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> Steven Preister's house in Washington, D.C. is a piece of American history, a gorgeous 110-year-old colonial with wooden columns and a front porch, perfect fo

> Steven Preister's house in Washington, D.C. is a piece of American history, a gorgeous 110-year-old colonial with wooden columns and a front porch, perfect for relaxing in the summer. Unrelated to the article, but I thought this was an odd characterization. The building I live in in SF is at least 10 years older than that. Most of the buildings around me were built before 1910. I think my building is ugly and sucks because of noise and draft and stuff falling apart. I wonder if they built better in DC because of the snow and comparably more rain?

aaronblohowiak 4y ago
Your building may have been maintained differently and your fast in aesthetics may be different
AlotOfReading 4y ago
There was a devastating earthquake and subsequent fires in 1906 that burned down nearly the entire city. Since the entire population of the city was displaced, they rebuilt as quickly as possible to get out of the refugee cottages/camps. It doesn't really matter how you build a home though, it's eventually going to become creaky and drafty over time. The only real way to mitigate it is regular maintenance and repair. That's true of all infrastructure.
- Gordonjcp 4y ago
  > It doesn't really matter how you build a home though, it's eventually going to become creaky and drafty over time. Why is that?
  - meheleventyone 4y ago
    The effects on the building materials of the weather, sun, insects, fungus, bacteria, vegetation, mechanical wear and so on.
    - Gordonjcp 4y ago
      I'm not really getting how brick or stone would creak or become leaky like that.
      - meheleventyone 4y ago
        Buildings tend not to be built exclusively in brick or stone and even when they are tend to be held together with mortar. Even brick and stone are susceptible to water intrusion and a bunch of other things. For example freeze-thaw is a very natural cause of erosion of stone. Vegetation is another common cause of undermining those sorts of structures. Of course some materials last longer than others but that doesn’t make the resulting structures habitable.
        Gordonjcp 4y ago
        Most of the houses where I live are two or three hundred years old, and not particularly leaky or draughty. The one I'm in is only about 90 years old. What are they building houses out of where you live?
        meheleventyone 4y ago
        With maintenance sure. Which was the very next part of the original post you quoted so this reply to me makes no sense. For example I’ve got a rubble wall that’s really showing the effects of freeze-thaw just now and if I don’t actively spend the money and time to fix that damage it will fall down eventually.
    - dredmorbius 4y ago
      Foundation settlement as well. Grady of Practical Engineering has a good segment on that: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8 https://yewtu.be/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8
- mgraczyk 4y ago
  My building was built before the earthquake and fires
exar0815 4y ago
This somehow just again sets into perspective what "old" means in different countries. I live in a house older than the US at the moment, and it's not even something special, compared to churches which are closer to Caesar than the founding of the US.
- AlotOfReading 4y ago
  It's a cultural thing that most Americans simply don't identify with or think about history prior to British/American colonization. There are still people living in medieval-era houses in the US and ruins that make Rome look young, but they don't occupy anyone's mindspace when it comes to how they think of age.
  - mgraczyk 4y ago
    Hopefully this is a joke? There are no structures in the US built prior to 1000ad, and the oldest structures built by indigenous people were abandoned long before European contact, because of deforestation.
    - AlotOfReading 4y ago
      So for context, I've literally seen/worked on structures older than that. I'll format this as a list to avoid a giant wall of text. * Plenty of structures were built prior to 1100CE. You can't build a freeway in Tucson without digging up an late archaic (~2300-1500 BCE) pithouse, as an example. * Plenty of indigenous structures have centuries of continuous inhabitation. Taos is a good example, having a single structure that's been inhabited since the 13th century. Other communities are older (e.g. Oraibi dates from ~1150), but don't have extant usable structures from those early days. * Indigenous structures were not abandoned prior to European contact, let alone because of deforestation. Did you autocorrect from "disease" (which would also be mistaken, but less so)? Very simplified statement here because this is a topic that could fill a library. Happy to talk more on it.
      - mgraczyk 4y ago
dwater 4y ago
This article appears to have a picture of the house in question: https://ggwash.org/view/74166/dc-preservation-hprb-denies-front-facing-solar-panels-takoma-climate-crisis https://ggwash.org/view/74166/dc-preservation-hprb-denies-fr... As someone who has lived nearby, I can say that this house is not rare nor remarkable in that area. It's technically a piece of American history but there are thousands of equally historic homes within walking distance. The author was using a bit of poetic license to add some flourish to the article.
- jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
  Ok, that's absurd. I live in a turn of the century neighborhood and am surrounded by miles of very similar houses. I bet I could find more than a dozen doppelgängers in a 10 minute bike ride.
  - thathndude 4y ago
    Agreed. To sound full of myself, I live in a historic house that’s simply much nicer than that. (Middle of nowhere Midwest) not expensive at all. I’m with you on the characterization. How bizarre.
- jeffbee 4y ago
  Wow. I wouldn't be surprised if you told me that was one of the plans out of the 1910 Sears catalog.
jeffbee 4y ago
If you think that's bad, every structure in Berkeley over 40 years old is automatically considered a historic resource, requiring the approval of the landmarks preservation commission to change or demolish.
- narag 4y ago
  That's bad, but having three milennia artifacts everywhere you dig is somehow worse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A1diz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A1diz
raisin_churn 4y ago
A significant percentage of single-family and rowhouses in DC are older Preister's, the actually historic ones by about a century. My own house is a couple years newer than his, 1919 I think. I just put up solar panels without any NIMBY nonsense like this. My only regret is that the south-facing roof is in the rear, so it was not economical to plaster the north-facing front roof with panels and thus trigger any passing reactionaries.

