Civil Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
In a given locale, builders might have favored the
log gable with purlins (mostly evident in early build-
ings), the lengthwise poles or timbers on which roof
shakes were laid. Elsewhere the gables are framed. In
Kentucky, Montell and Morse found windows in the
fireplace gable ends of many houses, but Roberts
states in
American Folklife
that this was rare in Indi-
ana. It was also rare in the Ozarks, except in more
recent houses. It was often a case of the window glass
itself being rare.
The custom of covering newly built log houses with
siding seems clearly to have been practiced in areas
where sided frame houses were common. It was sel-
dom, if ever, done on the early frontier, for the obvi-
ous reason that siding was not available to the harried
hunter-settlers. Where siding was later applied in the
more remote areas, it is usually easy to see the weath-
ering of logs underneath, long unsided and exposed.
Determining House Age
Perhaps a discussion of determining log house age is
in order here. You will find that local inquiry unsup-
ported by responsible records is almost worthless for
houses built before the generations now living. Com-
mon responses are “It's way over one hundred years
old” (200 years in the East) or “My granddad remem-
bered that house when he was little, and it was real old
then.” Any building weathered gray is taken as being
old, and folks have a fondness for perpetuating myths
about the age of things. Let me warn you that they may
also become vehement and even violent about the
veracity of their pet versions of history (as any of you
who have researched local precedent already know).
In general, there are a few obvious things to look for
if no reliable records exist. For instance, round wire
nails came into use around 1890, although cut nails
can be found in houses built later. (They can still be
bought today.) The cut nails generally appeared
around 1820, although there were machines for cut-
ting them earlier. Of course hand-wrought nails were
used on the frontier after 1820, but (nails being a high-
priority item of trade) they were rare. Cut nails are
those tapered, blunt-ended ones with two rounded
sides and a symmetrical oval head. Wrought nails will
show the hammer marks on the irregular heads and
By the 1820s, hand-forged nails had generally been replaced by the
square-cut nails. By the 1890s, the round wire nail had replaced it.
Both the forged and cut nail were driven so that the chiseled point
would cut across the grain to avoid splitting.
are flattened at the point, to cut across the wood's
grain without splitting it.
Consequently, a log house peppered with round
nails dates since 1890, unless they were added later —
and their application will tell you that. Cut nails in
strategic places, such as in original door facings, put
your house roughly in the 1820-90 range. Pegging of
rafters and window and door facings, with maybe a
few forged nails, can mean you have a really historic
log house — that is, if it's located in an area of early set-
tlement. Or it can simply mean the area was remote
or the builder poor.
In the 1970s, I dated a log house near my home at
1850 at the latest, because two of its four layers of roof
were nailed with cut nails and the shingles were of
heart cedar. This wood easily lasts 40 years, if prop-
erly applied, so even if the second roof had been put
on in 1890, I shouldn't be far off. This house was also
