A home for all; or, The gravel wall and octagon mode of building..

Front matter

I LAX OF SECOND STORY.

■RESIDENCE OF 0. S. FOWI-EIi, FISH KILL,

A

Preface

To cheapen and improve human homes, and especially to bring comfortable dwellings within the reach of the poorer classes, is the object of this volume — an object of the highest practical utility to man. It delineates a new mode of inclosing public edifices and private residences, far better, every way, and several hundred per cent, cheaper, than any other ; and will enable the poor but ingenious man to erect a comfortable dwelling at a trifling cost, and almost without the aid or cost, as now, of mechanics. Except in a single particular, and this he has greatly improved, this mode is the invention of its author, and occurred thus. Till past forty, his profession engrossed too much of his time and means to allow him to procure a comfortable home ; yet for ten years he has been making observations, in all his professional peregrinations, and cogitating by months, upon the best mode of building the home of his future years. These have at length brought him to results, now reduced to practice. Let no one suppose that he has forsaken, or even turned aside from, Phrenology — that first and only occupation of his enthusiastic youth, and the idol of his matured and declining years. He has turned aside only to build him a good home, and in doing so, has made and learned improvements to adopt which will greatly increase home comforts ; and this work is written to propagate them, rather tlian as a complete architectural production. As its author is a phrenologist, not a builder, it may lack occasional details and specifications, yet will give every thing peculiar to this mode of building. Specifications respecting doors, floors, windows, etc., common to this and other modes of building, can be learned from scientific works on this subject.

The octagon form and the gravel wall are its two distinct characteristics. The form, as applied to domestic residences, is wholly orig-

IV

PREFACE.

Inal with the author, ancl the latter greatly improved upon, and at the other principles and suggestions the author has arrived while planning and studying out his own house. The work is offered, not as beyond improvement, for “ progress is a universal law,” but to apply this law of progress to house-building. Why so little progress in architecture, when there is so much in all other matters ? Why continue to build in the same square form of all past ages ? Is no radical improvement of both the external form and internal arrangement of private residences, as well as building material, possible ? Let this work answer

Section I. Principles, Facts, And Common-sense Suggestions About House-building

1. Man’s Requisition for a Home. 2. Men’s Habitations correspond with their Characteristics. 3. The Pleasures of Building. 4. What constitutes a Perfect Home Page 7

Section II. The Gravel-wall Plan

5. Nature’s Building Material. 6. Wood is objectionable. 7. Brick. 8. The Lime, Gravel, and Stone Walls. 9. Selection of the Material. 10. Lime, its Proportion and Mode of Mixing. 11. Placing and Working the Mortar-bed. 12. Relative Cost of the Gravel-wall. 13. Foundations. 14. Mode of placing the Boards for Boxes. 15. Scaffolding. 16. Width of Walls and their Solidity. 17. Door and Window Frames. 18. The Top of this Wall. 19. Temporary Floors. 20. Anchorage. 21. Chimneys, Ventilation, Speaking-tubes, etc. 22. Outside and Inside Finish. 23. Clay and Stone Wall. 24. Cost of the Gravel-wall. 25. Quality of this Gravel-wall. 26. Vermin excluded from Gravel-walls 16

Section III. Defects In The Usual Shapes Of Houses

27. High and low Houses. 28. Large and small Houses. 29. Number of Rooms desirable. 80. Large and small Barns and Out-houses. 31. Long and narrow Houses. 32. The Winged Style is doubly objectionable. 33. The Cottage or Doric Style. 34. Additions stuck on 56

VI

CONTENTS.

Section IV. Superiority Of The Octagon Form

85. Its contains one-fifth more room for its Wall. 36. Comparative Beauty of the Doric, Square, and Octagon Forms. 37. Plan of an Octagon Basement — a Milk-room — Furnace—Wood-house — Large Lumber-room. 38. Comparison of a Double Mansion House with a Twenty-seven Feet Octagon. 39. Superb arrangement of its Rooms. 40. Third Story of the Octagon. 41. Howland’s Plan of an Octagon Cottage — Carpenter’s Specification— Mason’s Specifications. 42. Description of the Author’s Residence. 43. The Main or Parlor Story. 44. Upper Stories. 45. Filtration. 46. Piazzas. 47. A Green-house and Flower-pit. 48. Shade Trees, Shrubbery, Fruit Trees, etc. — Strawberries — Black Raspberries — Red Raspberries — Blackberries — Blue and Whortle Berries — Cherries — Apricots — Plums — Peaches — Pears and Apples. 49. Roof and Roofing — Roofing Material— Glass for Roofing. 50. The Octagon Form and Gravel-wall applied to School-houses and Churches — Complete Ventilation — Churches. 51. General Building Directions and Advice — Mature your Plan well— Get all Ready — Employ' good Workmen— Consecrate it by Affection Page 82

SECTION* V.

