Some additional thoughts about this house. The photo is from the Google Street View taken sometime last year. The exterior of the house hasn't changed much at all in the nearly 100 years since it was built. The front door has been painted gray, but it appears to be the original oak plank door, 2" thick, very heavy. The carriage lights on either side of the front door were added when the house was renovated after my sister's husband's grandmother's estate sold it c. 1962.
The floor plan, which you can barely make out, is of the house in Scarsdale. The one built in Sacramento was nearly the same, but there were some slight differences.
The upper floor plan is the first floor. You entered into a large terra cotta tile floored entrance hall. To the left, in the Sacramento house but not the one in Scarsdale, was a powder room, very tiny but adequate for doing one's business. It took up a small portion of the fireplace recess in the floor plan.
You went up a step into the main part of the house, specifically into the stair hall. From there you could turn to the right and go under the stairs into the butler's pantry, turn left into the living room, or go straight into the dining room, passing by the stair landing. There was also an entrance into the pantry from the stair landing.
The living room entrance was framed with a heavy fumed oak archway. Fumed oak is very dark. In the plan it looks like there is a step down into the living room, but in the house in California there was no step down. The room was approximately 27' x 16' not counting the bay window which probably added another three feet in length. The ceiling was 20' above the floor. There were three french doors leading to a long screened loggia. The fireplace was in a corner opposite the french doors, in a deep recess. On either side of the entry arch were built in bookcases, also fumed oak. The room was heated with radiators which were built in to the walls, one under the window on the wall where the fireplace was, and two others between the french doors. Each radiator had a wrought iron grille.
There was a Sarouk rug filling most of the dark-stained oak floor. The draperies were heavy wine red velvet, and the ones at the bay window and near the fireplace were hung on wrought iron rods. A Steinway "3/4 grand" piano was in the corner beside the bay window.
I remember three double branch electric candle sconces and two single branch ones, all in wrought iron with gilded leaf decoration. With all of them on, the room was dimly lit. It looked quite medieval, even chapel-like.
The furnishings were a mish-mash. Two small scale French sofas, both yellow tapestry covered, sat beneath the bookshelves on the entrance wall. There was a carved walnut coffee table in front of one. Because the other was next to the fireplace recess, it had nothing in front of it. There was a rocking chair, floor lamp and table with a magazine rack between the french doors. There were two 18th century style chairs (more English than French) in the bay window with a planter between them. An old cabinet radio that sometimes still worked was on the opposite wall from the piano. It had a very handsome burled walnut case. Between the fireplace and the window on that wall was a black and white television in front of which was a red-upholstered club chair set horizontally so that my legally blind brother in law could sit as close as possible the screen. It was the only way he could see the picture.
The walls and ceiling were covered in canvas that was applied like wall paper. It was painted gold that was varnished with a distressed finish. I've never really seen anything else quite like it -- except in a movie theatre from the 1920s. Overall, the room was heavy and dark, even though the bay window faced south. It was shaded most of the day, however, by a huge Monterey cypress.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed being in that room with others or by myself and spent many happy hours there reading the books and magazines from the bookcase, watching television, playing the piano, or listening to the radio when it worked.
I first visited the house in 1957, not long after my nephew's birth, and I would return to spend many days there during summers and school vacations from 1959 until the house was sold in 1962. During that period, my sister had two more children, and I enjoyed helping to care for them.
The dining room was also rather grand. It was a large, square, low-ceiling room with a heavy walnut dining table and six chairs. They sat on a large Karastan rug. There was a matching walnut buffet with a gilded and carved mirror over it. In one corner was a walnut tea cart with a silver tea service on it.
There were no windows as such, only french doors. One led to the screened loggia that extended on the west for the length of the living room. Another led to an unscreened but roofed patio that served as an outdoor dining room when the weather was good. The french doors had crewel embroidered linen draperies hung on wrought iron rods. There was a wrought iron chandelier over the table. It was decorated with gilded leaves like the sconces in the living room. There were also two single branch sconces in the dining room like those in the living room. The floor again was dark-stained oak.
All the furnishings in the dining room dated from the 1920s when the house was built as did some of the furnishings in the living room. The furniture had been highest fashion and very expensive when new, but by the late '50s, it was considered old fashioned, heavy, and rather ugly. I don't recall the dining room ever being used for meals when my sister lived there and I frequently visited. When we ate, it was usually on TV trays in the living room.
In one corner of the dining room was a swinging door into the long, narrow butler's pantry. Glass doored cabinets were filled with china and crystal that was never used in my recollection. The countertops were black linoleum. There was a sink under the window. My sister said it was "silver" but I would later learn it was German silver, an alloy of copper and zinc. I guess it was supposed to be used to wash the various dining room china and glassware, but it really seemed too small to be of much use for anything.
From the butler's pantry there was another swinging door into the kitchen. It appeared to have been renovated sometime in the late '30s or '40s. There was a six burner, two oven electric range in a tiled recess. A double door Frigidaire refrigerator was in a corner. As I recall, it no longer worked, and another newer refrigerator was on the service porch to serve the household. There was a door to the basement stairs in the kitchen; that's where there was a washer and dryer and laundry tubs. There was a double-bowl sink under the window and a built in dishwasher next to it. I'm pretty sure the dishwasher was the same age as the other appliances in the kitchen (late '30s - post-war '40s) and still worked, but I don't recall it ever being used. The service porch at the end of the kitchen (not shown in the Scarsdale floor plan) had the newer refrigerator and pantry shelves that held some of the bulk food my sister bought for the household. There was a door to the side yard used for garbage cans and line drying clothes, and another door to the "maid's room."
