Romancing the Home

LLITTLE IS KnOWn about the early life of the house at 83 S. High St. in historic Dublin.

It was empty in 2007 when Julie Seel and her husband, Vaughan, fell in love with it. In September 2011, Seel bought the house with plans to live there and historically restore it.

What Seel knows now is that the house was built in 1835 by the village tanner, Giles Weaver, as his residence and business. Twenty years later, the village druggist, William Davis, purchased the two-story house.

“We’re trying to respect the age of the house and do what we can to make it a comfortable family home whilst maintaining the integrity of it,” says Seel, a teacher at Scottish Corners Elementary School. “I can’t wait to move (in) because everyone’s been so welcoming.”

Mary Szuter, a Dublin resident for 24 years, is one of Seel’s new neighbors.

“My husband and I are thrilled,” Szuter says. “Government entities overlook the romance of … an old house in an old town … and I think it’s neat that Julie’s taking such an interest in putting the romance back into it.”

So far, for Seel, bringing back the romance has involved a lot of demolition and plaster dust.

Since she purchased the house, Seel’s weekends and evenings have been spent gutting it in search of the original structure underneath.

Thankfully, she doesn’t work alone –her team consists of woodworkers David Steinbarger and Michael Pearcy; her architect friend Tom Samms; her two college-age children, Jack and Olivia; and Olivia’s show-tune-singing class- mates. Everyone has been knocking down walls, sawing out rooms, peeling up flooring, ripping off plaster and working hard to strip off 177 years of remodeling.

In a bittersweet way, the process reminds Seel of her husband, Vaughan.

“Vaughan had an innate ability to bring out the best in people … and give them confidence,” Seel says. “It almost feels like … we are doing the same thing with the Giles Weaver House.”

Vaughan would not live to own the house. In early 2011, he was diagnosed with cancer. He passed away four months later.

Shortly afterward, Seel was in Florida – miles away in body and thought –when she got a call from a realtor friend. The bank now owned the house – did she want to make an offer?

“Of course, the wheels started turning, and everybody says, ‘Don’t make a big decision really soon after something like that,’…but I also thought, ‘We looked at this house together, there’ll be no other house in Dublin that I could buy that I knew he loved,’” Seel says. “I just feel like it was the right thing to do.”

After a word of encouragement from her architect friend Samms via telephone, she made an offer while still in Florida.

And Seel says Vaughan has found a way to affirm her decision at every step.

“When Vaughan was really sick, he told me he would leave us pennies to let us know he is still with us,” Seel says. “I realize people find pennies, but we find them all of the time just when we need them … For example, when I signed the papers to purchase the house, I got back in the car, opened my purse and a penny flipped out into my lap.” And after some of the remodeling scares, she needed every penny he sent.

Tearing down the plaster was not Seel’s original plan.

“There were enough plaster ceilings that were falling down that we knew we had to take them down,” Samms says. “And once we started taking things down, it just multiplied.”

It was a low point. But there were unexpected rewards. Hidden above the plaster, they found Giles Weaver’s handhewn beams of Scioto River beech and sycamore stretching across the ceiling. In the new plan, the beams will remain exposed.

After eight filled trash bins, Seel and her team finally found the bones of the house. It has no insulation, electricity or running water, but it is finally the original house.

Seel wants to complete the renovations by May 31 so her parents will be able see it while visiting from the United Kingdom.

Seel also wants to recreate the porch that once decorated the face of the house.

“People back in those days were porch people,” says Herb Jones, president of the Dublin Historical Society. “They didn’t have all those electronic devices we have; they went outside and sat on the porch.”

With a house like this in a town like Dublin, Seel and her family may be porch people just as Giles Weaver and his family were. And Seel believes Vaughan will be with his family on that porch – in spirit and in penny.

Heather McCray is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at laurand@ pubgroupltd.com.