Snow plow buried by a second avalanche (this and the following two pictures are from WSDOT)
We decided to flip a U'ey and head up Snoqualmie Valley to I-90 and then over Snoqualmie Pass and skip going to Lake Wenatchee. Not waiting for the pass to open turned out to be the right decision. While the road crew was clearing the avalanche from the highway, a second avalanche came down and buried the snow thrower. The operator escaped uninjured. It turned out that the pass was closed for two days.
Snow plow got smashed by the avalanche
Mud slide in Tumwater Canyon
While heading up the Snoqualmie Valley toward North Bend, we heard on the radio that a mud slide had just buried the highway at Tumwater Canyon. The west side of the pass was blocked by snow and the east side by mud and rocks. Skipping going to the cabin to pick up tools looked like the right move.
Snoqualmie Falls
It was still early in the morning, but we were an hour and half behind schedule at this point. We saw lots of news crews setup along the river to report on the flood. Nevertheless, we stopped at Snoqualmie Falls to see the flooded river pouring over the falls and let Gypsy out of the truck for a break. We got on I-90 at North Bend and headed over Snoqualmie Pass across Washington to Spokane. We stopped for gas, tacos, and bought some tools we knew we needed to pull up the carpet, including some scrapers, pliers, and screwdrivers. Originally, we were just going to bring all those tools from the cabin. We pulled into Wallace around 2pm. There's an alley behind the house where the garage sits. It was still pouring rain. We unloaded everything into the garage and from the garage, across the backyard into the house. We found two letters from the insurance company in the mailbox. Those letters proved vital in the days to come.
Master bedroom
I took "before" pictures of all the rooms in the house so in the future we'll be able to look back and see what the various rooms originally looked like. Our plan was to pull up the carpet in the bedroom and see if there were wood floors underneath.
Wood floors under carpet
When we pulled up the carpet, we found maroon-painted fir floors like the ones in a pair of other bedrooms upstairs. This is what we expected. We finished pulling up the carpet, the padding, and then the perimeter tack-board, and all of the nails and staples. Carolyn hauled all the carpet pieces downstairs and stacked them up.
Before picture of steps down to the lower level of the upstairs
After the bedroom, Carolyn and I began tearing the carpet from these stairs. It was a surprisingly difficult job. On each step, there were two rows of fifty 1" nails. Each nail had to be pulled out with a pair of needle-nose pliers.
After photo of the same stairs
One of the tools we were going to pick up at the cabin was a ShopVac. It was obvious we'd need a vacuum to pickup all the dust and dirt from the gaps beneath the baseboard and in the corners of the stairs. By this time it was late in the evening and the local hardware store was closed. We hopped in the truck and drove 10 miles west to Kellogg (another old mining town) where there's a WalMart opened 24 hours. We bought a ShopVac and some milk, food, and an unbaked pizza. When we got home, Carolyn cooked the pizza and we watched a dvd in the home entertainment system the previous owner left at the house.
Before picture of the upstairs hallway
After picture of the hallway
After a good night's sleep in our new bedroom, we got started pulling up the carpet in the upstairs hallway. Again, the number of nails used to hold down this old carpet made for slow going. I started on the stairs heading down to the first floor, but Carolyn was anxious to see what we'd find under the dining room carpet.
Dining room
When we pulled up the dining room carpet we found a beautiful aged fir floor, but there was a lot of old hard mastic on the floor as well. We found green linoleum tile in the stairwell and the living room closet. Obviously, this wood floor had been covered with the same green linoleum, but before the carpet had been put down, the linoleum had been scraped off.
Carolyn scraping off the mastic
We finished pulling up the carpet, padding, tack strips, and all the nails and staples. We loaded everything into the bed of the truck out front. We didn't want to scrape the old finish with metal tools, so Carolyn and I put on our coats and walked to the hardware store in the historic downtown. They didn't have a plastic scraper, but we found a windshield ice-scraper that might work. We stopped at the county building to register my motorcycle. The letter we found in our mailbox was crucial to prove that we actually had a house here. The woman at the window said we had to call Skip at Osburn's sheriff's office to come look at the motorcycle to verify the VIN on the frame matched that on the title. We also walked by the Wallace public swimming pool. It was built by the CCC in the 30's and the seller of the house mentioned he spent his summers as a kid at the pool. It's only a few blocks away. Back at the house, Carolyn was on a mission to scrape the old mastic off the floor.
Evidence of an old wall
Removing the old carpet was like excavating an archeological site. We found evidence of two walls that extended out to separate the living room from the dining room.
The other half of the old separating wall
Taking a load to the dump
Last night on the way to Kellogg, we drove by the garbage transfer station in Osburn to see what time it closed. It closes at 4pm each day. By now it was 3pm on Friday. We loaded up the truck with all the carpet and headed for the dump. Because we had Washington license plates, the dump master pulled us over. He wanted to know the dealio. We explained we bought a house in Wallace. He wanted to know if it was our primary residence. We said no. He said we'd have to pay a dump fee and weighed us on the way in (full) and out (empty). However, he was sympathetic and glad someone was actually moving into Wallace, rather than abandoning it, and didn't make us pay anything. Carolyn met our next door neighbors (in the green house).
