body snatcher pod (If you don’t understand these references Google “little shop of Horrors” and “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and then see the original versions). If your basement is choked with stuff like this but your conscience tells you metal is easily recycled but you know it will cost you more in gas than the money you’d make at the scrap yard. Here is a solution that is good for your basement, the earth, and your conscience; consider donating you scrap metal to Buffalo ReUse to support:
Seriously though, those few old bits of metal might not seem significant, however scrap metal is very useful for us as it provides a very quick and direct way to help fund 
our day to day operations. At about 75 cents per pound for ferrous metals (irons and steels) and about 3 dollars per pound for cuprous metals (copper, brass, bronze) it isn’t worth the average person gas and driving to recycle a few old coat hangers or faucet knobs. However at the Buffalo ReUse these small amounts of metal accumulate from many different sources and add up quickly. A truck load of metal might pay for a few days worth of diesel, or pay to repair an (all too common) engine problem, buy boxes of gloves, puncture protectors and goggles for the crew, etc…
Environmentally recycled metal is an excellent way to be greener. A piece of metal thrown away is a piece of metal that has to be replaced with new metal. The amount of energy needed to recycle metal into useful products is estimated to be nearly 1/3 of the energy to obtain it from raw materials. Metals also often require that tons of rock be mined to produce pounds of metal. The environmental costs of mining are very high, leaving enormous scars on the earth and badly poisoned waters and lands.
Of course, if you bring in interesting or useful 
metal items that can be re-sold we would not scrap them. Useful items can be re-sold in the store (Environmentally even better than metal recycling) or used to run our operations. And just like item donations, we will provide you with a tax donation form. We ask that you not bring refrigerators, propane cylinders, gas cans, entire cars or trucks, items that are less than 50% metal, or contain mercury (switches and controls). For very large loads we can pick it up with our truck by appointment. Items should be readily accessible at ground level. In any case call ahead to discuss your specific situation and see if we can use your metal.
So if you have a set of porch railings that were bent into a pretzel when junior backed into it 1978 while learning to drive, consider the Buffalo ReUse before you put it at the curb. It will help our cause immensely.
Recently the ReUse was contacted by Nail Jack Tools LLC to alert woodworkers, especially reclaimed wood workers, about their new nail pulling tools, the “Nail Hunter” and “Nail Jack”. Nail Jack Tools very kindly sent us a set of these tools to evaluate and since the weather was pleasant yesterday I decided to take the Nail Jack out into the yard to de-nail a pile of lumber from a recent deconstruction job.
Image Courtesy of Nail Jack Tools LLC
The Nail Jack and the Nail Hunter are functionally identical tools, except that the Nail Jack is Larger. Since building deconstruction literally produces tons of lumber studded with nails ranging from 10 inch long spikes to carpet tacks, I decided to use the larger Nail Jack, figuring that it could pull the largest nails but could probably extract any smaller nails as well.
The pile of lumber I de-nailed is a daunting opponent for any nail pulling tool as it consists of a
stack of, mostly 8×8 oak timbers recovered from a 100-year old barn. Typical to old barns, overly large nails were used in its construction, many 8 gauge or larger. Additionally many of the beams bristled with an assortment of smaller nails, cut nails, tacks, and staples used for cross beams, wiring, siding etc… Many of the smaller nails were heavily rusted, bent and embedded into the wood.
Before detailing my reasons I’ll get right to the ending – I think the Nail Jack is a really great and useful tool. It is innovative, seems well built, hardy, and very reasonably priced for contractors and do-it-yourselfers, at about $25 a tool (nippers, $15-$40 depending on quality).
An initial reaction by my colleagues was a “So what, it’s a glorified pair of wire cutters or nippers”. But it isn’t, and only after you start using it does its thoughtful design and utility become apparent.
