UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI

May 30, 2008 Date:______

Katelyn Cooper I, ______, hereby submit this work as part of the requirements for the degree of: Master of Architecture in: Architecture

It is entitled: There's No Place Like Home: an exploration of how the idea of home and architecture coalesce

This work and its defense approved by:

Elizabeth Riorden [First Chair] Chair: ______G. Thomas Bible ______

There’s No Place Like Home: an exploration of how the idea of home and architecture coalesce

A thesis submitted to: The Division of Research and Advanced Studies ot The University of Cincinnati

in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of: Master of Architecture

In The School of Architecture and Interior Design

Of The College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning

2008

by Katelyn Cooper B.S. Arch., University of Cincinnati, 2006

Committee Chairs: Professor Elizabeth Riorden Professor G. Thomas Bible Abstract

In America today the idea of home and attachment to home place is becoming less prevalent through the increase in suburban sprawl and the decrease in the importance of quality residential construction. Having a full and clear concept of home is essential to the definition of self, and the location of oneself within the context of the world. This thesis examines the concept of home at both the general level and the individual level to prove that the built environment can encourage attachment to home place. This is done through research, individual interviews, and finally through a design project involving the design of a house (for no one in particular) and neighborhood interventions in an existing neighborhood context in Cincinnati, Ohio.

 Table of Contents i Committee approval form 119 Section 4: Towards a Design ii Title page 119 4.1 The House for Anybody iii Abstract 119 4.2 Site Description and Analysis v Table of Contents 112 Section 5: Project Description and Design vi List of Illustrations Outcomes

112 5.1 Design Methodology and Outcomes 1 Introduction 128 5.2 Program

3 Section 1: Achieving a General Definition of 129 5.3 Reflection Home 3 1.1 Social Characteristics of the idea of home 130 Bibliography

4 1.2 Temporal Characteristics of the idea of home

6 1.3 Spatial Characteristics of the idea of home

7 1.4 Home as a Representation of Self/Identity

7 1.5 Section Summary

9 Section 2: Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home

9 2.1 Methods for Determining Individual Definitions/Ideas of Home

11 2.2 Description of my Method for determining individual ideas of home

12 2.3 Interview Transcripts

101 2.4 Analysis of Current Home of Subjects

105 Section 3: The Concept of Home and Design

105 3.1 The “Pattern Language”

106 3.2 Saarinen’s House at Cranbrook

112 3.3 Usonia

114 3.4 Seaside

115 3.5 Martha’s Vineyard
 List of Illustrations Introduction Title Image: www.ronshoots.com figure 3.2.6: pp. 94 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Total Work of Art” Section 1 Title Image: www.ci.loveland.co.us/WP/power/ Conservation/main.htm figure 3.2.7: pp. 28-29 and 148 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Total Work of Art”, graphic by author Section 2 Title Image: by author figure 3.2.8: pp. 126 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Section 3 Title Image: pp. 52 “Saarinen House and Total Work of Art” Garden: A Total Work of Art” figure 3.2.9: pp. 133 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Section 4 Title Image: by author Total Work of Art”

Section 5 Title Image: by author figure 3.2.10: pp. 136 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Total Work of Art” figure 1.1.1: by author figure 3.2.11: pp. 53 “Saarinen House and Garden: A figure 1.2.1: pp. 7 “Temporal Aspects of Homes” Total Work of Art”

figure 1.3.1: by author figure 3.2.12: pp. 28-29 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Total Work of Art”, graphic by author figure 2.1.1: pp. 111 “House as a Mirror of Self” figure 3.2.13: pp. 69 “Saarinen House and Garden: A figure 2.1.2: pp. 243 “House as a Mirror of Self” Total Work of Art”

figure 2.1.3: pp. 244 “House as a Mirror of Self” figure 3.3.1: pp. 27 “Usonia New York: Building a Community with Frank Lloyd Wright.” figure 2.1.4: pp. 182 “Some Place Like Home” figure 3.3.2: pp. 143 “Usonia New York: Building a figure 2.4.1: by author Community with Frank Lloyd Wright.”

figure 2.4.2: by author figure 3.3.3: pp. 144 “Usonia New York: Building a Community with Frank Lloyd Wright.” figure 2.4.3: by author figure 3.4.1: pp. 101 “Seaside: Making a Town in figure 2.4.4: by author America”

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figure 3.2.1: cover page “Cranbrook”, graphic by author figure 3.5.5: by author

figure 3.2.2: cover page “Cranbrook”, graphic by author figure 3.5.6: by author

figure 3.2.3: pp. 114 “Cranbrook” figure 3.5.7: by author

figure 3.2.4: pp. 49 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Total figure 3.5.8: by author Work of Art” figure 4.2.1: by author figure 3.2.5: pp. 28-29 “Saarinen House and Garden: A Total Work of Art”, graphic by author figure 4.2.2: by author

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Introduction: The Problem with Home

In American society today even though people (“homes for sale”), the building in which one lives, the have more things, bigger houses, better jobs, nicer cars, location where one lives, the location of one’s nuclear and an all around higher (monetary) quality of life; it family, the social unit that is a family, a country, a state, a seems that something is missing. People are socializing city, and a multitude of other things. In fact each person less, becoming more sedentary, and the overall outlook on has their own idea of what home is, and each person can life today appears rather bleak. Depression and obesity have multiple “homes” and ideas of home, or no home at are major issues in the U.S. and the number one killer is all. heart disease. This decline in society seems to correlate The best definition of home and home place that with the recent increase in suburban sprawl (the rapid relates to the built environment and improving society expansion of metropolitan areas in the form of suburbs through the built environment is an “emotional and low-density development). The reason for this decline attachment to place”. This is purposefully vague because in the perceived quality of life is not the boom in housing, the idea of home has a mythic quality that cannot be but the lack of quality construction, and community nailed down. There is no clear definition. Many theorists planning in housing developments. from many different backgrounds have tackled the While suburban development cannot be blamed concept of home and none have come to a clear entirely for all of society’s problems, it does play a large consensus. There are generalities that can be identified part. The lack individuality and diversity in housing within the concept of home, but there is no way to reach a makes it is very difficult to identify and locate oneself general definition of home that is specific enough to apply within the world. The reason for this is that without a to individual design projects. What must be done is that strong sense of place or “home” we have no anchor in for each individual design project an individual definition society and cannot define ourselves in relation to the rest of home must be understood. of the world. The reality is that typical American suburban The thesis I propose is that the built environment development and house undermines the psychological can (if the concept of home is carefully considered and depth and complexity of the idea of home and home applied) encourage attachment to home place. As an place. architectural problem this is a bit tricky. The concept of To understand this problem first we must come to home is not fixed in scale; therefore an individual person’s a consensus on what the definition of home and home definition of home may apply to something larger than a place is. Unfortunately, home is a difficult subject to city or state, something smaller than a house, or anything define. In the English language it can refer to a house in between. Architecture is generally limited to something  The Problem with Home on the scale of a neighborhood to on the scale of a house, and smaller. Within this scale limitation there are still many possible projects that could test my thesis, however, my research led me to believe that the best possible test for this thesis was to take an existing neighborhood and improve it’s sense of home place, but also to design a house within this context to test the smaller, more intricate details of home. The project that results is essentially a speculative house (a house with no client in mind, the reason for which will be explained later) and interventions within an established neighborhood.