aaronblohowiak 4y ago

Your building may have been maintained differently and your fast in aesthetics may be different

AlotOfReading 4y ago

There was a devastating earthquake and subsequent fires in 1906 that burned down nearly the entire city. Since the entire population of the city was displaced, they rebuilt as quickly as possible to get out of the refugee cottages/camps. It doesn't really matter how you build a home though, it's eventually going to become creaky and drafty over time. The only real way to mitigate it is regular maintenance and repair. That's true of all infrastructure.

Gordonjcp 4y ago
> It doesn't really matter how you build a home though, it's eventually going to become creaky and drafty over time. Why is that?
- meheleventyone 4y ago
  The effects on the building materials of the weather, sun, insects, fungus, bacteria, vegetation, mechanical wear and so on.
  - Gordonjcp 4y ago
    I'm not really getting how brick or stone would creak or become leaky like that.
    - meheleventyone 4y ago
      Buildings tend not to be built exclusively in brick or stone and even when they are tend to be held together with mortar. Even brick and stone are susceptible to water intrusion and a bunch of other things. For example freeze-thaw is a very natural cause of erosion of stone. Vegetation is another common cause of undermining those sorts of structures. Of course some materials last longer than others but that doesn’t make the resulting structures habitable.
      - Gordonjcp 4y ago
        Most of the houses where I live are two or three hundred years old, and not particularly leaky or draughty. The one I'm in is only about 90 years old. What are they building houses out of where you live?
        meheleventyone 4y ago
        With maintenance sure. Which was the very next part of the original post you quoted so this reply to me makes no sense. For example I’ve got a rubble wall that’s really showing the effects of freeze-thaw just now and if I don’t actively spend the money and time to fix that damage it will fall down eventually.
  - dredmorbius 4y ago
    Foundation settlement as well. Grady of Practical Engineering has a good segment on that: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8 https://yewtu.be/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8
mgraczyk 4y ago
My building was built before the earthquake and fires

exar0815 4y ago

This somehow just again sets into perspective what "old" means in different countries. I live in a house older than the US at the moment, and it's not even something special, compared to churches which are closer to Caesar than the founding of the US.

AlotOfReading 4y ago
It's a cultural thing that most Americans simply don't identify with or think about history prior to British/American colonization. There are still people living in medieval-era houses in the US and ruins that make Rome look young, but they don't occupy anyone's mindspace when it comes to how they think of age.
- mgraczyk 4y ago
  Hopefully this is a joke? There are no structures in the US built prior to 1000ad, and the oldest structures built by indigenous people were abandoned long before European contact, because of deforestation.
  - AlotOfReading 4y ago
    So for context, I've literally seen/worked on structures older than that. I'll format this as a list to avoid a giant wall of text. * Plenty of structures were built prior to 1100CE. You can't build a freeway in Tucson without digging up an late archaic (~2300-1500 BCE) pithouse, as an example. * Plenty of indigenous structures have centuries of continuous inhabitation. Taos is a good example, having a single structure that's been inhabited since the 13th century. Other communities are older (e.g. Oraibi dates from ~1150), but don't have extant usable structures from those early days. * Indigenous structures were not abandoned prior to European contact, let alone because of deforestation. Did you autocorrect from "disease" (which would also be mistaken, but less so)? Very simplified statement here because this is a topic that could fill a library. Happy to talk more on it.
    - mgraczyk 4y ago

dwater 4y ago

This article appears to have a picture of the house in question: https://ggwash.org/view/74166/dc-preservation-hprb-denies-front-facing-solar-panels-takoma-climate-crisis https://ggwash.org/view/74166/dc-preservation-hprb-denies-fr... As someone who has lived nearby, I can say that this house is not rare nor remarkable in that area. It's technically a piece of American history but there are thousands of equally historic homes within walking distance. The author was using a bit of poetic license to add some flourish to the article.

jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
Ok, that's absurd. I live in a turn of the century neighborhood and am surrounded by miles of very similar houses. I bet I could find more than a dozen doppelgängers in a 10 minute bike ride.
- thathndude 4y ago
  Agreed. To sound full of myself, I live in a historic house that’s simply much nicer than that. (Middle of nowhere Midwest) not expensive at all. I’m with you on the characterization. How bizarre.
jeffbee 4y ago
Wow. I wouldn't be surprised if you told me that was one of the plans out of the 1910 Sears catalog.

jeffbee 4y ago

If you think that's bad, every structure in Berkeley over 40 years old is automatically considered a historic resource, requiring the approval of the landmarks preservation commission to change or demolish.

narag 4y ago
That's bad, but having three milennia artifacts everywhere you dig is somehow worse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A1diz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A1diz

raisin_churn 4y ago

A significant percentage of single-family and rowhouses in DC are older Preister's, the actually historic ones by about a century. My own house is a couple years newer than his, 1919 I think. I just put up solar panels without any NIMBY nonsense like this. My only regret is that the south-facing roof is in the rear, so it was not economical to plaster the north-facing front roof with panels and thus trigger any passing reactionaries.