The fire department turned it down. The last tenant left over 10 years before. Windows were broken, animals had moved in, gutters were hanging off the eaves, and the roof had big holes. Most people would have driven right by without giving it a second look, but apartment life had run its course and what better alternative could there be to fill Dave and Lynn’s first-time home buyer needs than this? Ignorance truly is bliss. Had they known what was in store over the next 10 years they surly would have run away before pulling in the driveway for a closer look. And, as it turned out, it offered some of the best experiences – and crazy stories – that anyone could have hoped for. Bat Mummies in the Furnace Flue is a collection of many of the events surrounding the discovery, purchase, renovation and adoption of this farm as a member of the family. And, if the walls could talk, they would probably say their adoption of Lynn, Dave, and the family. At times you will laugh, you will shake your head, and you will enjoy this collection of these events told first-hand by Dave. And when you are done, you will begin writing down your own stories to share!

Although it seemed to take forever to happen, the day finally came when we would get inside. We drove out to Sunbury Road during a beautiful Ohio summer day. It was one of those pleasant Ohio days, neither too hot nor too cool. You could either nap in the shade or work in the sun in complete comfort. Possibly it was our excitement of the progress we were about to make in actually seeing the house, as we had talked ourselves into a frenzy by that time, but it seemed like a more perfect day would be hard to describe.

Our meeting was to be with a gentleman by the name of Smokey Ballenger who represented the sellers. Well into his sixties, he was a presence of a man, at least six foot four inches tall with a practical air in his manner. As we introduced ourselves and started to talk about the house, it was quite obvious that there was no perceivable drive to make the sale. In fact, he was probably more doubtful of there actually being a sale the longer we stayed on the property and eventually ventured into it. He certainly was familiar with the condition of the interior, a reality that he would let us experience firsthand instead of forewarning us as we approached.

Eager with anticipation and caught up in the excitement of the moment, we looked through and walked past any and all defects immediately noticeable from the outside. The house was solidly positioned on its stone foundation supporting a structure entirely of brick. Even though it was solid, there were several visible signs of neglect and age on the outside that would require attention in the near term. We made little note of the old green roof with swollen shingles that had long since passed their intended life. Clogged, corroded, and falling gutters had provided winter backup onto and under roof areas, causing rot and affording smaller animals (such as raccoons and squirrels) protected dens and undisturbed nesting areas in the free-roaming expanses of the attics—but on that day we cared little of these items. Broken windows in the upstairs, main floor, and basement mattered very little to us, although they offered perfect entry for more acrobatic and flying animals. Peeling paint on doors and windows were items of immediately low importance. Weathered and worn electrical wires certainly in urgent need of replacement were looked past as they, with all the other exterior deficiencies, were lightly classified as all being fixable. Whether we would undertake this effort would be determined by the state of affairs on the inside. And, by then, we were eyeing this place the same way a hungry dog looks at a fresh piece of unattended meat. It would have taken a massive defect for us to be dissuaded.

After proper introductions and several re-confirmations of our desire to see the house, we made our way to the rear of the building. We walked up an old stone path from the overgrown driveway to the porch. Even though we had visited the property before this trip, we were surprised to find a back porch during this meeting with Smokey. His large frame simply disappeared through a hidden seam in the brush onto the concealed porch. The once simple, ornamental shrubbery had grown so massive, it entirely covered the rear porch. We crept through the shrub barrier like a jungle safari caravan with Smokey finding the invisible passage then assuring our advance. We followed his invitation to the interior of the space, slowly and unsure as we stepped over a sunken concrete step whose supporting soil had been carried away over the years by the wash of a hanging gutter and clogged downspout. I remember my thoughts ran quite counter to Lynn’s as I felt the porch offered a unique and appealing mixture of nature and domesticated life. She just saw spiders.

Following our push between the massive evergreens, we discovered ourselves in the unique cave-like setting created by both man and nature. In dimension it was approximately fourteen feet wide and just under ten feet deep. Two of its four sides were intended to be exposed, one to the driveway and the other toward the rear of the property where the barns and kennel stood. The floor was concrete and sat above a section of the basement. The ceiling was finished beneath the roof area, which extended over the entire space of the porch and kitchen that we were about to enter. A rotted opening in the roof provided access for a small family of raccoons who had adopted it and the associated attic space as their home. As we moved onto the porch, they moved to the nearby tree. It was a startling experience for the raccoons as well as us humans. Unbeknownst to us, we had just been offered a preview of the treats this old house would eagerly be willing to share.