 Section 1: Achieving a General Definition of Home

When confronting the idea of home it is important categories is then sub-divided into social, temporal, and to understand the generalities of the concept first, and spatial properties. My characterization is based on then move to the specifics of individual ideas of home. Dovey’s theories, but I have differing opinions of how Many people from many different backgrounds with many home is really perceived. Dovey is correct in surmising different focuses have examined the topic of home. It is a that the concept of home gives social order, but I believe very broad subject, however this project focuses on a that social order and connectedness are related and section that is confined to how the idea of home is overlap. Home gives social order by grounding us in the perceived/felt/understood by individuals. Some of the sociocultural web. This also means that the idea of home theories I have examined are more complete than others, connects us to this same sociocultural web. Dovey’s but all of them have some aspect that alludes to either the home as a social identity really has more to do with the social characteristics of home, the temporal characteristics idea of connectedness and order than it does with identity. of home, the spatial characteristics of home, and/or the Later I will discuss how home is incorporated into ones home as a representation of self/identity. Put all these definition of self, but for now I believe that Dovey means aspects of the idea of home together and what comes out identity as in social order. Therefore all three of those is a complete general description of how individuals categories overlap in the social aspects. This idea of home perceive the idea of home, if not the specifics of what giving us social order through social connectedness and each individual idea entails. Thus the aim of the following social identity is the core of what home means in the section is to provide a general idea of the concept of social sense. Another key point that Dovey makes is that home. home has social dialectics. A dialectic is a contrast between two things, (e.g. inside and outside). The social 1.1 Social Characteristics of the idea of Home dialectics of home include self vs. other, private vs. public, Many theories imply or illustrate that home has identity vs. community, and so on (Dovey, pp. 45) (see inherent social and cultural implications. The first of these figure 1.1.1). These dialectics are another way of ordering theories comes from Kimberly Dovey (of the Department ourselves within the world, but the point is made that of Architecture at the Royal Melbourne Institute of through the contrast of things we see them more clearly. Technology in Australia). Dovey has divided the We cannot understand “us” without a “them” and a clear properties of home into several categories: Home as idea of home helps to clarify what comprises “us” and Order, Home as Identity, Home as Connectedness, and what comprises “them”. the Dialectics of Home (Dovey, pp. 33-48). Each of these  Achieving a General Definition of Home and things with meaning and emotion (Werner, pp. 5). Appropriation is what leads people to attach their identity to a home place. Neither Affordances nor Appropriation really relate to the social characteristics of home, but Werner, Altman, and Oxley suggest that social rules and relationships play a major part in linking people to a home place. Social rules and relationships cover a broad category that includes social and cultural norms and rules, emotional bonds, and cultural rituals and practices figure 1.1.1 (Werner, pp. 3). Social rules and norms dictate what behaviors are appropriate at what times and in what Another theorist in this area is Roderick J. spaces, thereby affording meaning to the setting. Lawrence who comes from a background in Architectural Ritualistic behavior over time gives meaning to a place, History. In the study of home he is mainly concerned with such as sleeping in a bedroom every night. This is a methods of study (i.e. how we approach and analyze cultural norm that is repeated over time and gives home environments). In one article he does conclude that meaning to that space in our homes. The emotional the definition of home is ambiguous, that “home is a component of this is the fact that people become linked to relative concept, not an absolute one that can be defined places because of social relationships and the memories in a dictionary by a linguist, or by a researcher” (Lawrence and emotions linked to those relationships (Werner, pp. 4). 1995, pp. 58). This is the inherent problem with home, The point of all of this is that social relationships, rules, but Lawrence does conclude that there are layers of rituals, and norms cause people to attach meaning to meaning that relate to the idea of home. One of these houses that then become homes. layers is comprised of societal dimensions and another is comprised of experiential dimensions (Lawrence 1995, pp. 1.2 Temporal Characteristics of the idea of Home 58). The societal dimensions of the idea of home include The temporal characteristics of home imply that ideological, political, and socioeconomic factors. memory and repeating events play an essential part in Basically one’s cultural, political, and economic position establishing individual definitions of home. Dovey views affects the individual idea of home. In contrast the the temporal characteristics of home as temporal order, experiential dimensions of home are comprised of temporal connectedness, and temporal identity (Dovey, emotions and values that relate to each individual’s pp. 33-44). These are similar to the ideas presented in the residential biography. Or that the emotions we attach to previous section. Temporal order is the tendency for an our changing ideas of home help ground us in the current idea of home to ground us in past, present, and future idea of home and how that affects us in the social sense. events. By understanding our current place in the order of A third set of theories based in Psychology comes events through home we can then become connected to from Carol Werner, Irwin Altman, and Diana Oxley. Their the past and future. This is temporal connectedness. By theory mainly relates to the temporal nature of home but understanding our home in the present sense we are they also propose that there are three general processes by connected to past homes (through artifacts and memories), which people can be linked to home; these are: social and we are also connected to the future (through control rules and social relationships, affordances, and and stability). Temporal identity overlaps connectedness appropriation (Werner, pp. 3). Affordances are where and order. Temporal identity is how we understand who objects in the environment are perceived according to the we are in relation to past representations of self through meanings, actions, and behaviors they imply. For home and the possibility of future representations of self example: a chair is for sitting in (Werner, pp. 4). Appropriation is the process in which people invest places  Achieving a General Definition of Home through home. This will be discussed in greater depth in a linear time may include the events leading to a wedding following section. ceremony. A slow paced event might be a period of Werner, Altman, and Oxley’s theories focus extended mourning. In cyclical time, pace could be the mainly on the temporal qualities of home. Their primary relative speed of recurring events such as the daily routine focus is the nature of how time is perceived in relation to in a kitchen, around mealtimes. Mealtime might be fast the idea of home. They note that time is perceived both in paced, but the intervals between meals would be slow the linear sense (events occurring in sequence one after paced (for the kitchen) (Werner, pp. 14-15). Finally, the other, such as moving to a new place, or starting a temporal rhythm refers to regularly occurring patterns of new relationship) and the cyclical sense (events that feelings, behaviors, and experiences within events. In repeat at intervals creating patterns, recurring events, or linear time it is a variable pattern such as how emotions cycles, such as getting up in the morning, driving to work, rise and fall over the span of a relationship. In cyclical events that occur in a daily routine, or special events, like time it is a recurring pattern such as the rhythm of the day, holidays, that recur on a yearly schedule). Both linear how we feel when we wake up, go to work, go to sleep, time and cyclical time are divided into categories of etc. (Werner, pp. 15). temporal salience, temporal scale, temporal pace, and Lawrence poses the idea that houses are artifacts temporal rhythm. Temporal salience refers to the temporal of past houses. He proposes that a home that exists in the present is a conglomeration of all past homes of that person, and of that culture. He advocates the idea that when studying the concept of home we must consider all past concepts of home that relate to that particular concept of home (Lawrence 1985). The true nature of home is revealed through the study of how each individual idea of home came to be. In a following section I performed a study of individual ideas of home based partly in this theory. Mary Douglas reiterates the idea that not only is home a space, but it has structure in time (Douglas, pp. 289). She perpetuates the idea that home is an organization of space over time, thus giving each domicile figure 1.2.1 (house, apartment, condo, etc.) a capacity for memory and anticipation. This appears in things such as a home’s focus (past, present, future) of an environment placed on storage capacity. If the house has experienced many hard that environment by a person. For example, and object or winters this gets translated into physical characteristics place is past salient if it reminds the subject of a past event like extra storage (for supplies to outlast the winter) or experience (Werner, pp. 11). Temporal scale refers to (Douglas, pp. 294). This is related to Bloomer and the temporal scope of an event, or how much relative time Moore’s theories of the house and architecture as it relates this event takes up in relation to all other time perceived to memory (Bloomer, pp. 46-55). The fact that a fireplace by that person. In linear time this means that an event is the anchor of a house relates back to remembered that takes a relatively large amount of time to occur has a fireplaces and the primordial hearth of humans in a tribal larger scale, such as a marriage. In cyclical time scale state. This repeats with concepts such as gardens, or refers to the interval at which the event repeats. A symmetrical entryways, or gable roofs. Because houses of monthly routine has a larger scale than a daily routine the past (in a general sense) have had these things they are (Werner, pp. 12-13). Temporal pace refers to the relative applied to the current idea of what is house and home. density or speed of experiences. Fast paced events in  Achieving a General Definition of Home 1.3 Spatial Characteristics of the idea of Home (Dovey, pp. 45). The contrast between the two conditions The spatial characteristics of home are more brings meaning to each condition. If you are outside and widely varied than the temporal or social characteristics. it is cold the warmth of home is more apparent, and if you Dovey also presents these in relation to spatial order, are warm at home and can see that it’s cold outside it spatial identity, spatial connectedness, and spatial makes home seem that much more cozy. dialectics. Spatial order is presented as understanding Perla Korosec-Serfaty suggests something similar where we are physically in relation to the world. Home is to the dialectics of home through the phenomenological perceived as a vertical axis on the horizontal plane. If we dimensions of inside/outside and visibility. The inside/ understand where we are in the horizontal plane in outside exchange is interesting because of the shift of relation to this axis we are given a ground/ordering point “space” to “place” (Korosec-Serfaty, pp. 72). How a house in the world. This axis is perceived both in the physical (or space) becomes a place (or home place) is through spatial sense and the intangible spatial sense. Dovey generating order. This is done by understanding inside vs. states that “to be at home is to know where you are; it outside and placing meaning on the inside through human means to inhabit a secure center and to be oriented in relationships and emotions. By visibility Korosec-Serfaty space.” (Dovey, pp. 36). By spatial identity, Dovey means means that the home (or dwelling) allows for visibility and that we see the physical being of our home as an external privacy. The home makes the person visible to the identity. This has more to do with home as a community along with that person’s status and state of representation of self, which will be discussed later. living; “visibility in hospitality and shared meals and in Spatial connectedness is similar to order because it is conflicts and contradictory claims” (Korosec-Serfaty, pp. about relating to the world around us. But what Dovey 73). The home also gives that person privacy from the means by spatial connectedness is an attachment to place, community or secrecy; “secrecy in closing doors and which is one of the key factors in the general definition of windows, secrecy in chests and shut closets, secrecy in home. We are connected to a home place by “putting putting the outside world at a distance” (Korosec-Serfaty, down roots” and attaching or incorporating it into our pp. 73). own identity. Spatial dialectics are how we define what is Another way to look at the spatial characteristics “us” and what is “them”. In the spatial sense, dialectics of home is Bloomer and Moore’s concept of the house as body representation. That we actually perceive the house as an extension of our body and doing things like pulling the shades down or locking the door is similar to a stiffening of body boundaries (Bloomer, pp. 46). If the house (or home) is perceived as an extension of body then it is easy to understand why burglary affects the emotions of people so much. A more pleasant picture might be that if the house is a representation of the body then by inviting friends in to our homes it is as if we are embracing them. Thinking of the home as an extension into the physical world of our own body clarifies the concept of home in the spatial sense, because it is easy to understand our body’s relationship to the world and thus figure 1.3.1 our relationship to the world through home. I will conclude this section with a quote from are how we define the boundaries of home. A few Mary Douglas: “The ethnic domain [the idea of home] is examples of spatial dialectics are: inside vs. outside, order the domain of structured domesticity. It projects the most vs. chaos, and “being at home” vs. being away from home encompassing set of analogies: like music, it creates its  Achieving a General Definition of Home own time rhythms; like a picture, it contrives its own her book, “House as a Mirror of Self”, is “the notion that spatial effects and its own regulation of vision and we are all – throughout our lives – striving towards a state perception of distance; like a sculpture it explores volume, of wholeness, of being wholly ourselves. – What this book movement, and bodily behavior in the gravitational adds to the debate is the suggestion that the places we live field.” (Douglas, pp. 293). in are reflections of that process, and indeed the places themselves have a powerful effect on our journey toward 1.4 Home as a Representation of Self/Identity wholeness” (Cooper-Marcus, pp. 10). The key to this This last component of the general definition of process (which she discovered through countless the idea of home is probably the most important. I have interviews with many different people) is the been alluding to it in each section through Dovey’s social, personalization of space (or appropriation) (Cooper- temporal, and spatial identity. The idea that home is a Marcus, pp. 11). Susan Saegert posses some interesting representation of self seems to be discussed in most things questions to refute this idea. They are: “What if the house I’ve read about the concept of home. Dovey touches on it houses [a] family, boarders, unrelated individuals, by referring to home as a part of our social, temporal, and servants, or regular guests? Whose self is it a symbol of? special identity, but I feel that home as a representation of How does housing bought as a commodity and possibly self runs much deeper than that. Through the used for years previously by others perform this symbolic understanding of home we create an identity for function? (Saegert, pp. 290-291). I would say that that is ourselves, and without that identity (that sense of place the joy of appropriation. If the dweller chooses to and belonging) we become very lost and unhappy. This is appropriate some aspect of their house, or apartment, or not to say that a person who doesn’t have a house can building, or neighborhood, or city, or state, etc. into their never be happy, but we must all have somewhere where concept of self and identity, it does not matter how many we belong, where we feel “at home.” other people have appropriated it before, or have some Israel focuses on the idea that home is as self- ownership in it now. There is a great variety to what home defining principle. One of Israel’s key ideas is that once encompasses, and therefore there can be infinite variety in we have shelter it is then possible to transform this shelter ownership and appropriation. Appropriation is mental as into a home. “At this level a house becomes a setting for well as physical. We do not have to change something in meaning. It becomes not only a physical structure, but a order to incorporate it into our definition of self; we just symbol” (Israel, pp. 2). Home is a symbol for who we are have to “lay claim” to it, or feel some sort of attachment or and is closely tied to our own self-actualization. ownership. Home as a representation of self is about As introduced earlier, Werner, Irwin, Oxley’s giving our identity some sort of external framework, it notion that appropriation is the process in which people doesn’t have to be apparent to others, but we can attach meaning and emotion to places and things (Werner, understand it within our being. pp. 5). Perla Korosec-Serfaty also refers to appropriation as a process of “modification, alteration, and 1.5 Section Summary transformation” (Korosec-Serfaty, pp. 75). That by The idea of home is social in nature because it changing our environment, and in turn being changed by connects us and grounds us in a sociocultural web. it, we are appropriating that space/place into our own self Through home we can relate to the social conditions that image. The concept of appropriation has strong ties to surround us. It sets up a dialectic of self and other, us and ownership (perceived ownership, not legal ownership). them. We can choose to incorporate varying people or When we take ownership in a space we are imprinting groups of people into the concept of “us”, such as a some aspect of ourselves onto that space. family, or a neighborhood, or a culture, or the people of Clare Cooper-Marcus also strongly believes that the city we live in, or the residents of the state/region. home is a symbol of self. She states that the core theme in  Achieving a General Definition of Home Social norms and rituals also influence the individual idea of home. The idea of home is temporal in nature because it allows us to connect to the past and the future through a physical embodiment of time and memory. Daily, monthly, and yearly rituals play a large role in the establishment of home. All past homes and ideas of home are “remembered” in the current configuration of home. And all future homes are seen through the lens of our current idea of home. The idea of home is spatial in nature because home has a physical embodiment in the real spatial plane of the world. Home, as a concept, is used as base point with which we can locate ourselves in the world in relation to. By understanding where we come from we can understand where we are going. This sets up a spatial dialectic of Inside vs. Outside and “being at home” vs. not “being at home”. Through this dialectic we can then understand where our place in the world is. The idea of home is tied closely to self expression and identity through all of the things mentioned above. By locating ourselves (through our concepts of home) within the social web, within time, and within the spatial world, we can better understand who we really are. We also incorporate our homes and their physical/aesthetic attribute into our being. If a house does not fit our idea of self-identity, then it is very difficult to think of it as a home.