First, there are the two sets of jaws, beaked jaws in the front and the grooved jaws in the rear 
that can grab onto nails at any point along the shaft. The narrow internal width of the beaked jaws allows the user to clinch the nail with significant force. Thus the nails do not need an intact head to extract them, just a small exposed piece to affix the jaws onto. The rear jaws are wider and primarily grasp exposed nails, especially large ones, between a set of three teeth so that substantial pulling force can be generated. What sets the Nail Jack apart from a pair of nail nippers is the banana shaped head that allows the user to leverage nails from almost any angle; backward, rolling side to side, or pushing forward when the rear jaws are used. The rear jaws also double a strike plate to hit with a hammer to bring extra force to the 
nail. I must confess I did not need this as its pulling ability was more than sufficient for the nails I encountered.
The tool’s features clearly sped the work because I could quickly re-adjust the tool back to the starting position to keep maximum force on the nail without having to use wood blocks to increase leverage or switch to tools for different nails or difficult situations. I should also mention that I alternatively used the nail jack with one or two hands and pulled or pushed depending on the situation.
An additional advantage I noticed while de-nailing timbers (as opposed to narrower boards) is that the range of motion of pulling is so wide that I could pull nails relatively easily on the top and sides of the timbers. This necessitated less moving or rolling of the lumber over, making the job easier and faster.
Since you can grip the nail at any place along its length and quickly re-adjust the tool back to where it has maximum leverage, each extraction consists of a sequence of small pulls rather than one long pull. Thus the tool spends more time flat against the wood, spreading the pulling force more widely and causing less damage to the wood. I generally noticed that even gnarly and crooked nails left with holes not much larger than the width of the nail.
In the approximately two hours I spent pulling a few pounds of nails with the Nail Jack I only resorted twice to using a pry bar and the nippers. I required the leverage of the nippers to pull a particularly long (~8 inches, upper right corner of photo) and crooked nail. To be fair this nail barely fit in the jaws.
The one downside I encountered with the Nail Jack is that there is a 
spring that pops the tool open as the default state. This spring, located in the rear jaws seems somewhat vulnerable to damage. In fact the spring in our tool developed a kink (last photo) after I used the rear jaws to push out an 8 gauge nail. I believe the force of the nail head pressed against the spring damaged it (it got the nail out though). Despite the kink the spring is still functioning but I believe it will succumb to metal fatigue relatively soon. We have contacted Nail Jack Tools and it appears that the spring can be easily replaced or used without it. I personally liked the spring loaded action as it readied the tool quickly for the next pull.
So in conclusion I highly recommend the Nail Jack. I believe that home renovators or re-used material carpenters will find this tool very useful. I also believe that the spring may not be a big issue for lighter duty jobs. The Buffalo ReUse is particularly hard on tools and, all in all, I thought this tool did an excellent job and fared well under tough conditions.
Comments (2) :: Deconstruction, How-To, Salvage, Store, Tool BARn
and nothing but the poop! So help me.
Toilets come to the ReSource in many types and colors and styles and generally sell for about 25 dollars. Whatever the price, or how fancy or not, they all do the same thankless job – whisk away waste in a clean and a (relatively) odorless manner!
Since last winter the ReSource has grown in size, scope, and mission. Importantly, we now have functioning, lighted, and heated restrooms and no longer have to risk frost bite on our nether regions, trudging outside in 5 degree weather to use the porta-potty. So, in honor of our new facilities Caesandra asked me to say a few words about the humble commode.
One of the first dichotomies to develop in humans is our relationship with our poop. Babies learn the humor of poopies early on and (at least in males) it never goes away. Everyone poops, as the children’s book says, but no one admits it. However, even most adults snicker, except maybe the Queen of England, when toilet humor is invoked. This dichotomy is the basis of every 12-year old boy’s mantra: “he who denied it, supplied it”.
Q: Did you hear about Robin Hood’s house? A: It has a little John.
Like Rodney Dangerfield, the toilet just gets no respect, so I’m here to have a intellectual and serious discourse on the importance and merits of the commode – without snickering -Ok, a little snickering. I’m a guy after all.