OTHER PLANS FOR PARTITIONING AN OCTAGON HOUSE, BARNS, BOARD WALLS, ETC.

52. A Superior Plan. 53. Cellar Story. 54. Stairs. 55. Upper Story. 56. Barns. 57. Board Wall. 58. Cost. 59. Plank Wall. 60. Poor Man’s Cottage. 61. Associative Houses 160

EXPLANATION.

Small raised figures, called Superiors, are employed for reference from one to another of those numbered headings or paragraphs found throughout the work.

% Ipjjnu fur

Section I. Principles, Facts, And Common-sense Suggestions About House-building

1. man’s requisition for a home.

Evert living thing must have its habitation. “Foxes have holes,” and all burrowing animals and reptiles excavate domiciles in which to shelter themselves from the merciless blast and piercing cold, to which to flee from danger, and in which to rear their young. Ants, bugs, beetles, crickets, and even worms, dig themselves holes in which to live and breed, while the more ingenious bee builds its hexagonal cells in which to multiply, and store its winter “ supplies.” Bears and wolves have their homes in hollow trees and deep caverns, and even fish weave domiciles out of water grasses, or deposit their spawn in crevices among the pebbles, which thereby become habitations for their young. Fowls, having larger constructiveness, frame their domiciles with twig-timbers, mason them with mud-mortar, and cushion them with hair and feather mattresses, and there live together in blissful love, while they produce and rear the offspring of their happy union. Not merely all animals, but also every tree and shrub appropriates to itself land for a home in some cleft of the mountain crag, or on the rich banks of some stream, there to send forth their roots, and build up their cylindrical walls and leafy roof.

PRINCIPLES OF HOUSE-BUILDING.

Even every seed, every kernel of grain, has its own chamber and bed in its paternal homestead, every ear of corn its stalkhouse and husk-walls, and each fruit and nut its stem-abode, till it can go forth in search of a permanent resting place. The very hills have their eternal residences, and waters their ever-occupied abiding-places, while earth, and every sister planet, and celestial sphere, each traverses his own pathway, unmolested by foreign foot. Thus, every living thing, aye, every herb, stone, and thing in nature, grain of sand included, have their own homes, and in turn become abodes for life, enjoyment, and development.

Nor is man an exception to this great home law. On the contrary, is he not its most perfect exemplification ? Endowed with the primitive faculty called “ inhabitiveness,” created for the express purpose of compelling him to provide an abiding-place, which shall be the instrumentality and focus of most of life’s sweetest pleasures ; he can no more help craving home than food or friends, and absolutely must have some abiding-place as much as breath or sleep. Nor should any quench this home luxury, and even necessity, but let all provide for themselves temporary or permanent residences, as much as with food or clothes — only cloth houses. As we appropriate considerable time to procuring food or paying board, so should all set apart as much time to preparing and improving our homes, and “ furnishing” them with instrumentalities of comfort and luxury.

Especially ought every married pair to secure a permanent residence for themselves and children; for, without it, one powerful mental faculty must suffer perpetual abrasion, and many more, diminished and interrupted action and pleasure. This “ moving” is ruinously costly, alike destructive of property and pleasure, cripples husbandry, prevents planting trees and vines, and obliges tenants to- frequent the grocery, with money in hand, for a thousand little things which, if land-owners, they would raise. None can duly appreciate home, till, having once owned and lost one, after being cast upon stone-hearted landlords, they repossess themselves of a comfortable domicile, again to feast upon the products of their own gardens and orchards. Father, mother, whoever, wherever thou art, heed this important advice — provide a home first — whatever else you do, or leave undone, man’s requisition for a home.

and however stringent your poverty, even as your best means of escaping it.