Section 2: Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home

The idea of home also has some very specific as if they were the house speaking back. This brought out criteria to it and these vary from person to person, from some very interesting dialogue and many deep emotions demographic to demographic, and from culture to culture. about each house from each person. When designing for home place it is important to Along with these interviews she had the people understand the individual ideas of home of the particular do drawings of their houses, or how they perceived their group of people you are working with. This section home, or what their ideal home would look like/be like describes how this might be accomplished and what I (see figure 2.1.1,2.1.2, and 2.1.3). Some of the drawings have done to determine more specific criteria for home place design.

2.1 Methods for Determining Individual Definitions/Ideas of Home In this category I looked at two other authors that had the most complete methods for determining individual definitions of home. These authors were Toby Israel and Clair Cooper-Marcus. I will start with Claire Cooper-Marcus; her method comes from her book “House as a Mirror of Self.” The book is a compilation of many interviews of many different people from many different backgrounds and what she learned about home from each of these interviews. What is really interesting is how she extracted each individual account of home. figure 2.1.1 Cooper-Marcus did her interviews in person and she started the interview by having each person talk to were fumbling floor plans, some were very diagrammatic, their house as if it could understand what they were some were emotional, and some were very figurative. It saying. She would have each person start with “House, really depended on the person. Some of the people she the way I feel about you is…” (Cooper-Marcus, pp. 8). interviewed were architects or designers and they showed And then she would have each person answer themselves

Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home their ideas with plans, and neat elevations, or sometimes a perspective. Some of the people she interviewed were artists and did very beautiful emotional representations that looked nothing like houses. And some of the people she interviewed were not used to using drawing as a means of expression but fumbled through it anyway. I think these drawings were very interesting but I question whether they were particularly useful in understanding each individual’s idea of home. Some probably were, though most probably weren’t. As a graduate assistant teacher, I have the worst time trying to get my students to diagram simple concepts let alone trying something so complex as home! This method is very interesting, but I think that by only asking about the current home condition much is left out. I think it is important to get a back history of home place and also what hope each person might have for the future, to truly utilize this analysis tool. Toby Israel details her method for determining individual ideas of home in her book “Some Place Like Home.” Israel refers to her method as “Design Psychology” because she uses some techniques of