The toilet is one civilization’s most important inventions. It’s not just an ideal locale for reading TV Guide; it’s critical in the establishment of human societies. Praise is always heaped upon the plow, the steam engine, and the printing press, while the humble toilet, which dutifully fulfills its task six to eight times a day for the average adult, is relegated to cheap humor. Read the rest of this entry »
In the Christmas song “Walking in a Winter Wonderland”, I always wondered why the lovers perspired, as they dreamed by the fire. That sure must be some hot fire?
The seasons have turned again and if you’re among the fortunate folks take romantic walks in Buffalo’s winter wonderland, perhaps, you’re even luckier to perspire by the fire, or at least in the glow of a hollow plastic log with mylar tassels flickering past a light bulb.
Whether your fireplace is wood, gas or a plastic log, the ReSource has a nice collection of fireplace surrounds and mantels awaiting new homes with lovers to perspire in front of them. Since space is limited here I will highlight a few exceptional pieces. The most impressive is a white oak mantel/surround decorated with Victorian spindles, dentil moldings, and two large, round, beveled mirrors. The oak is currently hidden under a coat of white paint but can easily be stripped again revealing the beautiful white oak.
Impressive for their sizes and details are a set of more colonial styled surrounds ranging from 8’ to 10’ in length. These are intricately assembled from white pine but like the white oak mantel they are slathered in various layers of paint and will probably require some refinishing. Not to be overlooked are the non-wood surrounds – personal 
favorites of mine. There are several complete or near complete sets of fireplace surrounds and mantels made of brownstone or shale. Most fascinating is the fact that they appear to have been chemically treated to make them look like marble, tiles or more expensive stones. It shows the up and coming attitude Buffalo once had when people made already pretty stones into even prettier ones. Lastly the ReSource has several cast iron surrounds and fronts (for coal stoves) which are particularly beautiful and are pretty decorations even if not used for a fireplace. Again, it is a testament to early 20th century Buffalo that even the coal stove was considered something to make pretty.
Enjoy a cozy toast for the new year.
Commander Frank Borman of Apollo 8, wished this sentiment to the world on Christmas Eve 1968. He and
Pilot William Anders were the first people to ever see the whole planet earth at once.
Earth was a small blue sphere, utterly insignificant against an infinite sea of blackness. Commander Borman related feeling homesick and nostalgic, yet fearful at how small and fragile earth is.
Ironically I find the most appropriate Christmas sentiment was made by the late, great author and scientist, and committed atheist, Carl Sagan. One of mankind’s greatest achievements of intellect, Voyager I, was leaving the solar system 4 billion miles away and Sagan suggested that they turn its cameras back and take a picture of earth. Unintentionally earth showed up as a small blue dot illuminated by a light ray. Reflecting on this photograph Sagan wrote in his book the Pale Blue Dot:
Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, 
everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.
It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.
In the radio address on Christmas eve 1968 the world was in turmoil, commnader Borman struggled to express just how insignificant it all was, and how we are all earthlings above all. He simply said:
Merry Christmas to all of you, all of you on the good Earth
Ditto!
I recently heard a radio vignette by the talented NPR science correspondence Robert Krulwich concerning the work of a Dr Nalini Nadkarni of The Evergreen State College in Washington. Dr. Nadkarni calculated, using data from NASA satellites, that there were approximately 61 trees for every person on planet Earth. She concluded that this was a good number.
But let me quote her husband’s reply:
…when Nadkarni sat down with her husband, Jack, a microbiologist at Evergreen State, to tell him the
good news [61 trees per person], he was less impressed with the ratio of trees to people. “He looked at me in his quiet, slow sort of way and said, ‘Well, you know, I don’t know. We use that much in a couple of seasons of our wood stove, and the amount of paper that comes off the printer and the lumber that made our home — so maybe it’s not so many.”
According to the article, Dr. Nadkarni is now trying to determine how many trees each of us consume and how the tree to person ratio changing. This is complicated question with no simple answers.
I am not a environmental scientist (yet), but what is clear is that we use a lot of wood for lumber, paper, and other products. It is well-documented that the vastness, age, and diversity of forests are decreasing. Populations are also increasing and using more wood, so my guess is that this number is decreasing.
But this matter?
