Hiraeth Restorations, LLC

01/04/2026

Took a quick trip this weekend to check out a simple pre-Civil War log cabin in Northern Virginia. A few rotten timbers to replace, nothing too serious. It’ll be a bit of a struggle to source the white oak logs I’d want to use. The Amish mill I’ve been dealing with has sadly went to mostly softwoods. Half the battle in finding a timber source is making it clear to the supplier what exactly I’m looking for in the way of a superior material. In this case, I want smaller logs, no bigger than eighteen inches in diameter at the small end, sixteen to twenty feet in length. Knots are acceptable in moderation. I’ll probably end up paying $200 to $300 for each log, spending a couple hours hewing on each, and then assisting a local contractor install them on site.

Between finding new sources for hardwoods and springhouse work, it’ll be a pleasantly busy week. Can’t wait!

01/02/2026

A fun week building rafters. Now to track down a big tarp, rip off the old roof, and frame up the new one! Next week will be even more fun!

12/31/2025

“What did you do for New Year’s?”

“Oh, I built a few rafters for a spring house. Using nothing more than an 1880’s rip saw, a random buck saw someone gave me, an old auger bit, and a marking gauge.”

Now to get the tenons ready. Those are fun compared to the mortises.

11/27/2025

11/20/2025

The repointing is just about finished. The Portland cement of the 20th Century was painstakingly removed, inch by inch, and replaced with a much gentler lime mortar. I next turned my attention to the deteriorated bricks, most prominent on the corners. With a little help from Vitruvius(Ancient Roman engineer), we’ve come up with the solution. Keep in mind that these degraded bricks had simply been covered over in the same Portland cement as the pointing so anything will be an improvement both visually and for the long term health of the 1734 structure. Looking forward to releasing this odyssey-like story over on the YouTube channel tomorrow afternoon!

Then, we’re off to the springhouse for some heavy carpentry for the winter!

11/05/2025

Life could be so much easier. Alas, it is no one except only me. Long day finishing up the pointing ahead.

10/19/2025

When I trace almost all my ancestry to the Mid-Atlantic colonies(excepting the odd Quebecois great grandfather), I guess I couldn’t expect anything different. Funny that my German Mennonite ancestors don’t show up.

10/16/2025

WARNING!!!! This will be a long post.

Several months ago, I was requested to give an estimate for removing the paint from the 1860’s-era metal plates at a local, formerly Methodist, church. Before stepping foot on the site, I did a bit of research on the history of the building. That, of course, is my standard practice with every project.

In my personal collection, I have a small book published in 1860, written by a former Methodist preacher about his grandfathers. I picked it up on eBay for twenty or thirty bucks five years ago, never thinking it would ever be of any significance. I bought it mostly because one of my own ancestors, an elder in the local Presbyterian church in the first decade of the 1800’s, was briefly mentioned. It sat half forgotten on my shelf until now.

I read it more carefully and found a much deeper connection to the book than I ever imagined.

First of all, the subject of the book, the Reverend Thomas Miller and a former resident of Cherry Hill, was obviously a close associate of my family. My own 4th great grandfather was the first treasurer and builder of the original Methodist church in Cherry Hill. The Union Church, the burial site of Miller and deeply connected to his descendants, was just a few miles down the road.

The connection goes far beyond the printed pages.

The original owner of this particular copy was John W. Simpers, a grandson of the Reverend Miller. Simpers was also a lieutenant in Company A of the 8th Maryland Infantry. Under his direct command were two brothers, related to me both as uncles(through marriage) and as cousins(they were grandsons of my ancestor, the former treasurer mentioned earlier. One of these cousins/uncles was wounded and captured at Spottsylvania in 1864, losing a leg. His mother was born where I live now.

The final connection that comes to mind is the second owner of the book, Altha Simpers Summerill. She was the niece of the first owner, John Simpers. Simpers had no surviving children upon his death, making it easy to see how his niece ended up with this book.

She married a prosperous lawyer from Woodbury, New Jersey and spent her adult life in that area. Anyone familiar with me personally knows that my son has lived near Woodbury with his mother and grandmother for ten years now. In that time, I’ve become very familiar with the area and I was surprised to find this native Cecilian woman buried within sight of a road I travel so frequently. Her home in Woodbury is still there today. Altha Summerill was instrumental in the er****on of a monument to the local Gloucester County boys who served their country in the First World War. That monument is still there today, almost as much a monument to this civic-minded lady as to the veterans themselves. Incidentally, and I feel bad for this, but I was almost about to remove her ownership plate from the book to see what signatures May be hidden beneath it. Fortunately, I stopped myself and researched the poor woman. She and her uncle are now both part of the history.