figure 2.1.2 psychoanalysis to determine individual definitions of home. Her method is concerned with discovering what place and type of house each person is drawn to, the type of home that will complete the individual. Israel’s book and method is split into three sections, the past, the present and the future. Each section goes with a set of exercises that can be completed alone, or can be administered to others like a test. In “the Past” section Israel focuses on uncovering the types of places the individual was attached to as a child. It is important to understand the individual’s home place history to understand how that person can establish that feeling in the future. The exercises that accompany this section are the “Environmental Family Tree” which is a diagram of the individual’s ancestral home places, the “Environmental Time Line” which is a list of the places that person has lived and at what ages they lived there; the “Mental Map” which is a drawing of a memorable place figure 2.1.3 that the person lived before the age of eighteen, and the “Favorite Childhood Place Visualization” which is an exercise to help the individual recall a favorite place from the past that may have influenced their sense of home 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home place (Israel, pp. 47-52). The exercises are meant to “Environmental Sociogram” exercise helps the individual illustrate a clearer view into the individual’s home place to gauge the way individual space, shared space, and history. Israel believes that by understanding our past public space, are manifested in their current home (Israel, homes we can then begin to understand what we want in pp. 109-110). Both these exercises help the individual to a present home. understand their current situation. The next step in understanding home place for the The final section of Israel’s book, “The Future”, individual is to examine their present situation. In “the uses the past and present as spring points for how one Present” section of her book Israel expresses the should proceed to pursue the ideal home place. The final importance of understanding the individual’s current exercises are focused on translating personal style into a home situation. One tool she offers is an adaptation of home place. The “Special Objects Inventory” helps the Maslow’s Pyramid of self-actualization. The theory behind individual determine which objects they own are special to them and why. Knowing this can help guide the design of their ideal home place. The “Homestyle” exercise similarly is focused on determining the individual’s personal style. And the final exercise, “Creating Some Place Like Home”, is to help the individual access their personal sense of home (Israel, pp. 155-158). These exercises combined can be used to paint a very clear picture of an individual’s sense of home, which can then be used to guide the design of a new home, or the remodeling of an old home. This information can also be used to help the individual decide what type of place best fits their home place needs. Both of these methods are useful, but neither really give a complete picture of each individual’s concept figure 2.1.4 of home. I think the best way to go about getting a more complete picture is to combine the two methods, which is this pyramid is that one cannot progress to the next level, similar what I have done (as detailed bellow). and eventually to self-actualization, without first fulfilling the base needs. Israel translates this into a formula for the 2.2 Description of my Method for determining different levels of home. The first is home as shelter, then individual ideas of home comes home as a satisfaction of psychological need (self My method for determining individual definitions expression and belonging), then home as a social of home is similar to both Cooper-Marcus’s and Israel’s satisfaction (that meets our need of privacy and methods. I think when trying to understand an individual independence, while allowing us to fit in to a idea or definition of home we have to look closely at the community), then home as aesthetic satisfaction (home as past, but we must also look closely at the present a setting for experiencing beauty and pleasure), and finally condition of home in each person’s life and how that home as self-actualization (Israel, pp. 56). This pyramid is person sees their future homes. I believe my method important to the present, because it is important to covers all these areas for a small group of people. understand what needs one’s home fulfills presently to see Because of the time limit and the limited scope of a way to move forward. The exercises in this section are this project the individuals I chose to examine are very focused on this idea. The “Personality and Place” exercise close to me and all have something in common when it helps the individual to understand how their present comes to their ideas of home. This group is three personality is reflected in their present place. The  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home generations of the Cooper family, the grandparents (Bob room which was kind of nice to be in. I was, uh the and Nan Cooper), the parents (Tom and Mary Beth proud bearer of a number of cases of strep throat while we Cooper), and the son (Michael Cooper). I chose these five lived in Portland. people because they are very different in many ways (age, personalities, stage in life, place of current residence, etc.) KATELYN: Do you remember if you looked at the street a but also the same in many ways. Through a series of lot, people walking, that sort of thing? interviews I had each person describe all past home places that they could remember. I also had them BOB: It was not a busy street, the number of vehicles describe to me what their “ideal home” would be and people had then was a lot less than now. Having a truck what things were essential to this ideal. The interviews go down the street was cause for alarm and everybody brought out patterns and by then end of each interview came out and cheered when an airplane went by, they each person had a better understanding of why they chose didn't fly very high, so everybody would come out and the places they have lived in. wave, and he would wave back, it was an open cockpit. In addition to the interviews I examined each Fort Wayne was a great place, I guess. We've visited the person’s current living place. This was to be mainly location since, and it appears a far smaller house than I without input from them because I wanted the house to remember it being. tell me what was important to them through the way that they lived. Each place is different because each person is KATELYN: It seemed a lot bigger when you were five different, but there were also repeating patterns in the *laughs* Well you've described that. After you moved out current dwellings of each person as well as patterns that of that home, what did you move into, and why did you were common to all. move out, can you remember?

2.3 Interview Transcripts BOB: Yeah, well I can remember only because I was told. This section is comprised of the (mostly) We moved away from Fort Wayne in 1930, and you can unabridged transcripts of the interviews I conducted on remember there was some national financial distress November 24th, 25th, and 26th, 2007. The key points/ around 1930. My father had been a part of the concern comments are highlighted with bold text. formerly known as General Cable, and was doing very well in the Company, he had elevated himself very nicely, Interview One but when the bottom fell out of the stock market, the Subject: Robert Perry Cooper (Born 1925, 82 years old) bottom fell out of the General Cable Company so Dad Interviewer: Katelyn Cooper on November 25, 2007 was out of a job. He was able to find a job in Chicago, and we moved to Chicago, the Chicago area at least, KATELYN: Tell me about your earliest memory of home. around Evanston, which is a little bit north of Chicago. Because of the demise of the family fortune, we were only BOB: Well my earliest home was in Fort Wayne, Indiana. able to move into apartments because there was really no Uh, I don't remember much about it because I was five down payment, and we lived in a number of different when we left. But I do remember it had a front stoop on apartments in the southern part of Evanston. And there the porch where my boy friend would come and finish up were many. I think there were three different apartments in his nap while he was waiting for me to finish mine. And all, and they all kind of jumbled together, the places we then we would go out to play. And the only other feature were living at. They were not a place that you remember of the house I that I remember was that it had a solarium because of its uniqueness. on the second floor which had just a great number of windows facing the street and there was a very light KATELYN: How long did you live in Chicago?  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home BOB: Well, I stayed there almost until I went into the KATELYN: Do you have any bad memories attached to the Army, so until I was 18. features of the house, or any of the houses you lived in as a child. KATELYN: Did you go downtown Chicago a lot? Did you spend time in Evanston? BOB: Well unfortunately it was the same apartment. Once you got in the front door of the apartment, there was a BOB: Yes to both. I went into downtown. The Elevated, long hallway, which was permanently dark because there which we called the L, was the prime transportation to get was no light in that hallway, which led into the living into Chicago. My sister and I would go into Chicago with room and then up into the solarium at the other end of the impunity; there was no reason we couldn't. And there living room. But it was a long, dark, hallway, and my was a lot to do in downtown Evanston. I worked in sister, who was a little older than me, enjoyed hiding in downtown Evanston, I still worked in Chicago. I had a job some of the crevices of the hallway and scaring me and working in the grocery store in Chicago and I did a my friends that came in with me. number of different things around Evanston. KATELYN: So, when you were 18, you left to go into the KATELYN: Is there any specific place, because you Army. Do you remember any places specifically having a obviously don't remember much about the apartment, so home place attachment during that time, or did you think was there any place that stood out in your memory of of wherever your parents lived as home? Chicago? BOB: Oh yeah. I always thought of wherever my parents BOB: Yeah the Art Institute. My sister and I took lessons were as home. Nothing in the Army ever satisfied me to down there, I haven't the foggiest notion what I studied, make me feel that it was being comfy or “warm-fuzzy” but I have a sneaking suspicion it was sculpting lessons, I *chuckle* wanted to be a sculptor, and you can see how that turned out; but it was great fun. We would ride the L into KATELYN: Well I’m sure the barracks weren’t particularly Chicago go to our class and we lollygagged going back comfortable but I mean, that’s a place you remember home again because we had to buy a lunch and living so, I guess features of that you would never look for sometimes we didn’t buy a very healthy lunch. Working in in a home, obviously. I have never been in a barracks, downtown Evanston. Evanston was a walking city. They myself, so could you describe what it was like? did have a wonderful bus system but I would prefer to walk, as everything was in walking distance. It was a BOB: Well, yeah, there were a number of aspects to a delightful place. barracks. They are barn-like structures, that were open, and there were bunk beds on either side of a central KATELYN: Do you have a favorite place from your hallway. And the bunk beds were probably five, six feet childhood that you remember. apart. And as many bunk beds as you could get into that room on either side, there were people occupying the BOB: That would be the last apartment we lived in which bunk beds. There were latrine facilities at the end where was on Elmwood. And it was on the first floor. The front people could take a shower or shave and do what people room of that apartment was almost like the solarium and do in latrines. And there were usually two floors so not there were a number of windows that faced the street, only did you have one floor of myriad people, but the and it was just a delightful place to go sit, read, study, myriad continued on the second floor look, whatever you would like to do. That would probably be my favorite place. KATELYN: So, you traveled to foreign countries (Mh-hmm). Do you remember anything from those countries?  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home squatting the way they did which they had done since BOB: Yeah. When I went to Japan, one of the, I don’t birth, so it was more of a problem for me. I would sit remember quite how it all came about, but I but I became cross-legged on the floor or I would kneel when we were acquainted with a Japanese family. And they were going through the magazines. The floors were wood, and interested in learning to speak English because the most of the other construction pieces would have been patriarch of the family was teaching English and his ability wood and they were kind of a reddish color, I don’t know to speak was identified by his ability to speak each and what wood that would be, but the paper that was on the every word with a pause in between each word. So – it – wall was a very heavy paper, but it was still paper, and I was – very – difficult – to – get – any – enjoyment – out – was fearful that someone would knock the hibachi over of – listening – to – him – speak – English. So I negotiated and light it on fire. It was a novel experience, and I have with my mother to get picture magazines. So, I would let never been in a house that other people lived in that I them know when I had picture magazines, and I would go thought was as unique as that one. Looking at their house, over to their house. We would go through these picture and others in the area, I would say that it was one of the magazines one by one and I would explain to them the better homes in that area. American way of life, in English, and slowly but surely, he and his family learned to speak English so that they could KATELYN: Any other places that you visited? be easily understood by the Americans. They lived in a typical Japanese house, you took the shoes off after you BOB: When I was back in the service and was in Korea came in, and when you sat down you sat on your knees, (this was my second tour of duty). One of the things that I as they do. It was always warm, though it was really marveled at was how they heated their houses. wintertime. And they had multiple paper walls. The paper They had a fireplace, the flue of which would run under kept the heat in, but the closer you got to the outside the the floor and it spread under the floor into a number of colder the rooms got. But they were lit, without offshoots, congregating at the other end of the house into electricity, but with lamps. Light and heat both came from a rather broad chimney. So the fireplace would heat the a hibachi, the people would straddle, you would put your air, which would go under the house, heat the floor, so kimono over the hibachi, and the hibachi wasn’t at full tilt, the house was quite warm and comfy. but it would warm them from the inside, and they would take themselves off of the hibachi and be warm from the KATELYN: And the chimney was the other side of the vapors within their robes. It was an interesting experience. house? The houses were very simple. And their simplicity was easily understood, it was easy for me to understand the BOB: And the chimney was on the other end of the house, house. I enjoyed that. The doors slid back and forth, so they had to devise a chimney of enough height so they quietly, it was fun. got enough draw, but they had been doing this for generations so they knew how to do it. KATELYN: Do you remember the materials, the feeling, or do you just remember the feel of the home? KATELYN: So, home was always with your parents at this point in your life. Did your parents move? BOB: You mean – BOB: Yes, but they always left a forwarding address. KATELYN: Like what it was made out of, what it felt like to *laughs* sit on the floor. KATELYN: So you may have never been there but that was BOB: The floors were wood, and they were not soft, but still home for you. you had pads to sit on. I was not as physically oriented to  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home BOB: Well, when I was in Japan, Dad had not yet BOB: Yeah, pretty much. I would go visit my folks, but transferred from Chicago to Detroit, so when I came back they really didn’t have much room. They had a couple of from service, after being in Japan, they were still in small bedrooms upstairs, and their bedroom was upstairs Evanston. Ah, but then I went to school in Monmouth, and too, I think there was one other bedroom upstairs but it while I was at Monmouth Dad was transferred to Detroit. was quite small. The house was small. Monmouth could not give me the degree I wanted, I wanted a degree in Chemical Engineering, and they could KATELYN: So your space was more your room at the only give me a degree in Chemistry, so I transferred to the fraternity house? University of Michigan, because, my folks being my home address, I was a resident of the State of Michigan, which BOB: Yeah. I had a room in it, which of course I shared. It meant I paid in-state tuition and I was still on the GI Bill was a typical fraternity house. You had your room, and and that was better too. But I was able to get my degree you shared the bathroom, which you shared with sixteen and then went back to Korea. Good question. When did or seventeen thousand people, and on the whole, it was a my folks move? Yes, they moved to Detroit. And they were fraternity house. And it was a good fraternity house. It was thrilled when (after they moved to an apartment, a terrible fairly new as those were. The furnace worked, which was apartment in Detroit), they moved into their own house. unusual for fraternity houses at that time. And the house was I think it would be described as Detroit architecture. This was a typical two-story house, KATELYN: Well that’s good! *chuckle* Heat is always a with a kind of semi-basement. And it had a peaked, ah, a good thing. Do you have any places that you lived that gabled entry that was exaggerated. There would be street you seriously disliked after you moved out of your house after street of the same house as my parents. and before you met Grandma?