Nor should any be content with a poor home only till they can better it, but provide the best they can. Time and money are wisely spent, which add to the real solid pleasures of home and family. All of us shamefully neglect this essential point. We carelessly tolerate evils and miseries by the score for days and years, which a few hours or dollars would remove. W e fail to give our domiciles their due proportion of our time and hinds. Those who are content to live in old rookeries, while possessing the means to build mansions, or perhaps erecting “ houses to let,5’ have sordid souls, and rob themselves and families of most of life’s joys, while those who build better barns for their stock than houses for their children, are both unwise and inhuman. Reader, look around your own residence. Rind you no evil, inconvenience, or nuisance — a smoky chimney, a poor oven or cellar, perhaps even a rat-hole — which a few dollars, cents, or hours would suffice to obviate, and thus remove a perpetual vexation, which now sours naturally sweet tempers, and makes every thing in the house and out of it go cross-grained 1 Or perceive you no improvement, which would cost but little, yet be a source of perpetual pleasure for life ? A neighbor remarked, “ I put up a dumb waiter for 030 — it need not have cost 010, if built with the house — which saves so many steps, and is so handy, that we would not do without it for 0100 per year.” And it will continue, for generations, many times a day, to save weary steps, expedite work, and bless every member of that family. In what other way could he have created as much pleasure, or avoided as much unhappiness, with that money ? Apply this principle, not merely to a good house, contrasted with a poor one, but to every iittle improvement you have added, or could add, to your home, and then consider whether a given sum spent in endowing home with little conveniences or instrumentalities of comfort or luxury, could be invested so as to yield as great an income, perhaps perennial stream, of pleasure. Ask yourself, “ Can I get more enjoyment out of time and money spent in providing a good house, rather than a poor one, or making this or that improvement, than by some other appropriation of them?” and let the answer

1*

PRINCIPLES OF HOUSE-BUILDING.

guage your home expenditures. Improving home facilitates, aids every other end and pleasure of life, while scanting it scants all.

It matters less what a house costs, than how good it is. Better disburse money in improving home, than on thousands of things on which we too often well-nigh throw it away. Let others spend theirs on balls, rides, fashions, etc., but let me expend mine on home, in annually adorning and improving it, till in life’s decline, I shall have erected for myself and family a perfect home ; surrounded by as many means of comfort and even luxury as possible, my land rich, trees yearly loaded with every variety of the choicest fruits, and provided with every thing conducive to beauty, utility, and comfort. In short, let all provide just as good homes as they can, and better than most think themselves able to do, even at the sacrifice of many other things. Not that in building you should endanger bankruptcy, or spend beyond your means ; but that you had better curtail other expenses to spend on home fixtures. To some, cheapness is an important matter. Let such cut their garment according to their cloth, yet get the largest garment possible out of what cloth can be had. Yet on few things can and do men literally squander money as foolishly as in building. To begin with a crude plan, and then alter this and patch up that, is foolish extravagance. Get all ready before laying the first stone. Especially, mature your plan. Know just what you want, and how to do it, and keep all your wits sharpened up. Inform yourself on this subject, so as to trust more to yourself and less to the mechanics, who may take more interest in your money than house ; and excuse this omission or that error, by, “I did not know how you wanted it.” Be your own boss, and throw yourself more on your own judgment, and less on that of mechanics, which is sometimes inferior to that of common men, because not warped by wrong training.

2. men’s habitations correspond with their characteristics.

The domiciles of all animals bear a close resemblance to their respective characters. Thus, inferior animals, moths, worms, reptiles, etc., make very poor homes, while the coarse-grained woodchuck, and other burrowing animals, are content with dark, damp, ground-holes. Beavers, higher in the creative scale, build them-

HABITATION AS CHARACTER.

selves nicer and better residences, while beasts of prey seek some dark cavern, from which to sally forth in search of hapless prey, and in which to deposit their booty. Walking fowls build on the ground, swimming ones in marshes, and flying ones in trees; while eagles select the towering crag, hawks and owls some deep wood, and innocent and tame birds, the tree by our door or window. Beautiful birds build tasty nests, the coarse-grained goose a coarse nest, and thus, throughout all nature, the abodes of all animals correspond perfectly with their characteristics, so that the latter can safely be predicated from the former.