After successfully forcing the stubborn door into the house, it became clear to us that the only visitors over the last several years had been the varmints and critters staking out their claims on the premises. The air was stuffy and distasteful—the type of smell produced over years of humidity, dust, and stagnated air mixed with whatever fauna had passed through and the remnants of what had been left behind. Clearly not in a state to have a dinner party, unless your dinner is nuts, a root, or an insect or two!

The more we looked the more we discovered. Immediately we were observing and collecting massive amounts of information we had starved for during the months leading up to this point.

The first room we entered from the safari porch was the kitchen. It was large and offered a big window toward the back of the property as well as another to the north. Doubtlessly inspired by a designer who felt that a view of the large yard as well as the working barns and land would provide vigilance to occupants juggling the duties of the farm, family, and food. Its size and placement could easily afford the creation and consumption of meals for a large group inside or out during the busy times on the farm. A small bathroom, the only one on the first floor, sat in what I would describe as a corner of the kitchen. Although a mark of efficiency, it offered little privacy when the kitchen was bustling and could adversely influence one’s appetite in certain situations.

The entire kitchen and bathroom area was part of an addition to the original house added fifteen years or more prior to the departure of the last human occupants. It is hard to imagine what had been there before. Although it was extremely well built, it offered no dramatic appeal. It was logical, practical, and functional, right on target for its intended purpose. The most puzzling piece of this room was a simple fixed vent above the door between the kitchen and the bathroom. It was permanently set to the open position and prevented complete privacy. It was possible to have a clear conversation between people on either side of the door. The sound traveled between bathroom and kitchen completely unmuffled and unaltered, as if the bathroom door was not even closed. It was clear that a person using this bathroom could never be totally isolated from anyone in the kitchen—a situation that allowed for selective practical jokes upon first-time users of these facilities.

From the kitchen, we entered the dining room, passing some built-in cabinets and a laundry chute. For the type and style of the house, this room stood out to me as one of the grandest. It was the first room of the original house that we saw. I felt something special when I walked into it through its thick, tall archway. It was also one of, if not the, biggest room in the house. Unlike the kitchen, the ceilings were almost ten feet high. Two narrow windows viewed out onto the rear porch. A second window, approximately six-feet high, faced the driveway, next to which was a door to yet another porch. As I stood there, I could imagine dining with all windows open, a cool summer breeze passing through, and the evening ending with a casual conversation, cool beverage, and relaxing rocker.

The dining room offered two routes into the front section of the house. One was through a hallway, which led directly to a front sitting room. The other, although to the same room, went up four steps to a landing leading up to the second floor, and then down four steps into the sitting room on the other side. These two paths, along with the high ceilings and tall open windows lighted by a conspicuously undersized chandelier, gave this room its openness and feel of size. The diminutive size of the fixture created a noticeable and strange orientation to the room altogether. Was the room really big or was the light too small?

Shag carpeting that had gone out of style at least twenty years earlier covered the floor and was most likely embedded with a collection of organisms that only National Geographic fans could appreciate. With a little wall-plaster and hidden floor damage from a water leak, due to the gutter wash from a second-floor downspout clog, this room was in relatively good condition.

Before leaving the dining room, I tried to imagine what it must have been like running the entire farm in the late 1800s when it was new. I was curious about the people who first moved in and what they did to live and thrive. I could only wonder how different everything had become since those days. I took a moment to think how many people had walked through that same archway and looked into this room when it was full of food, people, and conversation. Although this was our first time in that house, I made a promise to myself that we would soon be hosting our first of many Thanksgiving dinners here, as long as the rest of the house was in as good of condition.

The front section of the house offered two good-sized rooms separated by a large archway. It gave the feeling of one big room. The sitting room was nearly the same size as the dining room and had a vestibule off the side of the house toward the driveway. It had been added at the same time as the kitchen addition, so it lacked the higher ceilings and was small and dark. The sitting room had several original tall, thin windows and looked out toward the front of the house along Sunbury Road. Although there was no visible major work to be done, the red shag carpeting and maroon velour paisley drapes would certainly have to go.