KATELYN: Was there a big porch on this house? BOB: Well, ah, after I came back from Korea, I really didn’t uh – Well, let me put it this way. My wife and I BOB: About enough for a chair, and you could probably were married on our seventh date. So I didn’t spend a lot put your feet up on the side of porch, and it didn’t go of time living in other places. I got a job with a concern in around the side of the house Massachusetts. And knowing that we were going to be married, I found a place for us to move into; which KATELYN: So you never really lived in the house. happened to be a third floor apartment.

BOB: No. KATELYN: This was Grandma Nan?

KATELYN: Where were you living while you were going to BOB: Yes. college? KATELYN: Didn’t you meet Grandma Nan at a wedding? BOB: At Michigan I would live in the Theta Chi Fraternity house, which was just off campus, and it was a big BOB: Yes! Her best friend and my fraternity brother were monstrosity, but again, it had a series of windows that being married. She was a maid of honor, and I was an went looked right over the street that lit up the whole usher at the wedding. And that’s where we met house. (theoretically, on the blind date before the wedding, which the bride and groom arranged). And I think they KATELYN: So you did consider that home? were just glad to have me there because most of the men that Jim knew were off in other parts of the world, trying to establish themselves and here I came home, without a  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home job and not very secure, and I was available to serve in the BOB: Well the two places I, well the company I worked wedding. So he asked me to, and I did, and I met Nan, with in Massachusetts was the Norton company. And and we’re still married. *chuckle* before we were married we had this third floor house or apartment. And it was notable because it was the first KATELYN: Well, there are obviously places you were place I knew that had air conditioning. And the air living in, such as when you were in the Army, that you conditioning was because the windows didn’t fit. We had didn’t like. one bedroom, actually we had two bedrooms, and the second was the cold room, because the wind would BOB: Well, I was commissioned, that is, I was an officer in come in. And when we got our free turkey at Christmas World War Two and in Korea, and the quarters for officers we kept it in there because it would stay frozen. were a step above the barracks, in that I had my own room, but we still shared a bed, which was perfectly KATELYN: Oh wow. alright, but I had no bathroom. It was like a motel room, with nothing to get attached to. You might hang pictures BOB: Later on, after we had been married for a little on the wall, but that’s about all. while, we were able to, with help from Nan’s mother and father; buy a house in Portland, Massachusetts, which KATELYN: Did you hang pictures on the wall? Did you do was a suburb of Worcester, which we were able to keep anything to make the space “home”? for about a month until a tornado took the house away from us. But this was kind of a … what do you call it … BOB: Oh sure. pre-built… pre -?

KATELYN: What were those things? I’m curious. KATELYN: Pre-fab.

BOB: Well I had a picture of my Mother and my Father BOB: It was three bedrooms, and it was a nice house. It out on my desk. had three bedrooms and a bathroom that would fit two people, a kitchen and a family room and the like, which KATELYN: Pictures. was far more than we needed at that time in our life. It came easy and it went easy. We then moved to the west BOB: I think so. But I don’t think there was anything else, coast, where life actually began. We found a house up in and they went on the desk. Pictures on the wall took up the hills outside of Pasadena, first of all we lived in a little too much room when you have to repack them to go tiny place which had one bedroom, but we had to get somewhere else. And if it hung on the wall it was glass ourselves situated. And then we moved into the house up and you didn’t want to pack that because if it broke you’d in the hills outside Pasadena, and this was a delight. It have glass all over you clothing. You made the most of it was the first place in the world I had seen a fireplace that and everybody else had the same thing. There wasn’t any you could use from both sides. And it was just a delightful sense in complaining about it because where would you place. Sunny and airy and warm, I remember that I go to get anything better? It was alright. We got three mowed the lawn on Christmas day. square meals a day, and a bed at night and we could take a warm shower. KATELYN: I guess that’s the problem with California.

KATELYN: Which of these places you’ve talked about BOB: Yeah. It was a California house; instead of a furnace stands out the most? What place do you remember most we had a wall heater, and that was more than adequate to vividly after you moved out from your parent’s? keep the house warm, and break the cold from the cold air. What else… wood floors, the walls were combed  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home plywood, well the design on it was as if it was plaster and were horizontal pieces that broke up the sunshine. Do they had taken a rough comb. you follow me? There was a frame that ran lengthwise.

KATELYN: Oh so it was combed plaster. Not plywood. KATELYN: Oh like louvers.

BOB: No, it was plywood, but it looked like the combing, BOB: Yeah. Kind of. We made boxes, and we then put the combed plaster that you would have. some louvers, stationary, in there. And we didn’t cover the whole area with these louvers, but we would slide the KATELYN: Oh. So it was fabricated, and then painted. It boxes down to where we needed a little shade, and we wasn’t just plywood. would have other boxes that we would slide away or into to augment that. But it made a very nifty area, your BOB: Yes, it was a combed pattern that had been painted father, I remember, was very partial to it. And we would on. And it was what quite a lot of people used. It was slide one of these things over so the sun wouldn’t be in cheap and it was available, and it covered a multitude of his eyes. surfaces. KATELYN: *Quick pause of recording* So we’re starting KATELYN: Better than drywall. with when you and Grandma moved out of the house that blew away. BOB: Yeah. I think that might have been used, but probably not, plywood was cheaper at the time. It was a BOB: And we moved into Pasadena, California. And we nice house. lived in a small little bungalow, when we first got there, a one bedroom a very nice little place in a circle of small KATELYN: Do you remember what the outside was? Brick, bungalows. siding, …? KATELYN: And then you moved into the other house? BOB: Wasn’t brick. BOB: Uh-huh KATELYN: Stucco? KATELYN: So how long were you in the bungalow? BOB: It was probably just a wood siding. It certainly wasn’t plaster? RPC: I suppose close to a year, a year or something like it.