The church is not quite ready for the work so that’s definitely off the table for awhile. I can’t complain. I’ve got more than enough to do with the continuing Salem work keeping me busy for another six months and the Pike Creek springhouse about to restart in the next two weeks. I ought to be pretty busy until at least early next summer.

There’s always plenty to do for a small one man operation. Between field work and the YouTube channel, I’m constantly moving. This little side quest into some local history and its connection to my own people was a brief moment of relaxation.

The book is now at the Union Church. I have permanently loaned it to their collection and am free to retrieve it at any time. I’ll never donate something outright to any organization. Ever since I learned that my ancestor’s Revolutionary War musket “disappeared” from the collection of a state historical society, I don’t trust organizations to protect, in the long term, what rightfully belongs to my own descendants. However, I trust the good folks of the Union Church to appreciate something so deeply connected to their history.

09/06/2025

Nearly finished removing the Portland cement from this almost three hundred year old brick office building. It’s been a slow and tedious process in order to minimize the damage to the surviving bricks.

The Portland was applied liberally, often plastered over the faces of the bricks to cover wear and other imperfections. This, of course, made the removal that much more onerous.

There were pleasant surprises, however. In one small area, evidence of possible 18th of 19th Century stucco(which was simply the same lime and sand mixture as the mortar and interior plaster, often added as an effective extra layer of protection or insulation over a brick or stone base) peeped through in the form of a lime and sand mortar mixed, imperfectly, with what appears to be cattle hair. “Dead mice”, I’ve heard them called: clumps of hair that were not properly teased into the mortar mix.

Whenever conducting work of this nature, documenting every step is absolutely essential. By the end of next week, this documentation will be published as three related YouTube videos. Can’t wait!

07/08/2025

Tedious work. Removing the Portland mortar from the oldest law office(1735) in the United States without destroying the fragile bricks is going to take time and a delicate touch. We pointed a small area two weeks ago to see how our new lime mortar will do. It’s surprisingly hard and durable. However, the colour isn’t quite to my liking. Will probably add a touch more lime and use a lighter coloured sand to brighten up the joints a bit. The darker sand gives it a natural look that, for this particular building, doesn’t seem quite right to me.

I kind of suspect that this little building may have been stuccoed when it was first built. If it was a field stone building, I’d be willing to bet that it was. Colonial era brickwork, however, could easily go either way. The stucco would add an extra layer of protection to the underlying materials and, honestly, it’s much faster and easier to stucco a surface than to fill in each individual mortar joint. With no clear evidence otherwise, we will simply point the joints.

05/22/2025

Another wet and weary day. Despite the weather, it’s been an exciting morning. The first plate went on with no real struggle. That’s relative, of course. If you consider wrestling a 250 lbs white oak timber up a pair of ladders and having it win a couple of rounds to be not a struggle, then it’s an uneventful morning.

The second plate, the subject of this post, is going to be the real challenge. It is a couple feet higher than the first due to the grade of the ground. It’s longer to span an opening, naturally making it heavier. However, I won’t complain about that. I’m happy to be challenged. Once I hit forty, I came to the conclusion that when a white oak six by six could whip me, I’d be ready to go to Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory. Until then, I’ll give a good old “ooorrah” reminiscent of my old man’s Marine Corps exclamation and do what needs done.

However, that isn’t the point of this post either.

It’s rather more exciting than that. In removing the old top plate, I was pleasantly surprised to find clear evidence that the attic joists were tied into the plates on one half of the building with mortise and tenon joints. I even found the fragile remains of the broken peg!

This complicates things a bit but, in another way, simplifies the work. It’s a complex little building we have here, altered from a springhouse to an office building in, I believe, the 1830’s. These alterations are clearly evident in the subtle construction details between the original springhouse and office. This simple mortise and tenon joint is one such piece of evidence.

05/19/2025

Almost ready for installation! The roof framing for the springhouse is roughed out. Two more rafters and the first section will be ready to go by the end of the day tomorrow. Just my luck, they’re calling for rain Wednesday so we’ll likely be soaked to the skin when we slide them into place.

The joints are a bit loose at the moment. This is by design. In most old buildings, stone outbuildings in particular, perfect measurements are hard to get and there is so much variation that all but rough measurements would be almost meaningless anyway. When these rafters are slid into position, there will be a bit of chisel work to be done to make each joint as close to perfect, both for aesthetic and structural reasons, as possible. When the wooden pegs are driven home, every joint should be almost a work of art if you think along those lines. I don’t really. It’s just practical work using methods that take the most advantage of the natural strengths and durability of wood.

At least the shingles are ready. Just need the lath and we’ll be ready to finish the first half of the roof. Once the buzzard moves out later this year, we’ll tackle the other half.