In Jared Diamond’s book: Collapse, How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed deforestation is a
key ingredient of the catastrophic collapses of great civilizations such as the Maya, the Easter Islanders, and the Greenland Vikings. Deforestation is generally not considered the overt reason for the collapse of civilizations, but it is considered a significant factor with subtle downstream effects. The largest effect is that it lead to a loss of agricultural productivity through soil erosion, leading to starvation, social instability, war, and genocide.
Surely we are more advanced and this couldn’t happen to us? These were just primitive societies? Right?
Comments (4) :: Community, Education, Environment, How-To, Store
If still you think me mad, you will think so no longer when I describe the wise precautions I took for the concealment of the body. The night waned, and I worked hastily, but in silence.
I took up three planks from the flooring of the chamber, and deposited all between the scantlings. I then replaced the boards so cleverly so cunningly, that no human eye — not even his — could have detected anything wrong. There was nothing to wash out — no stain of any kind — no blood-spot whatever. I had been too wary for that.
The ReUse’s main capital is architectural salvage. Strictly speaking this is framing lumber, flooring, windows, doors, bricks, and that sort of stuff. When dealing with old houses, however, it is unavoidable that all kinds of things… I’ll call it unconventional salvage, turn up. Although no gold bars, money stashes, lost artwork (worth saving that is), guns, bodies (rodents excluded) or, as master Poe describes above, beating hearts have turned up under the floorboards many other interesting things do.
Finding this stuff is somewhat of an art form, and experienced crew members know where to look for it. It requires part Indiana Jones, This Old House, and Antiques Road Show. Basements, attics, crawlspaces, cupboards, closets, rafters, coal bunkers, etc… are where this stuff resides. Your inner Dr. Jones is needed to wedge yourself into filthy crawlspaces, past wads of spider webs, mice, centipedes, spiders and other filth and vermin. Your Bob Villa (or whoever is hosting these days) knows how old houses are put together and where people could stash stuff. Finally your Antiques Road Show expert knows that a particular light globe is old glass not just a Chinese knock-off.
So in honor of Halloween tomorrow I thought I’d spin a few yarns about some of the stuff I’ve seen and heard about while working in old houses.
Flying Free Again
Attics always contain cool stuff. Michael and I recently cleared out an attic, and while leaving looked up and saw two poles, neatly wrapped in brown paper, stashed up in the rafters. They are 48-star American flags (1912-1959) made of stitched linen. They were probably made in the 1920’s since the depression and WWII luxuries and materials in short supply, and all flags after WWII were made of nylon. I always wonder who stowed these flags in such a loving manner. We may never know but their flags now proudly fly in the ReSource and are a perfect symbol for rebuilding urban America.
The Curmudgeon Bench
An East Side garage yielded a monstrously heavy pattern-maker’s bench and vise. The bench is made of hardwoods and bears the scars from of years of hard work – deep oil stains and tool marks. A favorite conversation of Kevin’s and mine is about old curmudgeons that seem haunt workshops, garages, and places like that, and this bench just screams “old curmudgeon” and I believe the builder would begrudgingly approve of its reuse at 100 years old (Note it’s not for sale because we use it).
Toyland, Toyland, little Girl and Boy-land…
Its always poignant to find toys in houses. It is a reminder that even the most dilapidated houses once
housed families. I’m not a Polyanna but I always hope that the toys we from happy children with caring families that gave these toys to the children as presents on Christmas mornings, or any special event. We mostly modern plastic toys but one house north of the city yielded the tubular steel chassis of chain-drive peddle car. It looks like it once sported a streamlined body, something like a 49 Mercury. I imagine a young child played with it for years and then in the teens decided to remove the body with plans to convert it to a hot rod go-cart. Like many things, however, the chassis sat in the basement, the boy moved out, eventually mom and dad passed away and the there it sat until the house was scheduled for demolition.
What’s Your Sign Baby?
