In which I tell a floor saga.

An acquaintance, who happens to be a good, honest floor refinisher called me last week to ask about an ink on paper that he had in his house.  After answering his question, I immediately wrote him to say that I had been meaning to contact him about refinishing the first floor of the Ocean House.  I had been adamant about saving it.  We've had our share of leaks over the last year and I knew we had to replace some of the floor.  I was headed over to meet him at the building and he called, said he was already there and that there was no need to meet up.  The floor was beyond saving.  He said he would wait and show me what he meant.  

 First, he pointed out all the places where the floor was cupped....there were twice as many places that were separating, etc.  

Then, he said that there were about 5 different floors, some fir, some yellow pine, some wide board, most 3" wide.  

There was new damage and old.  The column replacement didn't do the old floor any favors.  

It would cost more to repair than to replace.

All of this would have to come up, and fast.  

The first floor was a mess, the cold room was still in place from the winter and there were boards and sawdust everywhere.  I am still painting trim, Greg is mired down in a project and I am scheduled to leave town on Wednesday for a trek to Philadelphia.  What do we do!  We get our ass up at 5 and start the day, is what we do.  We also hire a nice young fellow, son of great friends, and someone we knew needed to pay off a speeding ticket....three days should do the trick.  

First, I had to move and/or throw away a bunch of stuff.  NYF (nice young fellow) was due at 8am, so I got up, went to paint for two hours, got to the building and started clearing.  We did about a third of the building the first day....Or rather NYF ripped up most of the floor, while I moved the lumber yard from one spot to the next!

  

Poor NYF got to pull up the part of the floor that was screwed down...which meant the whole middle section!  I relieved him for a while, removed a floor board and found this little green army Jeep, the kind I used to play with, screwed down underneath the board. A shim perhaps??  

On the first day we uncovered the original lift doors.  Each floor had a set of these doors that could open, probably in order to move baggage for the hotel.  These heavy doors were completely rotted through.  On the floor above, the doors were charred black from a fire that swept through the floor.  Scary to think this place had a fire once!  

We are almost finished taking the floor and the nails up. We should finish tomorrow and then Greg and I have a hankerin' for solid hardwood hickory if we can find it at a good price.  I remember buying a cord of hickory wood for our fireplace in Chicago when I had roommates back in 1991.  Gorgeous wood.  I can't wait.