Our house was essentially in move-in condition. The drawers were stuffed with clean towels. The cabinets had plates and glasses. We washed a load of clothes in the washer and dryer down in the basement. I washed a load of dishes in the dishwasher. Everything worked. The house was kept in remarkable condition.
We don't have hardwired internet at the house and the only cell phone provider that works in the area is Verizon. Fortunately, the Verizon signal is strong and I was able to turn on the "wifi hot-spot" feature of a Xoom tablet and Carolyn was able to access the internet (and chat with Allison) from her phone and we were able to listen to General Conference on my laptop, all via the shared internet connection. It worked great.
Wallace library
Back from the dump, Carolyn and I walked to the Wallace Library. It was built in 1911 with a grant from the Carnegie Foundation. We went inside and got library cards. Again, we had to use that letter addressed to the house in order to get those cards. We checked out a VHS video on knocking down the smelter smokestacks in Kellogg and a DVD on mining silver in the area. Carolyn cooked dinner and we watched the documentaries before heading to bed.
Living room floor
On Saturday morning we pulled up the carpet in the living room and found a nearly pristine fir floor underneath. This section had not been covered with linoleum so there was no black mastic to remove. We pulled out all the nails and staples.
Before pictures of stairs
While Carolyn was scraping the mastic off of the dining room floor, I ripped up the carpet from the stairs. With 50 or more nails per stair, it was tedious work.
After view of the stairs
We're going to repaint everything, eventually.
Back bedroom on first floor
When we pulled up the carpet in the first floor bedroom, we found the dreaded green linoleum. Scraping off the linoleum left a thick residue of mastic. We'll have to investigate and bring various chemicals next time to try and remove this mastic. Hopefully, the fir floor will be in good shape when we're done, but it's more likely we'll have to sand and refinish the floor.
Carolyn scraping off the linoleum
Gypsy found a twin!
The neighbors next door are wonderful. The husband grew up in Wallace and his wife has lived in Wallace since high school. They raised their family here. She teaches at the high school. Her commute to the school is 37 footsteps from her front door. Her husband worked in Wallace as an HR person for a mining corporate office during Wallace's hayday. Now he has to commute all the way to Post Falls for his job. They have an Aussie dog just like Gypsy, but about 6 months older. Both dogs spent hours outside playing with each other through the fence. Our neighbors invited us over for dinner that night.
Barnard Studio
We made another run to the dump with the last load of carpet and linoleum. The dump master today heard our story of buying a house in Wallace and waived us right through. When we got home, we took showers and walked downtown to the fancy Jameson Hotel for lunch. On the way back, we walked by the Barnard building. Carolyn and I both read the book Mining Town, which is a photographic record of T. N. Barnard (and his assistant) from the late 1800's through the early 1900's. He built this building and his studio was on the first floor. When his assistant passed away in 1964, an astute historian was able to snag 200,000 photographic glass plates and negatives and donate them to the University of Idaho. Part of the collection has been scanned online and Carolyn and I have poured over the photographs looking for a picture of our house from the early 1900's.
Barnard Studio in 1907
Barnard's building looked a lot better a hundred years ago. I wonder why the windows have been boarded up smaller and the various storefronts bricked in?
The old town of Burke
Later on Saturday afternoon we drove up one of Wallace's side canyons to the old town of Burke. For nearly a century it was the center of several large silver mines. There were a couple of high schools and several elementary schools in the towns on the way up the canyon. Now almost all of the buildings are gone.
What Burke looked like back in the day
An old sign
Hecla mine buildings
I snapped all these photos while it was snowing.
Hecla building from 1924
While the Hecla Mining Company has abandoned Burke, they're still mining silver from this same vein, but accessing the vein from a 7,000' deep shaft in Mullan, up the highway from Wallace.
Another view
Hecla loading buildings
Headframes to mine shafts
Ore loading building
Old sign
We met several neighbors today. One older gentleman "Moe" rang our doorbell and said he came to give us back the key to the house. He was friends with the woman who lived here and had a key in case of emergency. We invited him in and asked him if he'd keep the key and keep an eye on the house. He was really friendly and wanted to know our religion. We told him we were LDS. He said his brother-in-law was a bishop. He pointed out a house across the street where he was born and told us a lot about the area. We also met the neighbor to the right of our house. He lives in a small town in Washington and is trying to sell his house in Wallace. He asked if he could put a ladder on our property to get access to his attic. I said sure and told him any arrangements or agreements he had with the previous owner are still in effect. The doorbell rang again and an insurance guy from our insurer was there to measure the outside of the house. It seems like a busy day meeting lots of people.
That night we went next door to our other neighbors for a delicious roast beef dinner. Their house was beautifully decorated. They're empty-nesters now and told us all about their kids. Since they themselves grew up in Wallace, they told us all about the town back when it was the headquarters for all the mining companies, the execs lived in town, there was a nunnery, two hospitals, and the town was a bustling metropolis.
On Sunday morning we got up fairly early, packed the truck, and drove home. Allison was anxious for us to get home. It was a productive, fun, and adventurous trip.
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