Another ubiquitous feature of old houses is the adult entertainment…oh heck…porn stashes under the stairs or in a back closet. There’s usually no vintage Betty Page pinups but mostly assortments of cheesy 1970’s items and media. Because of the commonness of these prurient collections I do not believe they are the product of any Ted Bundy types, but rather the personal library of an Archie Bunker-type guy who kept this little bit of forbidden fruit for himself and the fellas on poker night. What Archie didn’t know is that Edith pretended not to know about it and Junior shared it with every other guy and their younger brothers on the block. Amazingly, Junior (who couldn’t chew gum and walk) always rearranged it in such perfect order so that only Pops believed it was a secret.
You Wanna Go Where Everybody Knows Your Name…
Buffalo is said to have a church, bowling alley, and tavern on every corner. The amount of brewski
memorabilia and paraphernalia certainly corroborates that saying. Printed beer crates and beer memorabilia are particularly common finds. We recently found an Iroquois Brewing Co.-branded pop-top opener that exactly matched the Iroquois Brewing Co. bottle boxes found a few months earlier in an attic. Must have been a popular brand. Teenage hangouts in attics and basements are postered with Labatts and Coors signs – in between Farah Fawcett and Bo Derrick posters. Actual bars are also a popular find along with church pews and church parts!. I particularly like the souvenir mugs from Bishop Timon High School’s 1987 junior prom (same year as my junior prom). “Don’t Dream it’s Over” by Crowded House was their theme song. However the wisdom of beer mugs for a high school prom escapes me.
Heavy Boots of Lead, Fills His Victims full of Dread…
This story is really heavy, although there are no clever anecdotes I can find to open it. Simply, a former medical office yielded an X-ray machine and several tons of lead. Having worked with radiation I am not surprised, but the crews were when they discovered that the walls and door were lined with ¼ inch lead sheeting. Pretty heavy Eh?
We’ve Got Trouble Right Here in River City
Mason jars, glass containers, and old bottles, especially patent medicine bottles are always an interesting find. I always wonder how they end up under houses (perhaps next to the beating heart!), under stairs, in crawls spaces, etc… Under a house in South Buffalo a bottle of tonic “For everything that ails you” was recovered. Brewed up in Rochester New York this marvelous “tonic” contained 75% alcohol and some herbs (I believe this is called a Harvey Wallbanger nowadays), and if it at least didn’t cure you it must have made you forget about whatever ailed you.
Everything Old is New Again, and Again
While deconstructing a house in South Buffalo we discovered that ReUsing is not an entirely new idea. As we lifted the
beams from this mid-1800’s house we noticed they were particularly heavy and not made of hemlock – the usual structural wood in Buffalo housing – and had notches and bolt holes indicating a previous life as perhaps a railroad bridge. Closer inspection and discussions with a customer revealed that these beams probably came a factory since the notches appeared to be mounting points for pulleys for leather belt driven machinery. Kevin and I imagined another old curmudgeon grumbling about lumber prices and dragging these monsters (grumbling as he went) from the former factory site. I know we certainly grumbled loading them on the trailer.
Return to sender, address unknown…
As you pull apart old houses you find all sorts of postcards, stamps, pictures and documents in boxes, under baseboards, etc… Recently I
found a segment of a postcard with a two cent stamp (1920s) used to shim up a door hinge. These documents are always interesting because they remind us that old buildings once houses people. Some lives were exciting and exotic as we find postcards, letters, and brochures from all over the world. Others were very normal as is attested by school notebooks, ticket stubs, and shopping lists. One interesting find I remember is a piece of drywall from an East Side house. On the back, obviously done when a repair was made, three children left a note for the future. It said that is was January 1972, Gerald Ford was president and it was cloudy and 23 degrees outside. Message received.
Well there’s a few stories for today. As I go out I’ll leave you with the end of the Tell Tale Heart. Happy Halloween and see you at the ReSource.
Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God! — no, no? They heard! — they suspected! — they KNEW! — they were making a mockery of my horror! — this I thought, and this I think. But anything was better than this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those hypocritical smiles no longer! I felt that I must scream or die! — and now — again — hark! louder! louder! louder! LOUDER! — “Villains!” I shrieked, “dissemble no more! I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here! — it is the beating of his hideous heart!”
