The house lands on its new foundation


To prepare the foundation wall for the house, the carpenter covered it with a two-layer wooden sill.  He anchored it well
enough to ensure that, should a tornado ever take the house to Oz, the basement will come along with it.


The carpenter covers the top of the foundation wall with two layers of wooden sill beams, on which the house will sit.

Then, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving Day ...


workers on crib of wood beams supporting hydraulic jack for lifting metal I-beam
head of moving crew outside garage operating hydraulic controls via hoses running to individual jacks inside garage
Using four hydraulic jacks centrally controlled (left), the movers lowered the house a few inches at a time by raising the metal I-beams slightly (above), sliding out the beams one row at a time (below), then releasing the air in the jacks (left) to lower the building to the next row of beams.


workers remove wooden beam below an I-beam which is supported by two hydraulic jacks on either side
head of moving crew perched on an I-beam 5 feet above ground chain-sawing a header block to size

The crew had to trim (left) and carefully watch (below) all beams and header blocks which held up the house walls to make sure they fit into the pockets in the basement walls.

The carpenter keeps his eye on a header beam to be sure it lines up with the pocket in the foundation as the house slowly lowers

Watching from the street and from underneath, I could see, inch by inch, the house lowering first left, then right, then a little forward... Then the walls touched the rim of the foundation.  Even more slowly now, the movers eased the 113-year-old onto its first flat foundation in decades.  I'd had no idea how painful listening to all those creaks and snaps would be!  What was happening to the structure??

Yet, miraculously, stepping inside afterward we saw how the crooked door frames had squared out.  Some of the cracks in the plaster walls actually sealed themselves closed again!  



Grandma stretches out her arms on the porch with Brian and cousin Colleen.

The following Saturday, Grandma came to visit and showed off for Brian, cousin Colleen and the camera
that she was on the porch without steps leading up to it!


view of the house, newly on its foundation, from the southwest, with Travis on porch and Grandma, Ken and Colleen exiting
(Her secret was the ground-level back entrance.)  Click here for a couple more group shots from Nov. 29, 2003.

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