On Thursday, August 13, 2020 at 4:15:13 PM UTC-5, wrote:
On Thu, 13 Aug 2020 15:48:45 -0500, dpb wrote:
On 8/13/2020 2:40 PM, Clare Snyder wrote:
...
about 10 or 15 years ago up in Sault St Marie - and the studs were
FULL 2X6 fir or hemlock old growth lumber, and harderthan the hubs of
hell!! Picture straight grain fir lumber 20 feet long,on 12 inch
centers all around a 20X30 ft house, and on the gable ends, up to 36
feet for the peak of the gable - - - -. The place was likely worth
almost as much for the recycled lumber as it was as a house in"The
SOO" back then -- -
I've still got a stack of clear 20-ft Doug fir 2x8, -10, and 12's from
the bins we built in the back of the barn for the feedmill in late '50s....
The barn framing itself is old-growth SYP with some built-up columns of
2x6 and 2x8 as long as 24-ft. Nothing 36', though.
Purchased about 25,000 bdft of what turned out to be walnut from the
demolition of an old school in Lynchburg, VA, built in the late 1840s to
not long after Civil War when last major wing added. It varied from 2x8
to 4x16 in lengths from 16-ft to almost 40-ft.
It was just stacked the morning they opened for the sale; I had gone
down to get a piece of slate blackboard for the kids' room when saw
stuff sitting there that looked like something other than just old,
dirty lumber...a little whittling on the corner of a few revealed just
what it actually was...
Offered $5K on the spot for the lot and they took the check! (And threw
in the blackboard section, gratis...)
Called Mr Davis at Davis Paint to send one of the flatbeds with the
forklift...we stored it in the 3rd-subbasement where he had set up a
shop for friend turning out decoupage plaques in that craze period in
late '60s/early 70s....we ended up running up to 40,000 bd-ft/year of
soft maple through the shop making the wood 2" thick bottoms for
Craddock-Terry shoe company a few years later.
https://www.jamestdavis.com/about/
Great story - thanks for sharing.
Some old growth is still available to be re-claimed -
but it's at the bottom of the rivers & lakes :-)
.. it doesn't sell cheap.
John T.
That North Wilkesboro, NC company has another cache of reclaimed lumber up for sale.
"Revient, LLC ceases operations in North Wilkesboro, NC. Auction includes (127,000) board feet of reclaimed lumber €“ (24,000) board feet of reclaimed Chestnut lumber!€“ Huge quantity of reclaimed beams! €“ Cherry, Maple & Poplar Slabs! - Large Quantity of reclaimed Pine - Reclaimed Maple, Cherry, Oak, Cedar and other Species! €“ Reclaimed Barn Lumber! - Reclaimed Decking, Flooring and Paneling! "
https://www.irsauctions.com/lots/?pg=details&id=23628
Sonny