KATELYN: Do you remember what color it was? Pastels, KATELYN: Do you remember anything about it? or? BOB: Yeah, it was too small. BOB: As I recall it was kind of … redwood. KATELYN: And this is before you had my dad? KATELYN: Redwood? Oh, so it wasn’t colored at all, it was natural wood. BOB: Yes, well before. It was just the two of us, but it was, uh, we had access to the outside and all that, but it BOB: Ah, in order to, ah, regulate the amount of sun we was just too small, we kept running into eachother… we had an immense flat porch, which was at ground-level. It were accustomed to more room. was a single story. And we had an awning, wait, no we didn’t, what we used was sliding frames, in which there  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: Mhm. So you moved to Pasadena because there BOB: Actually, no. The only changes we made were was a job out there? probably the… as far as the interiors were concerned, we repainted it. One of the things we learned was that we BOB: No, we were transferred, right after the tornado; the were not designed to wield paintbrushes ourselves. company saw fit to transfer me from Massachusetts to Vocabulary expanded quite a bit in thirty minutes. We California. I had been in training in Massachusetts for the repainted the baby’s room, and we kind of painted the job that awaited me in California. rest of the house a multitude of colors. Oh, one of the things I wanted to show you in the house. This is the KATELYN: Okay, so then you moved to a bigger house to outline of the house, these are panels on the front wall, start your family. Okay, I guess you can describe that. inside the front door, the breakfast area was over here. There was a kind of bookcase installation over here. And BOB: Okay, we moved from South Pasadena to the city of it had, kind of shelves, in it, what do I want to call them… Pasadena, and we were on the side of one of the box? mountains [?], basically, and it was a three-bedroom house with, um, a kitchen and all of the accoutrements KATELYN: Shadow boxes? that go with it. But it was a California house. We weren’t accustomed to it, it had a beautiful view out the back BOB: Shadow boxes. And Nan was able to really dress where we could see the mountains, and a wonderful back those up and make them interesting so the people porch that we were able to use and another of the coming in weren’t shocked to find a blank wall, and architectural details was the sliding panels which we during breakfast it was something nice to look at. But would slide to give us shade where we wanted a little there was a great big window there; and one of the things more sunshine, and leave a lot of sunshine where we I could say about the house was that was a fair number of wanted a lot of sunshine. windows. There was light coming in, all the time.

KATELYN: And you were there, before you had my father. KATELYN: Do you remember if the majority of windows faced south or … ? BOB: No, I think we adopted your dad, while we were there. BOB: I would say the back was to the west.

KATELYN: But you lived there for a little while without KATELYN: Um, And I know you guys moved a bunch, so kids. there was the house in Pasadena, and then…

BOB: Yeah we were there for a couple of years without BOB: We moved elsewhere in Pasadena. kids. KATELYN: Do you remember that house, why you moved? KATELYN: So once you adopted Tom, did the house accommodate children? BOB: I think we wanted a little more substantial house. It wasn’t more room, necessarily, but the location was a little BOB: Oh yeah. Yeah, we had… It was a three bedroom better for us, and it was generally a ranch type house that house. We fixed up one bedroom for a child. suited us better. We put in a patio in the back, it was a free form patio and it had a fire pit in it. It was really a KATELYN: So, did you make a lot of changes to that delightful place. And we had a lot of input on the finishing house? of the house, which we did not have in the first house.

 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: So you kind of built this house? Or? them, but they were interested in hearing what you had to say. Which was so unlike Massachusetts, so unlike BOB: Well it had been started, and some of the things had Michigan. It was interesting and we had some ideas, and been put in. The floor plan had been decided, we decided we would bounce them off our friends. And they would what kind of countertops and what kind of cabinets, and counter them, or they would augment them, or whatever. what colors were being used. It was a great way to start out.

KATELYN: Was there anything you specifically chose, do KATELYN: Kind of a new, happening place. you remember? Or was it all Nan’s job? BOB: You bet. BOB: Well, you understand. She was involved with the architects at that the time. She had a lot of input from KATELYN: So that was the second house you had and the them, too. So I was making the money, I was going off to third house, and you moved somewhere else after that? work and she was busy - BOB: We were transferred from Pasadena to San Diego, KATELYN: So you weren’t concerned. which was south. And as we were going to be transferred we realized “Gee whiz, we wanted a second child.” And if BOB: Oh I was concerned. Yeah, and she would pass that we were going to San Diego that means we have to start stuff onto me, and if I had a violent objection there would all over again. What we thought we would do would be to be discussion. maintain a house in Pasadena and actually move to San Diego; and we thought that was a lousy way to commute KATELYN: Do you remember anything you had objections with a family so we went back to the adoption institute to that you didn’t like? and laid our cards on the table, “Look we’ve been asked to move.” So they decided that they could place a second BOB: Well I’m probably more inclined to be a little child in ten and a half months. I mean, from Tom’s date of reticent to jump off into the wild blue yonder to do things birth they could give us a child that would have a date of they suggested, and she did a good job pulling me back. birth ten and a half months after his. Which, biologically, Precisely what they were I don’t know. They were very that would wash, so we waited until Pat was in our hands, progressive architects, and I felt that almost anything they and then we went down to San Diego. We had to rent a would suggest was worthy of consideration. I liked what house, first of all, this was even more southern than they did. I liked the finished product. South Pasadena. Again, it was a ranch house, and it had a high berm on one side which was necessary because that’s KATELYN: Is there anything about Pasadena itself as a city the way the road came down; and on the opposite side of that you remember; were you attached to the city? our house was a great big cemented patio and the previous owners had a birdcage which was full of birds, BOB: The Rose bowl. It was our first experience with the and we were able to see that out of the kitchen and West Coast League. It was entirely different from to what breakfast windows. It was just a delightful way to wake up we had been used. I heard Los Angeles defined as the in the morning to see these birds flitting around while we most dynamic city in the world. And as you fly into it were trying to get our act together. The kids began to grow night, you see this expanse of lights. You just feel this up in that area. energy as you’re coming in, and it permeates the whole area. The people we met were interesting; they were KATELYN: This was the rented house or another house? interested in new ideas. They would listen to your ideas. That doesn’t mean they would agree with them or follow  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home BOB: It was the rented house. Then we had a chance to KATELYN: So what happened after San Diego? move into “El Cahone” which translated means, “the box.” And it was over the hills so we were actually in a desert BOB: Ah, Nan’s father was looking for someone else to community in “El Cahone.” And we were in the involved come into the company. He wrote me a letter and said in the design of that house pretty much from the that if I ever thought I would like to come back to beginning. And it was a warm climate house, as opposed Michigan, he would like to have first refusal. Well, his to a mixed climate house. Ah, I gotta be honest with you timing couldn’t have been much better. We were filling and say I don’t remember much about that house. It was out; you probably don’t remember what IBM cards were. an easily livable house. But I do remember tying my tie in They were cards that were fed into an IBM machine that the morning, looking to the east and watching that ball of contained input data, that the computer would do fire come up out of the east and saying to myself, “So something with. Crunch. And I was tired, and after a day’s help me God, if it sunshines again today I’m going to slit work, I would enter a five digit number in for each of the my wrists.” calls that I made, and tell them what I did on my call by checking off boxes. I found after a while that nothing that I KATELYN: How could you get sick of sunshine? *laughs* did on those cards made a heck of a lot of difference. So I made my mind up I was going to put all the cards into a BOB: Well for 364-and-a-half days of the year you had wastebasket and when they decided they wanted more sunshine and you could count on it. In Pasadena we were information, they would let me know. I told my district bothered with smog. In El Cahone we were bothered with manager that I was going to do that. He upon hearing that sunshine. 364 and-a-half days was a little exaggeration, went right through the roof and said, “You can’t do that! because we did get some great days of, ah, unsunshine. The company will have bad information … and you can’t But I was gone a good twenty-five to thirty percent of the do that!” And I said, “Too late, I’ve already started.” And time, because I was traveling the three southern counties they never did let me know that they didn’t have any of California the State of Arizona, and Clark County information. However, after I left, they put three men on Nevada. the territory that I had been covering, so I felt that they were aware that I was doing something right. But my KATELYN: Yeah talk about your job a little. You move a lot. father-in-law, I did respond to his request, and said, “I You were a salesperson, right? would like to come back to Michigan and work, but I would like to come back and look at it first.” And I flew BOB: Yes. Yeah. back to Chicago, and I then was going to fly from Chicago into Grand Rapids, where my brother-in-law was, KATELYN: So you were often in your car during the day, because he was covering the territory then. And the driving around, not in an office. airplane never got very high off the ground, and I could see that there was water in the rivers; there were green BOB: That is correct. leaves on the trees, there were green crops growing, and I had forgotten these things existed, living in the desert. KATELYN: So you got to see a whole wide web of the Before I landed I decided, “I’m coming back.” area, right? KATELYN: So you had never lived in Michigan, Chicago’s BOB: Yeah, because I had to travel to see my customers. close but – But I enjoyed that. I enjoyed the necessity of movement. I enjoyed my customers; I liked what I was doing, I was BOB: No my folks moved to Detroit. But I really had never very comfortable. But the sunshine got to me. lived in Michigan because I was kind of visiting them after school or in between semesters or something like that. 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home ought to put in here.” KATELYN: Oh, and there was the time you studied in U of M, that was in Michigan. KATELYN: So this was the builder who built your house for you. And he was kind of designing it too. BOB: Well yeah, that’s right. And I got to know it again. I guess I loved four seasons. It’s nice to have something to BOB: And he was right. He was absolutely correct. He put bitch about. And you learn that summer is good because a window seat under the window and we had bookcases you can compare it with winter. In California you don’t all over the place and it was just exactly what had to be have anything to compare it to. put in there. But we had three bedrooms up on the fourth level, and we had a living room, a dining room, kitchen KATELYN: It’s always the same. Every day. That’s and breakfast on the next level; next level down was an interesting. The weather. immense family room, and a laundry and other bathroom, and on the bottom level was a basement under the house. BOB: And it’s a strong influence. And I guess it’s an unknown influence or an unfelt influence. But both Nan KATELYN: Do you remember any tactile, smells, any other and I grew up with four seasons. We anticipated it was sense, feelings about this house as far as materials, like the going to get colder in the fall, and there would be snow in carpet was really soft or the walls were smooth or colors, the wintertime, and all of a sudden the world would come too, if you remember any of the colors of the house? back to life in the springtime. But California there was perpetual springtime, theoretically. And it got to be so-so. BOB: Seems to me that blue was a predominant color in You know the kids were blonder out there. But they had the living room. And we had a uh … not a … hmm… I more roses in their cheeks after they had been here for don’t know. three months than they ever had in California. And we came back to live in Grand Rapids, Cascadian Meadows. KATELYN: You don’t remember. And we rented a house there until we were able to help build a house in Ada, and the house in Ada was a delight. BOB: In the final analysis, no I don’t. It was probably a It was a four-level. And it was built by, he was primarily an wooden house, because I remember we did have a little Indian (Native American), and he built the house for woodpecker problem. He thought it was a dead tree. The himself, and he put the kitchen together for his wife, who only real fault I found in the house was that we were in a was a baker. And there were some great things in there for wooded area. And he had told the guy that cleared the instance the countertops were higher than they usually land precisely what trees were going to be removed. And were. You didn’t have to break your back leaning over to nothing else was moved. And they made just enough roll out dough to make pie-crusts, they were at a height room for a rather winding driveway to go into the garage. where you do that. Breakfast area was right adjacent to And we did have a little trouble backing the cars out of the kitchen; there was just a countertop in between. And the winding driveway. It was quite a challenge. And we on the other side was an indoor barbecue grill. Who ever mastered it after a while, but it would have been easier to heard of anything like that in a house in those days? But have a little bit more direct straight drive on the driveway. he did it. He was that type of guy; we had been in the I don’t know, some of these nuances of color and tactile house a few months and decided that one window wall, response I think are probably more to the feminine we should convert to a library wall. And I told him that I mystique than – wanted him to come over and kind of give us an idea of what it would cost. And he came in and said, “Okay well KATELYN: You just remember generally it being pleasant. I’ve already ordered the lumber.” and I said “I haven’t told you what we want.” And he said “I know what you really  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home BOB: It was. I probably have an aura of remembering colors, but they fit, and it was very comfortable for all of KATELYN: We’ll have some steak, thank you *laughs* Oh us. I’m trying to think of what material we had for that’s funny. Okay, so you were in Ada for a while and carpeting in the living room, it wasn’t what people then, how long were you in Ada and then you moved normally used for carpeting. It was kind of a braided rug again? kind of thing. And, um, it worked. BOB: Uh, Yeah. We moved business-wise. It got so that KATELYN: You’ve mentioned Solariums and things in a lot Nan’s father, who was president of the company and my of places. Was there a room, particularly in this house that brother-in-law Denver McCord, and I were his two you enjoyed? principal employees if there were two others. But Milt, Nan’s father, began to have health problems and decided BOB: Well the family room was completely window wall. he was not going to travel anymore, and he asked Denver And it looked on a wooded area behind us. And the other to come to Detroit and he wanted me to go to Grand builders in the area took pains to keep the next house kind Rapids to live. Oh no, the other way around. He was of off, just a little bit, so we didn’t look right into their having trouble and Denver wanted me to come into, uh, windows and they didn’t look right into our windows. And that was why I went first of all to Grand Rapids. Then I it was nice, rustic, and pretty natural, there was a came back to Detroit because his health deteriorated even walkway in the back that had been put in, and as I recall further and Denver decided that uh, he was the nominal it was brick. We wanted a walk to the front of the house, head of the company at that time, and he decided that it wider than standard, we wanted to have at least a three- was better that we coalesce forces in the Detroit office foot walkway a four-foot walk made of brick and we did and I would cover the western part of the state from and it added just a wonderful touch to the house. But uh, Detroit. So I did that. it just fit into the trees, it looked like it belonged there. And I loved the house. Didn’t want to leave. Have you KATELYN: Did a lot of driving. So then you moved to seen the house? which house?

