Smith's Fort Facelift et al

The restoration crew is deligently trying to diminish the deferred maintenance list before August 11th when they start the siding phase at the Hollow. They fixed the leak over Betty's head at the Cole-Digges on July 1st, which turned out to be a very poorly sealed flange for an air duct in the HVAC unit. Betty was so impressed with the aroma of the Geocel 2315 liquid rubber product we used that she is trying to find it in aerosol form to spritz in her office. The pictures you see are the exterior elements of Smith's Fort. It is our intention to repaint all of the exterior trim of the house. As you can see, it needed doing. Due to the weather and the extensive amount of scraping, sanding and window reglazing this job will take 3 men about 4 weeks to finish.

Scotchtown Monument

On the 27th of June, the restoration dept set the "Colonial Dames" plaque at Scotchtown on the brick pedestal they constructed. Scotchtown has a monument area, and this was installed in a manner as to compliment the two existing plaque monuments. This task took two men 4 days to do, mostly because there were 3 distinct phases of construction, each of which was dependent on the successful completion of the prior.

Marshall chimney works continues

Also had a chance to visit the John Marshall House on Friday to check on the ongoing roof repair. As Doug has previously reported, the chimney stack on the Courthouse side of the roof was found to have significant deterioration when the flashing was removed. As the scaffolding was in place and the time to make the repairs was right, we quickly engaged Davies Masonry to undertake the repairs. These photos were taken with my camera, but not by me. Being "height-adverse", I sent Doug up the 40 foot aluminum ladder with the camera where he enlisted one of the masons to take some photos of the work.

Tombstone Work Continues

I had a chance to visit Historic Jamestowne last Friday to check in on the ongoing restoration work on the tombs near the rear wall of the Memorial Church. Much has taken place since my last visit in early June . We choose to concentrate on the two tombs showing the most deterioration. Once the infill had been removed and the loose bricks and brick debris, there was pratcially nothing left to work with, so the tombs are being essentailly reconstructed. All usable bricks and pieces of stonework are being incorportated as possible. Davies Masonry is handling the project and Jon Miano of our restoration crew is assisting. This continues Jon's training in masonry work.