Monday, February 24, 2014

The Old Kellogg Home in Lancaster NY

This is the house, built sometime in the 1800s, where John Kellogg lived until age 13. It's somewhere between 16 and 20 rooms.  He said both in his book. The photo, taken in 1940, shows the house next to another, sitting on a paved street with little land, compared to the 3 1/2 acres on a hill where it was in 1899 when John was born.

In Pieces of a Life I quoted a section from John's autobiography called "Life in Lancaster in the Early 1900's".  John sketched the small town atmosphere back in the 1870's and 1880's when his father, Charles, had his first three children with his wife, Clara Shotwell, who died.  They were born in the 1870's:  Charles, Kittie Clara and George.  These were John's much-older step-brothers and step-sister.

"Now let's go way back.  What was life like when Father lived in the little town of Lancaster?  Perhaps 5,000 people walked or drove buggies or wagons over dirt roads.  The sidewalks were of wood planks as were the cross walks.  Sometime later the Village paved Main Street with brick, which was a big improvement."

"Our house had been built many years before we bought and had about 20 rooms.  It had two floors, plus a cement floor, full basement.  In the basement there was a furnace in which we burned hard coal and which gave hot air through two ducts to the two living rooms and dining room on the first floor, also to both second floor front bedrooms.  The first floor also had a large kitchen and pantry, which were heated by a large range primarily used for cooking or baking."

John goes on to say that his room and those of the hired man and woman were not heated, yet "I did not feel bad about that for none of my friends had rooms with heat.  You piled on the blankets in zero weather and dressed fast in the morning."   When John speaks of the heat, "it brings to mind the fact that he turned off the heat at night in our house in Oak Park.  In the belly of the winter when pipes might freeze, he put on just enough heat to avoid that.  So I, too, remember bundling up at night and getting dressed very quickly in the morning."  


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