This law applies equally to man. The Bosjowan builds a rude hut, yet of the lowest type of human architecture, because at the bottom of the ladder. The ruins of Pompeii contain only two houses, and these of rulers, above one story high — humanity then being little developed — while the Hottentot, Carib, Malay, Indian, and Caucasian, build structures better, and better still, corresponding with the order of their mentality. In villages, too, fine, fancy, old-fashioned, elegant, or odd houses, signify fine, fancy, old-fashioned, or elegant people.

Individuals, too, little refined, will build some outlandish tenement, as unsightly in looks as inconvenient in arrangement, but those endowed with good taste will erect a neat, well-proportioned, and beautiful edifice. The slack, low-minded, and “ shiftless,” aspire only to some hut or hovel, dug out of a bank, just to ward off the major part of storm and cold, placed in a muddy hollow, only a half story high, and supplying few of life’s necessities even, much less luxuries ; while the spirited, ambitious, and enterprising, whose aspirations are lofty, and minds high-toned, select eminences, and build high houses. Especially will the quantity and quality of man’s intellect evince themselves in the houses they build. Those who let the mechanic play with their purse, by first playing on their fancy, and persuading them to build after this or that gaudy or antiquated fashion, lack independence and judgment, while those of immature tastes will attempt some tryto-be-extra-exquisite monument of gewgaw crudeness, but those of well-balanced minds and sound practical sense, will plan and execute a comfortable, good-looking, well-arranged residence, which they will finish off in a style corresponding with their own order

PRINCIPLES OP IIOUSE-BIILDLNG.

of taste. Indeed, other things being equal, the better a man’s mentality, the better mansion will he construct, and the characteristics of the house will be as those of its builder or occupant.

Of course this general rule has many modifications and exceptions, both ways. Men possessing mental superiority may occupy inferior tenements, from necessity, habit, aversion to change the abode of earlier years, or even sheer inattention, while inferior ones may owe their fine houses more to their architect or fortuitous circumstances than themselves. So want of means, or a thousand other causes, may prevent given persons from carrying out their building tastes or talents ; yet, as a general rule, a fancy man will build a fancy cottage ; a practical man, a convenient home; a substantial man, a solid edifice; a weak man, an illy-arranged house; an aspiring man, a high house ; and a superior man, a superb villa. Yet this diversity of taste is well, for it variegates and beautifies both town and country, is compatible with superb taste and the highest utility, and promotes both ; and will indefinitely perfect the habitations of man throughout all coming time.

3. THE PLEASURES OF BUILDING.

Nor is man constituted merely to require houses, but also adapted to build them, by being endowed with a building faculty. Not merely does nature double and quadruple most of life’s pleasures by means of houses ; but she has made their erection absolutely certain, by rendering the very building itself most pleasurable. Behold how happy yon birds, in gathering materials, and building up day by day, a sweet little home for themselves and their prospective offspring; and say, ye who have ever built a residence for your own self and family, if its planning, its preparation, and its erection, from its very corner-stone, were not all pleasurable, so as literally to form an epoch in your history, and to overbalance even its expensiveness. And if it were conducted in the best manner, it might all be pleasurable. Building too hastily, or at great disadvantage, or unwisely, is more or less irksome, as is the non-obedience of all nature’s other laws ; but to see this room finished to-day, and that tomorrow ; this excellent fixture begun, and that added, is exult-

PLEASURES OF BUILDING.

ingly pleasurable. No labor of my life has given me more lively delight than the planning and building of my own house ; and to all it can likewise be rendered almost intoxicating.

Notwithstanding its expensiveness, men have a literal mania for building, which increases with civilization, and should continue till all are supplied with comfortable homes. Houses being so absolutely necessary,1 nature has made their erection absolutely certain, by rendering it thus pleasurable. This pleasure is consequent on its gratifying those two primitive faculties, Inhabitiveness and Constructiveness, along with several others; without the former of which he would never wish to build if he could ; and without the latter, could not if he would. How perfect this home-erecting arrangement of nature ! Then let it be cultivated by all.