Of course, there had not been a maid for many years -- if ever. The room had been converted to a ham radio room by my brother in law. He had lots of equipment and was a noted local amateur radio enthusiast. There was a bathroom off the maid's room which he had converted to a dark room. He was also an amateur photographer, even though he was legally blind.
That took care of the first floor. The second floor was reached via an oak-tread staircase (I believe there was an "oriental style" stair runner to deaden the sound of footsteps), that was in the stair-hall which was directly off the living and dining room. The bannister was wrought iron with gilded decoration. At the top of the stairs was a wide hallway with grilled window that overlooked the living room. That hallway led to two large bedrooms and another narrower hallway that led to the third bedroom (labeled "library" on the Scarsdale plan). There were two bathrooms on the second floor, one of them private for the master bedroom, the other with a doorway on the narrow hall and a door to the second bedroom.
The master bedroom had a bank of multipane casement windows that faced west. There were roller shades on the windows, but I remember the room could get quite hot in the summer time. After my brother in law's grandmother moved out, the room was not used except for occasional guests. On one side of the room was a narrow "sleeping porch" above the loggia. It was enclosed with casement windows, but apparently was used with the windows open when the weather was good. There was a bed and a couple of dressers. There was also a desk and chair for writing.
On the other side of the room was a bank of closets filled with "granny-ma's" clothes and shoes. Beside the closets was a door way to a short hall with more closets. I don't remember what was in them. At the end of that short hallway was the master bathroom. It was blue-tiled with white porcelain '20s style fixtures. There was an enormous tub, a stall shower, a pedestal washstand, and a toilet. There may have been a bidet, but I can't be sure as it is not clear in my memory.
The master bedroom was furnished with painted "French" furniture. It was really '20s versions of French style, sort of Louis XV, but not. There were twin beds, a dresser, a dressing table and mirror, and various small pieces -- a nightstand, lamps, a bench, a couple of chairs, a chaise longue, all matching, painted white with flowers and gold trim, all '20s style. There were also two double branch wall sconces, painted white with gold trim and flowers.
The other two bedrooms were a little smaller than the master bedroom and their furnishings were newer, purchased by my sister and her husband in the Mid-Century style. One bedroom housed the two older children (they weren't very old at the time), and the other bedroom had a king-sized bed for their parents and a crib for the youngest girl who was not even a year old when they moved out.
The second bathroom was also blue-tiled and featured similar fixtures as the master bathroom, but I think the shower was over the tub rather than a separate stall. There was also diaper changing equipment for the kids in that bathroom.
The bedrooms had wall to wall carpeting. The halls, however, were oak floored, and I don't recall any rugs or carpeting, so they were kind of noisy when people were walking by.
The house is about 3100 square feet according to the Zillow. For my sister it was way too much to care for. Like me, she'd never lived in a house that big or that fancy, and she didn't feel she could keep it up while she cared for her kids and went to school for her masters degree. Her husband's parents lived down the street, and they'd send over their housekeeper from time to time, but my sister was overwhelmed by the size of the house and eventually hired her own housekeeper/nanny who would come every day and took care of the children and much of the house. But when the place was put on the market, it was to my sister's great relief.
After it was sold and was put under renovation by the new buyer, I toured it while workers were on site. The new owner wanted to lighten it up, and the interior was painted light gray and off white. Ironically, it made the interior look much smaller. Previously, the dark old gold faded away and fooled the eye into thinking that rooms were larger and higher than they were. The new owner also put a gray wash on the fumed oak woodwork and refinished the dark oak floors to a much lighter oak shade. Again, the effect was to make the rooms look smaller.
He put a huge crystal chandelier in the living room and replaced the iron wall sconces with crystal as well. He replaced the iron chandelier in the dining room with a crystal fixture that hugged the ceiling.
The kitchen and maid's room were being worked on so I couldn't tell how they would turn out, but I recall the listing for the similar house in Greenwich, CT combined the kitchen, maid's room and service porch into an open kitchen/family room with lots of '70s hoo-hah that really detracted from the character of the house. I don't know whether that was the plan for the house described here. I haven't been in the house since, so I don't know what's been done to the interior in the decades since it was first renovated in the early '60s.
This post is another memory exercise. I'm still experiencing memory issues, though they're not quite as severe since I increased dosages of vitamins D3 and B12. They really seem to help. I haven't been able to see my doctor however, as today's appointment got canceled when she went on early maternity leave.
So I'll keep doing exercises...
Meanwhile the chaos of the outer world increases exponentially, doesn't it?
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Interesting. I was able to see another provider (a PA) yesterday about my memory issues. She did a pretty thorough assessment and said she could refer me to a specialist if necessary. Ultimately, she determined I wasn't (yet) in a pre-Alzheimer's or pre-dementia state but that I was experiencing "Transient Global Amnesia" which could lead to something else but hadn't yet.
Increasing dosages of D3 and B12 was actually a good step because episodes of memory loss are not getting worse, in fact, I have fewer episodes than prior to increasing vitamin intake.
She suggested I also take melatonin as a sleep aid.
As for the causes of memory loss, she said that in addition to aging the medications I take for rheumatoid arthritis are likely depleting vitamins and affecting many other aspects of brain and body function. So keep up doing what I'm doing, watch for changes, and see what happens.
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