Tools for Dismantling

We’ve begun in earnest the dismantling of the O’Kane House, in Durham, NH.  It began with a training day with John Butler, a photographer and carpenter who has worked with us on a number of museum de-installations.  He showed us how to remove trim without damaging the surface using a variety of softwood wedges, and other specialty tools.  He has also been working with us to develop a streamlined process for labeling and documenting all of the parts we will remove.

As we dismantle the house, I hope to keep the blog up to date with a series of posts and pictures of the neat stuff we find.  Consider the following the first:

Look at that enormous Chimney Girt!

The interior door jambs were rabbeted into the casing.  Those dadoes and rabbets were all plowed by hand!

When the carpenter who milled this piece of baseboard ran into some squirelly grain, or screwed up and ran off the edge of the board, he just flipped the piece over, and ran the molding on the opposite edge of the opposite face.  We revel in connecting to other carpenters in this way.  We all make mistakes, it’s the good carpenters who know how to fix them.