These two faculties make men prefer to build their own houses, rather than to buy those equally good built by others. Hence, houses can always be bought cheaper than built. But, as birds, instead of living in some vacated nest, prefer to build a new one to their own liking, so men, unless too poor, should rather build than buy ; for, otherwise they will wish this different, and that bettered, all their lives, and probably spend more in “ alterations” than the extra cost of a new house. One may well be content to live in the old family mansion, consecrated by the joys and sorrows of his parents and ancestors, and by the sacred reminiscences of his childhood ; but give me a relatively poor house of my own erection, in preference to one built by some stranger.

4. WHAT CONSTITUTES A PERFECT HOME.

That which combines the most instrumentalities for comfort and enjoyment, especially domestic — the only rational end of any dwelling — only a few of the most important of which we will now name, leaving others to be developed as we proceed.

To inclose space is the first and main object. This is effected by making walls, floors, roof, etc.

Strength and tightness are required ; the former to resist winds, and the latter to exclude rains and colds, and include warmth. Light is needed, and secured by windows, as is also warmth, which should be easily created, cheap, governable, and

PRINCIPLES OF HOUSE-BUILDING.

complete ; for what comfort can be taken in an open barn of a house, the chilling blasts pouring in through a thousand insolent apertures, freezing one side while you roast the other, and exposing you to every sudden change of temperature.

Complete ventilation, under control, is another ; for every human being requires a copious and constant supply of this commodity, so indispensable, not merely to human comfort, but even existence.

A suit of rooms is also requisite ; one for cooking, another for family use, others for sleeping and other purposes, and all so arranged as perfectly to subserve their respective ends, and, of course, easily accessible from each to all, effected by doors, stairs, entry, etc. And these rooms should be conveniently located, as regards each other, and especially adapted to facilitate family ends, house-work in particular. Practical house-keepers know that it takes twice the labor to do up a given amount of work in some houses as in others. To have each room and its appurtenances, and all the rooms, as regards each other, so placed and arranged as to have every thing handy and convenient, and a place for every thing, is indeed a great desideratum. How much fretfulness and ill temper, as well as exhaustion and sickness, an unhandy house occasions. Nor does the evil end here. It often, generally, by perpetually irritating mothers, sours the tempers of their children, even before birth, thus rendering the whole family bad-dispositioned by nature, whereas a convenient one would have rendered them constitutionally amiable and good.

Beauty is also desirable, as gratifying an important human faculty.

A good building spot is also necessary, and one adapted to the proposed kind of house. The same money will often build a far better house on one site than on another. A superb building spot was one of the three motives which induced me to build where I did — the other twTo being good water, and an excellent fruit locality.

As to what constitutes a good building spot, “many men have many minds.” Some prefer valleys, streams, and lawns ; others water scenery, elevations, and sightly prospects ; but I confess partiality for the latter. Give me a beautiful landscape and an

WHAT CONSTITUTES A PERFECT HOME.

elevated site. This also guarantees a fresh, dry atmosphere, in place of valley fogs and miasms, together with whatever summer breeze may be afoot. And what if it is exposed to winter’s bleak winds'? Are they not bracing and healthy'? Yet a plan will soon be proposed which will enable you to defy them, yet enjoy summer’s balmy breezes. At least, do not build in a mud-hole. Yet good water, and handy, is most desirable, and springs exceed wells.

But, be your site where and what it may, let it and your house be adapted to each other. Some sites are admirably adapted to one kind of house, yet miserably unfitted to another, and the reverse. Choose your site with reference to your general plan, and then modify the latter till you effect a perfect correspondence of each to the other, and adapt both to your own wants and taste.

Section II. The Gravel-wall Plan

5. nature’s building material.

Nature has made ample provision for supplying every legitimate want of all her creatures. Behold in this her tender fondness, her maternal care. Hence, since a comfortable home is one of these natural wants, has she not made perfect provision for this home-demand of all her creatures ? Nor for rich merely ; for, does not her provisionary care extend to her needy creatures quite as much as to her more favored children ? Is nature so aristocratic as to provide homes only for the rich1? Does not her vast laboratory abound in some “ coarse homespun,” about as promotive of human comfort as her more expensive materials ? Ye homeless poor, be assured your mother has not forgotten you. She has provided some cheap and comfortable building material, if you only knew what it is. And in various climes it is exactly fitted to each clime — in cold latitudes, one every way fitted to withstand and keep out cold ; another in warm climes adapted thereto ; in damp places, something adapted to them; and thus of all the other conditions of all climates, for nature’s provisions are all perfect.

