Today I had the pleasure of meeting Nancy, 91 years old, who lived in the upstairs half of Bonebrake in the late 1930s through the end of World War 2. Her mother rented what was then a four-bedroom upstairs apartment and subleased three of the bedrooms to single male tenants. Her father served in the war, so Nancy and her mother slept in the remaining bedroom (which is now the nursery/sitting room), and her brother slept on a pull-out couch in the living room (which is now the master bedroom). She had many memories of growing up in the house, including sneaking through a tenant’s room to play on the second-floor porch during the day while he was at work, and hearing her mother call to her on the street through a front-door intercom that communicated with the upstairs apartment at that time. She recalled having an icebox that sat on the fire escape outside the kitchen (which is now the master closet and bathroom), and seeing the iceman deliver chunks of ice to it. Because it was a separate apartment at the time she lived there, Nancy didn’t have anything to tell me about the first floor of Bonebrake. In fact, she’d never set foot there! After touring the upstairs, we sat in the parlor downstairs and she said impishly “So now I’m in the other lady’s apartment!”
Her recollections about the home confirmed many of the deductions I’ve already made. This house was already an up-and-down duplex by the 1930s, one of the first on the street, at a time well before the neighborhood started experiencing economic decline. By that time, the mantelpieces, cornices, and many other Victorian details were already gone. Several bedroom doors have large cut-outs where deadbolts used to be. It’s incredible to think those holes have been there for at least 80 years!
I should mention how I met Nancy in the first place, because it’s such a remarkable story! She still lives in Columbus, and apparently she and her daughter like to drive past this house about once a year just to look at the outside of it. When she drove past last week, Karen went over and asked what they were doing, assuming they were just being creepy. So we were able to make a connection and schedule this visit. It was such a rare treat to talk with Nancy and I’m so glad she was willing to make the climb up and down my stairs.