New (very old building) shop

[njsteve]

You know, of course, that every horror movie starts with the finding of one of these wells...


I love these kinds of movies!

Keep posting updates...

if you aren't too scared !

[m22mike]

Be cautiuos Lynn, Nessie might be in that well....

[Zedder]

Very cool Lynn...I’m tired just thinking about all of that work!

[A12pilot]

Your own a well!?!??!! Man, I’m jealous! “Hey Lynn, what’s going over there?” “Oh, nothing. Just drinking some water out of my OWN WELL!!l” Not many people can say that!

Do you think this could be the Money Pit they’ve been looking for on Oak Island but can’t seem to find? Maybe they just need to look further South!

Progress forward!!!

Cheers
Dave

[firstgenaddict]

The train tracks directly beside the building were in all likely hood a siding not the main line.
Having had rail service and having looked at buildings from the early 1900's with rail, they were not directly on the main line, there were switches and siding tracks.

FWIW
https://www.okc.gov/departments/util...-water-history

OKC Water history... after the LAND RUN in 1889 there was ONE WELL and you had to bring your own bucket.
The town purchased 14 wells and pipes in 1908 but they went dry in the summer... so they started planning the first lake in 1910 and opened in 1919.

May have been part of the original water system... or just a private well.

PERSONALLY I think the whole thing is cooler than the other side of the pillow... I just love old brick buildings.

[Lynn]

I am going to try and slowly bring this thread up to date. Most pictures were taken with my phone or Sherri's phone, so I spent some time last weekend transferring to my computer. I think the last picture I posted was of the newly discovered well.

I had already shown where I broke out some of the old concrete which had no rebar, poured new pads with 5/8 rebar every foot it two directions, and had to fill in the massive crater from when I removed a support post. Seems like a lifetime ago when we took out the post and put in two 28 foot long LVL timbers to create a clean clear span work area. What caused the crater? The concrete under the post was 18 inches thick. Even without rebar, it was pretty stout. I broke it down as far as I could with a 10 pound slege. Had to pull the last chunk out with my gantry crane. Here it is in the back of my El Camino. I am guessing 1200 pounds, give or take.

I ended up hoisting it out of the El Camino, then winching it up onto my trailer to haul to the free dirt and rock dump.

[Lynn]

You can see from the first picture that we removed about 1/3 of the wood flooring. I took no steps to salvage any of the flooring planks. The nails were really long, hard, and partially rusty from the moist environment. So, I just sawed down the joist lines creating 16 inch boards out of that 100 year old 2 x 6 douglas fir flooring which had no knots. I felt bad throwing it all away, but pulling nails one at a time was just too time consuming. We removed that first third of flooring and the underlying joists in less than a day.

Originally, I was just going to remove that one third, build a wall, and leave the rest. But, when I found the well, it was too close to where I needed the wall. We decided to remove it all, and concrete the whole area, creating additional work spaces.

I have some great friends here in Guthrie that REALLY wanted the flooring. They are restoring an old barn. You cannot find wood like this anywhere at any price. No knots, very heavy, with as many as 40 rings to an inch. I told them I had a couple of young bucks who work cheap on Sundays, and my friends agree to pay them to pull it out, one nail at a time. Took them three sundays to get it all. You can see the progress after one Sunday. Those 2 x 12 joists are still in place in the middle third section. Set my progress back three weeks, but I was glad to see the wood get repurposed.

For some reason, when I transfer photos from my phone to the computer, they end up flipped 90 degrees. Even when I flip and save they still come out wrong, so I apologize if you have to lean your head hard to the left to see the pics.

[Lynn]

What do you know, the pics stayed right side up.

[Lynn]

And James is correct. The RR tracks that are just a foot behind our building are part of a spur that came off the main tracks. The main train tracks are still in the same place today as they were in the 1800's. Even the depot is still there. Very cool old building that a young couple is renovating. One of the best steak houses in the State is now in that depot.

There is still a spur that operates a few hundred miles to the South. That is where the local lumber yard has the train bring in lumber.

[m22mike]

How are you going to seal up the well Lynn ? The floor joists are awesome.

Mike