Before considering what this material is, let us see what it is not. Nature’s building material is abundant everywhere, cheap, durable, and complete throughout. Of course what is objectionable is not hers.

6. WOOD IS OBJECTIONABLE.

Because the whole of the earth’s surface is or will ultimately be required for raising food for man. All nature’s economies

WOOD IS OBJECTIONABLE.

point to the greatest possible number of human beings she can feed and clothe. For a time yet, or till she is well stocked with human beings, that surface is of little account, and can just as well be spared for raising timber for lumber as not. But let earth’s population increase for five hundred years to come, as fast as it has for one hundred past — and it is sure to far more than do this — and her entire surface will be densely populated. But to raise wood enough to erect and repair all the human habitations then needed, will require immense tracts of land, which otherwise could be appropriated to raising food, which would allow a far greater number of human beings to inhabit and enjoy earth and her luxuries, if there were some other building material, than if wood were mainly used. The strife will then be between tree and man, and will be short. The great consumption of food then will also render land so valuable for horticulture as to render wood too dear to be bought for building, even by princes. It is even now becoming enormously high in New York, namely, good pine $35 to $45 per 1000 feet. Then what must it become in fifty years ?

Wood decays, whereas economy requires that houses, once up, endure like time, and improve by age. This being obliged every few years to paint and repaint, to repair and re-repair, and even then to have your house perpetually rotting down upon you, is a defect too palpable to characterize a proper building material.

Wood houses burn down, often in half an hour; whereas a complete house must be incombustible. The ravages of fire in cities and towns are horrible, beyond almost any other horror to which man is subjected ; and even a country fire, if only a stable, is awful. No ! nature’s building material will not render her occupants liable to be turned by thousands in an hour out of comfortable rooms into houseless streets, perhaps in a night of darkness and storm, of snow and blow, terrible of itself when warded off by a comfortable house, but awfully horrid when forced out of a comfortable house and warm bed, perhaps sick, or aged, every article of comfort and luxury, the accumulated toil of years, consumed in a moment, perhaps a beloved child or companion scathed by flame and suffocated by smoke, burned to a crisp. No, no ! wood is not nature’s building material,

THE GRAVEL-WALL PLAN.

although a wood house is indeed better than none, and will do for man when he can afford nothing better.

7. BRICK.

Ah, now we have it. Slow to decay, incombustible, requiring little of earth’s surface for its production — yes, brick must be the very thing, says one. Not so fast. It wastes by time, is marred by frost, expensive, both in cost and laying — too much so to be nature’s staple building material — for nature cares for her poorest sons and daughters, and will not put good homes beyond their reach. Still, brick is by far preferable to wood, and will do in many localities, especially where it can be made on the spot , yet is too costly to transport far. An anecdote. A proud English lord spent an immense sum in erecting a magnificent manorial mansion, and invited another noble lord to examine, and say what he thought of it — proud to exhibit his riches and his taste. As his opinion was solicited, the visitor replied: “Well done for a mud house.” The muddy adjective so stung the owner, that he removed every brick, and rebuilt of stone. “ Then,” it is replied, “ you recommend stone houses.”

Not exactly. Very laborious to hew them into shape, very cold in winter, and damp in wet weather, either expensive or else unsightly — there must be something else better than this, than brick, or wood — some perfect building material. What is it %

8. THE LIME, GRAVEL, AND STONE WALLS.

Simplicity and efficiency characterize every work of nature. Her building material will therefore be simple, durable, easily applied, everywhere abundant, easily rendered beautiful, comfortable, and every way complete. All this is true of the gravel wall. It is made wholly out of lime and stones, sand included, which is, of course, fine stone. And pray what is lime but stone ? Made from stone, the burning, by expelling its carbonic acid gas, separates its particles, which, slacked and mixed with sand and stone, coats them, and adheres both to them and to itself, and, reabsorbing its carbonic acid gas, again returns to stone, becoming more and still more solid with age, till, in the lapse of years, it becomes real stone. By this provision of nature, we are enabled