The final room on the first floor was the fireplace room, which sat on the other side of the large archway. It offered windows to the north and to Sunbury Road. The fireplace had been replaced during the same period as the vestibule and kitchen. It offered an inviting picture of warmth and comfort. A young tree had grown from a squirrel’s hidden cache next to the house and had matured with a branch pushing through the window’s aged glass. The scene in this room was more artistically appealing than comforting to us as possible owners; since live plants indoors are typically contained in pots, and generally are not rooted in the yard just outside the window.

With the inspection of the first floor completed, we ventured up to the second floor.

The stairway cut through the center of the first floor’s footprint, something unique to this house and atypical of its period. It was solid but narrow and seemed steeper than necessary. At the top of the steps was a hallway offering four rooms. One was to the left several steps down the hall toward the rear of the house. A second was just ahead at the top of the steps. Another was to the right just a couple steps. And the fourth was also to the right at the end of the hall. A small doorway in the ceiling provided the entry point to the attic. Even with the tall ceilings continuing up to the second floor, it felt like a tight fit. A quick gaze at the hall, walls, and floors suggested no major defects or difficult repairs needed to be performed. Although I had been expecting to be looking up at a dark cavern of rafters and cobwebs with curious, secluded eyes staring back at our group.

The bathroom was our first, and almost final, stop as it provided the biggest challenges. It was a mess with a droopy, suspended ceiling, buckling vinyl floor, nasty sink, peeling wallpaper, and corroding tub. All this was enhanced by the form of a semi-petrified black bird preserved in this final resting place for our discovery and pleasure. We made note, closed the door, and moved to the next room with renewed thoughts of what little bugs could be jumping onto our shoes and climbing up our pants. We swallowed lightly, shortened our breathing, covered our heads, and moved on, making sure not to touch anything.

At the rear of the house was the master bedroom. It had two windows, one facing out the back of the house and the other over the driveway. This room sat directly above the dining room. From either of its windows, one could climb out onto the roofs above each of the porches. Although it was one of the rooms that I was originally concerned about, due to constant washing from the clogged downspout, there was no damage at all. Lynn and I looked at each other. “Carpet and drapes,” check, got it—on to the next room.

Returning back down the hallway to the remaining rooms showed mostly the same conditions. The layout of the second floor exactly mimicked the footprint of the rooms on the first floor. All rooms were in relatively good shape and, of course, in need of carpet and drape removal plus new paint. According to Lynn, “The colors of green, yellow, and pink are not in our color palette.” “Ditto” was my response. “But what is a color palette?”

The walls and ceilings had yet to be effected beyond a state of minimal maintenance and repair. Only one wall would require some major plasterwork. The ceiling above the back porch would need to be replaced as the raccoons and rain had affected it beyond recovery. In the kitchen it was clear that an entire redo would be in order. All windows on the house would eventually need to be replaced along with gutters, downspouts, and soffit. The furnace was old. The yard was a mess. And we were not certain to what degree beyond the raccoons, but we knew there would be more critters to be found.

In other words, it was perfect! To everyone’s surprise, and Smokey’s delight, we decided to buy it.

As it turned out, however, it was much more of a challenge to get the owners to reach that point. As we quickly discovered, the house was jointly owned by a group of retired, octogenarian physicians who no longer spoke to each other, and this mutual dislike almost derailed our purchase on several occasions.

The entire process of getting them to agree among themselves, reach a price, and contract the sale took almost a year. Our side of the purchase was funded by Lynn and me selling our cars for the down payment. I sold my 1977 Corvette and she sold her 1981 Camaro. We were so limited by our budget that we could only afford an $800 monthly payment, causing us to set up the purchase with negative amortization. This meant that our monthly payment was not even enough to cover the interest accruing on the debt. Still, to us, we had succeeded in accomplishing our goal. We got it, and it was ours.

During our fifth or sixth year there, we were chatting with some of our friends about the property and this very story of its purchase. As I was telling these friends the story, I shared how Lynn wanted it so bad that we really leveraged ourselves to buy it for her. She overheard that statement and said, “It wasn’t me who wanted it. It was you!” Of course, my response was the same back to her. We smiled and all burst out into a fit of laughter. In that noisy and jovial moment, Lynn and I exchanged a glance realizing that it was neither her nor I that had chosen the house or created the bond. It was the magic of the house, its spirit, and the richness of its character that had brought us to it. view abbreviated excerpt only...

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