KATELYN: I don’t think I have. I can probably find it. BOB: When did we come here first in Detroit…? Oh! Well, it was on Ridgewood. I selected the house as being BOB: Sheffield Drive. In Ada. probably the one that Nan would like the most and our real estate had two or three houses for us to look at. He KATELYN: Do you remember anything about living in Ada took us to the other two first and I had told Nan all about itself. Where you ate out for dinner or what you did when the house I told her the wrong color the wrong shape of you hung out in Ada. Did you walk to work at that point the house and everything else and as soon as we walked or were you still driving? in it was all over. And it wasn’t a good house. The bedroom we had for Pat was quite small, and it was right BOB: I still had a territory in the state of Michigan, and I opposite of the door. And the room we had for Tom was had to drive pretty much wherever that I would go. Yeah ideally placed for him and also for the Master Bedroom, there were a couple of restaurants that we would go to but Pat had to walk all the way across the living room in that were pretty close by. We made the mistake one night, order to get to the bathroom, we only had one bath. We where we would normally cook steaks for ourselves and had a lot of things wrong. But it was the perfect house hamburgers for the kids and one time eldest son Tom for us. Everything worked. We had a great room; we had decided he wanted to try what we were having and that three acres, and there were three holes of golf on the three was the end of hamburgers. They would have some of that acres which was off the back of the house. And we had a after this *chuckle* Solarium on the back of the house there. And it was just  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home three walls that were nothing but window. And we looked out at this natural landscape out there all seasons. BOB: I don’t think so. We put in a new walk, and we had The golf course was a nice asset, but it took a lot of work to do something to our back patio, which was to replace to keep up to the standard that we would like to have had the canvas that they had over it. But I think most of the it. work we did was outside. The house took kind of care of itself, I think, inside. I don’t think we’ve ever - we hired an KATELYN: So that was great for the kids, there was a lot of architect to redo our house, where? I guess it was the room to run and play. But you were still selling, driving house one Ridgewood, but we decided that we didn’t around, you weren’t home a lot of the time. Do you want to go through with it. remember anything on weekends or when you were home what you did when you hung out at the house or in the KATELYN: So you’ve lived here (current house) for quite a Plymouth community? number of years?

BOB: We played golf in our backyard. And that was fun. BOB: Thirty years. That was fun; all four of us could play golf. Specifically we began sailing, and we bought a sailboat, or two, or three; KATELYN: Thirty years. Wow. And obviously there have and we had to drive about twenty minutes to a half-hour been changes to this house. to get to Whitmore Lake, which was a portage lake in this area. And we would sail around the buoys and race and I BOB: Well yeah. Really I don’t think we’ve done any got a smaller boat for the kids to sail, but then they were structural changes. We’ve re-roofed and we’ve done things acting as crew for the other people in the yacht club downstairs but I don’t think we’ve added anything to the because they were both good sailors. Tom went all over house. the country sailing, and Pat went all over the general closer area sailing. They were good, better than I was. We KATELYN: The window in the living room, wasn’t that an had a lot of fun with that. addition?

KATELYN: So Ridgewood was quite a while. Probably BOB: There was a window there, but it wasn’t quite the until – same configuration. I think the center window was smaller than it is now, and the side windows were larger, BOB: Seven or eight years, I think we were up there. And I obviously, and they did not open. We went to opening think, yeah, both of the kids left for college from while we windows and this center window. But that’s the crown of were in Ridgewood. And while they were finishing up our house and we both love it. And again, it’s our college we found this house, and came here, and they solarium, where we can look out and watch nature and came back and stayed here minimal times while they were all the seasons and we have a couple cups of coffee there kind of getting their act together before they went out to every morning. do their thing. But ah, this again, we used the same realtor, I think, and here again, we walked into this house KATELYN: So I guess this is the house that sticks out most and that was the end of it. We liked the house. It was, in your memory. I want you to describe it in your own again, a ranch. Other than the house in Ada I don’t think words. we ever lived in a house that was more than maybe one floor. BOB: This house?

