Van Sweringen Demonstration Homes

The Van Sweringen Company, developers of Shaker Heights, commissioned several demonstration homes. These are not demonstration homes as we think of of them now, but rather suggestions of the sort of houses that buyers of lots might build and might expect their neighbors to build. The build and design quality of these houses is impressive, to say the least.

Five of these houses sit next to each other, on my block. All were designed by architect Bloodgood Tuttle and built in 1924. Most have impressive gardens and a great street presence, the result of double lots.

The five models are shown here, from west to east. To the east of this group is a sixth house, not a model, of similar proportions, also on a double lot.

My favorite is probably the fourth one, with the blue-green windows. I'm not sure whether that color is original to the house, but it was one of the suggested color schemes provided by the Van Sweringen Company at the time that the house was built.

Buy Langston Hughes' house for less than $10,000!

Poet, playwright and celebrated author Langston Hughes lived alone in an attic apartment in this house, at 2266 East 86th Street, Cleveland, Ohio, from 1917-1919. (Arnold Rampersad The Life of Langston Hughes, p. 26). He was in high school at the time, and without much money, his time was spent reading. Some of his first published works were written while he resided here.

Of the five residences Hughes called home in Cleveland, this house, and the one below, on the other side of the two vacant lots are the only survivors.



Langston Hughes lived with his mother in this house at 2256 E 86th Street from early May 1936 - April 21, 1937. It is presently being run as a rental property, though between tenants right now, according to the resident of the house next door to it, who would like to see it demolished to increase the size of his yard.



The house at 2266 is bank-owned, as of April of this year.

Cleveland is at the center of the "foreclosure crisis", and, given some neighborhood comparables, there's no way that this house will sell for more than $10,000. Further, I think that there's a very good chance that if you offered the bank who owns this house $1,000 or $2,000, that they'd take it. No back taxes are owed, and the house, overall, is in decent shape. The street looks good - most of the houses are lived-in and maintained.

Further, there are two adjacent vacant lots, if you should want to have a bit of a yard. One is owned by the city, who will sell it (once you own the adjacent lot) for a mere $26. The other is owned by Fairfax Renaissance Development Corporation, who would likely be willing to sell to someone interested in fixing up the house.



The house has good lines, underneath the vinyl siding. Everything that I could see underneath the vinyl looked solid.



It even retains most of the wood double-hung windows. The exceptions are in the kitchen and on the third floor.

The interior appears to be in good condition, with nice original woodwork and doors.



Even the front porch looks good, underneath the awning and siding.





There aren't any obvious signs of major damage.





The kitchen leaves a bit to be desired, but these days, who doesn't want a new kitchen?

What problems do I see?

The roof. There are at least two, if not three layers of asphalt shingles over the original slate. The house will probably be due for a re-roof before too long. The chimney also needs attention.

The replacement windows in the kitchen look awful. The house could use a more historically sympathetic front door.

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When was the last time you had a chance to buy a local landmark for less than you pay each year in property taxes? How can you possibly lose with this house? I'd find a way to buy it myself, if only I had the free time to fix it up.

We'll be able to park our cars in the garage?

The garage floor is all ready for the cement pour. We've been told it will happen on Friday. Here's hoping! It'll be nice to be able to put our cars in the garage. Rather, it'll be nice to be able to put one of our cars and a bunch of junk in the garage.

Photo by A.

Making progress on the guest bedroom

Before


During


Almost done

The painting was mostly done by A - I did the finish work. The third photograph is the more accurate representation of the color.

We'd peeled up the corner of the carpet during our first walk-through of the house and found that the flooring was in excellent condition. I've pulled up the tack strips and all the staples - now all that remains is to scrape off the remaining bits of padding and scrub the floor.

The padding, by the way, is really nasty.

Yes, that is a near-mint, framed, Star Wars one-sheet, style C, sitting on the bed. Ah, how tastes change.

Photographs, of course, by A.

That electrical supply line really had to go...

This is the old electrical line that brought the power from the service entrance, through the garage, under the breezeway, and into the house. Note the lack of insulation and the lovely patina. Note that the patina is on the ground. Yes. The ground. Ack.



In this detail, note the frayed state of the ground. Note that it has been arcing against the conduit it is running through. ACK.

Finally, note that these photos were taken by A.

Garage floor

The garage floor is taking longer than expected. Either today or tomorrow the drain, shown here, will be replaced with one that isn't damaged.



The building inspector also said that we have to run the wiring here, with the lovely exposed ground, through conduit. This means that we will be replacing the wiring from where it comes out of the panel in the garage all the way to the subpanel in the basement. This is another $1500 that we hadn't planned on. That price includes the wiring for 100 amp service and running additional conduit next to it for the future upgrade to 200 amp service.

Photographs, of course, by A.

The End of an Era

This morning, I took my van in to my mechanic, The Lusty Wrench. It's a little hole in the wall place on Lee Road, near Cedar, in Cleveland Heights. They're the best, most honest mechanics I've ever met.

The airbag light has been on for a while (clockspring needs to be replaced) and there have been some problems of late with acceleration, which I had attributed to the slow demise of the transmission. Yesterday, they became more pronounced. This morning, on the way to the shop, they became really bad. I adjusted my position in my seat, and saw that the "check engine" light was on. It's unclear just how long it has been on and I simply failed to see it, hidden behind the steering wheel. As I drove on, the check engine light started flashing.

They called me back this afternoon, a mere $30ish of diagnostics later, to inform me that my car needed the following items addressed:

• airbag clockspring - while airbags are really really nice, even nicer is having cruise control again for those long drives.
  
• rusted out shock tower
  
• misfiring engine
  
• an outer tie rod end or two
  
• rusted out muffler

Further, the transmission probably doesn't have more than 20,000 miles left in it, and the front tires look to be near the end of their lifespan.

They strongly encouraged me to look for a suitable replacement.

I'll pick it up from the shop tomorrow morning. Unfortunately, we can't start looking for a (used) replacement just yet. We'll be waiting until the state legislature manages to put together a budget for the next fiscal year. The proposed budget the governor put forward cut state funding to public libraries in half. As one of the last librarians hired by my library before the hiring freeze, things wouldn't look good if the proposed cuts went through.

The above photograph was taken while I was in grad school and taking a class in Columbus, OH, a 2 and a half hour drive away. I wanted to see just how much I could improve the gas mileage of the van. With the seams taped, window shut, and the cruise control at about 55, I managed 35mpg, a personal best. With the tires inflated a bit more, synthetic motor oil, and a bit more weight taken from the van, 40mpg seems quite possible.

How did I get in? Through the window, of course.




This series of four photos show the van after it was stolen, in Baltimore, Maryland. Note the trail of transmission fluid behind the van and the hole in the transmission pan - I knew that there had to be a reason that the transmission hung so low in the vehicle - I didn't realize that it was a theft-recovery mechanism.



In Shenandoah National Park.



Shortly before we got stuck in snow in the Bighorn Mountains, in Wyoming.



As the über camping van, in Mant-La Sal National Forest, near Arches National Park.



Stalking old milestones on the National Road, near Frederick, Maryland.



And finally, in front of our house, the first or second time we saw it.

I guess I should start looking for an "Obama 2008" bumper sticker now.