Wednesday, December 29, 2004

A House with a Name


chestnut grove Posted by Hello

Architecture is an interesting thing.

What holds up this WallintheHouse is a Victorian building
initially constructed by a prosperous local lumber merchant
named Charles Sealey. Perhaps because of the large number
of Horse Chestnut trees growing on his land in 1850, Sealey
chose to build a home for himself directly in front of them
and aptly named it Chestnut Grove. This house originally
faced west until he later constructed an addition that
featured a new south-facing front entrance by carefully
matching the original brickwork. Today, only an expert can
detect evidence of his initial plan. This south entrance
still contains an original oak door with etched and frosted
glass and above it remains an ornate second story porch.

In the 1920's, ownership passed on to orchard growers,
Walter and Estelle Drummond, who planned to use the
house as a retirement home. Over the years, they
divided it into two rental apartments with individual
front entrances. But shortly after Walter's death in 1976,
Chestnut Grove was once again put up for sale.

A notable book dealer named Craig Fraser next purchased it
for use as an office for his business ("Specialty Book Concern").
His built-in bookshelves in the second floor front room
(now named The Board Room) still stand, as does his addition
to the back east side, a screened-in porch (currently used as
'a quiet room'). In 1987, Chestnut Grove and its property
was deemed to be of architectural and historical interest by
The Heritage Act. When Fraser finally sold Chestnut Grove to
the town in the early 1990's, municipal renovations removed
the walls that divided the house into rental units. Since
then, this home has housed a variety of community-based
programs and seen further renovations. Doors that were kept
in storage whenever removed have since been made into work
tables; these preserve more of the original architectural
flavour by inviting the outside back in.

When painting alone at night in this house, one can hear
particular sounds that only solitude affords. Time spent
in an old structure is unlike other kinds of time. Just
as any old house does, this one is comfortably filled
with its ideosyncratic creaks, stretching the trace of
past lives forward into an ever-present now. But time
spent in this house is also overlaid with more recent
living memories of children's laughter oozing off
the wall(s). Sounds that echo happily from within its
stillness and beg the question: how does one reverently
carry the memory of others forward? Although our sense
of (Canadian) history is still so young compared to
that of other places, one becomes acutely aware that
we write ours as we go.

Always wondering, through the quiet night of every
wordless stroke, how our (collective) actions will be
remembered by those who follow.

The marks we leave behind.
And those that hold us up.