KATELYN: Did you ever make any changes to the house KATELYN: Yes. This house on Ridgewood? Significant additions, or remodeling?  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home BOB: How would I describe it? KATELYN: Maybe you need pine trees KATELYN: Yes. BOB: Well, that might be a step in the right … what’s the BOB: Ranch, I mean, you want to use those terms? least favorite thing about this house…

KATELYN: You can use those terms if you want. KATELYN: Or even in this community…

BOB: It’s my cocoon; I’m very comfortable in this house. BOB: Oh, the only thing … Well, we live on a cement I can walk around this house at night with the lights off road and we are at the edge of a dirt road. I would far and I know where I am. Were I to redesign the house rather that it be paved out there cause it would be a lot there are some things I would change, but they’re minor. I easier to keep clean out there. I think that the major would like the rooms a little bigger, I’d like to have a little complaint that I would have with this would be, as you larger master bedroom, this and that; but that isn’t the go from the kitchen or the dining room into what we call house. This is the house. I don’t think I’d change a thing. the clubhouse; you have a step down. And I wish that did not have a step down. Cause it is on the same plane as the KATELYN: What are you favorite features of this house? garage. And we have had some friends that are a little unstable and they step off and have fallen. Were I to make BOB: That window. a change; that would be one thing I would certainly redo.

KATELYN: That window, the big window, and those chairs. KATELYN: That would make the clubhouse – was the Those chairs make the house. clubhouse an addition?

BOB: *laughs* They go together. And you know, I get a lot BOB: It came with the house. And I think that other of… I enjoy the basement. I enjoying doing work down houses of the same design have that on there too. there, I’ve got a computer down there, and I’ve got bench projects I can handle down there; I put in some storage KATELYN: Well, I guess you have a great attachment to down there – it’s my little retreat when things get hectic this house. Partly for living here for thirty years, but is as they sometimes do. there anything that really stands out and says, “oh, that’s my house, that’s my home.” If there was one piece that KATELYN: So you have the workshop and the big window. you could take out that would make it not home.

BOB: And I have the leaves … BOB: Well it’s like an arch. Pieces of the arch, you take one out and the whole arch falls down. Friends that are in KATELYN: What are your least favorite things about this the area. We can walk to downtown. house? KATELYN: Do you walk to downtown? BOB: The leaves. BOB: Yeah. Our church is even closer. All of these things KATELYN: *laugh* Other than the leaves. Well, you like fit into this. We have good neighbors. And I think we have the nature … good neighbors because we are good neighbors. And we try to be good neighbors. The neighborhood we live is the BOB: Yeah. Oh yeah, you’re into the timing of that, aren’t level we’re comfortable with. It’s not starter homes, and it’s you? *laughs* not big mammoth places either. The people that are living  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home here are interested in keeping their houses looking nice. with. Inside and out. And all of this fits in to make this arch stable. KATELYN: And you would have to be in a community with good neighbors. KATELYN: I guess. Five words that mean “home” for you. Five words that could define your idea of “home”? BOB: Yes. I’m not ready to isolate myself and my family. I guess I need to have civilization around me, and close by. BOB: Comfortable? Secure? Mine? I could say “Paid for” but that would be two more… KATELYN: And I would think that Michigan, that trying to find that within Michigan you wouldn’t want to leave KATELYN: That counts. Five phrases/words. Michigan to find that. I mean, Massachusetts there’s probably communities that fit this description but the BOB: I’d just say… “it pays me back.” There’s a poem I people there are completely different from the people remember, “The house with nobody in it,” have you ever here, right?. heard that? BOB: I haven’t visited everyplace on earth that would be a KATELYN: No. possibility. But I am sure that there are a lot of general locations, physical locations that would fit. It doesn’t have BOB: It starts out, “Whenever I walk to supper, along the to be Michigan. It doesn’t have to be Arizona. It doesn’t eerie track, I pass by a poor old farmhouse, its shingles have to be anyplace else. But I would stay in Michigan. are broken and black.” And it goes on to talk about this farmhouse, and the author is so upset because it’s a house with nobody in it. And I think this house wants us here.

KATELYN: If, in a world without budgets or anything else, what would your ideal home place be. I mean, grandma has said that you’ve thought about it and it thought it was this one, but if you could build anything you wanted, anywhere you wanted …

BOB: It would be very close to the general architecture of this place, but I would very much like to be on water.

KATELYN: You’d like to be on water.

BOB: Very much so. I still dream of sailing. I probably shouldn’t do it. I’m not sure I’m that reliable anymore on a sailboat. I would love to be able to see water. Even if it’s just a river, I would like it. I need to see the outside. And that would be one of the first things I would like. And I would like to have a fireplace. I would like to have enough room where people could be together, and yet find their space without alienating the people that they are  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home Interview Two to when I was alone in our closet. It even had a window. Subject: Nan Cooper (Born 1932, 75 years old) We also played in the dining room a lot. I guess we Interviewer: Katelyn Cooper on November 25, 2007 played under the table. We might have played there because that’s where that big warm register was. There KATELYN: Tell me about your earliest memories of home. weren’t many bright colors in that house, mostly browns and grays. NAN: I was born in Toledo, Ohio and we lived in a duplex My grandpa had a garden there and he raised above my Dad’s folks. They had built the whole house to lots of flowers and vegetables. He built me a big sand raise their five boys in and after they were gone, Gramma pile in the side yard and I spent a lot of time playing there. and Grandpa made the house into a duplex. The two We’d catch fire flies and stick them into the castle so that places were identical except for the porches. We had a at night it looked like our sandcastles were lighted. There front screened in porch and a big back porch and they was a long walk covered with a grape arbor between the had a big front porch with a swing---in which I usually got garage and house. He raised rhubarb on one side of the in trouble for swinging too high. We had a big floor heat arbor and the other side was all violets and lilies of the register in the dining room and in the winter our mom valley. On May Day we used to pick those flowers, paint would put our pajamas there in the evening and our tin cans with whatever color paint was available and then clothes there in the morning and they were always warm hang the cans filled with flowers on neighbor’s doors. In to put on. Mom had stuccoed all the walls in the living the summer we seldom played indoors. We were outside room and the dining room. from dawn to dusk. When it was time to come home, my The back porch was large enough for mom to iron mom just went out to the back porch and whistled and we on and there was an icebox there. We had an iceman and knew it was bedtime. a butter and egg man and they just came in through the We had a wonderful long alley and I used to unlocked downstairs door and up the back steps and left wander in that to look for treasures. We did a lot of what ever Mom had ordered. I remember we put a sign in pretending, drinking cool aid, playing in the hose, paper the window so the iceman knew how much ice to bring dolls and just giggling. I remember once while playing in up. We also had a refrigerator in the kitchen, but the the hose, I kicked a jar of cool aid and almost cut my toe icebox was built-in. Mom could watch the whole off. Until we moved there were bloody footprints on the neighborhood from that porch. One time my sister and stepping-stones between houses and up the back steps to her friends were trying to haul me up into a tree in a peck our back porch and I thought that was really cool. Every basket and Mom spied them. I can still remember her mom in the neighborhood was our mom. We didn’t get scream!! away with very much and if we got hurt or were in The house had a huge kitchen with cupboards on trouble, there was always someone’s mom to take care of one side and a counter under them that no one used. The us or to at least get us home. We trusted everyone and other side of the kitchen just had a sink and a little were never told to watch out for bad people. Even at four, counter and the table was pushed up against the wall. We I wandered the alley alone, of course, I’m not sure I was never used the middle of the kitchen. The floor was gray supposed to, but the treasurers I brought home were and blue linoleum squares, and the cupboards were gray. wonderful. My sister and I shared a bedroom because my mom’s mother lived with us so she got the third bedroom, KATELYN: How long did you live there? but the bonus was we had a very large closet and not much to put in it, so it was a great hidey hole for me. NAN: I went to kindergarten in Toledo and then we This was during the depression and we didn’t have a lot of moved to a small town in northwest Ohio called Bryan. toys or clothes, so I could just imagine anything I wanted So I lived in Toledo almost six years.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: So you didn’t spend a lot of time in the bed way over on the other side. My mom’s mom lived community? with us and we shared a big closet. We could walk through the closet and get to her bedroom. Not much NAN: No, except in those days, everybody was my mom else very exciting about that house. That was on Cherry and I knew everyone. I wandered from house to house Street. and got a cookie or a pat on the head here and there. Then we rented another house in the same town Everybody took care of everybody else. Often on Saturday, and that was on Walnut Street. I liked that house. It was we would go to the art museum and just wander around a very special house and I don’t really know why. It had and we had lots of relatives in Toledo and the area. four bedrooms up stairs so I had my very own bedroom when I was about eight. It had a powder room that I KATELYN: Do you remember making any changes to that thought was quite ritzy, and a great sunroom that was a house when you were there? year around room so I could play there all winter and again, I played under the dining room table. The garage NAN: No. was attached and I’m sure my Dad thought that was a great relief after the shed back on the alley at our last KATELYN: In that house what was your favorite space and house. I also had a hide-away in the bushes under the why was it special. sunroom windows. Oddly enough, the girl next door who was a very good friend is the sister of our present next- NAN: Well, I loved the closet because it was a good door neighbors. retreat, but my favorite place was the basement when my We moved again, another rental. This was probably my Grandpa was there. He was my favorite playmate and all time favorite house. It was quite large with a center he’d play hide-and-go-seek with me. When he got tired entry. The front yard was terraced and the porch had big he’d go down to the basement. I wouldn’t go down there pillars. The entry opened onto a winding staircase and unless I was sure someone was there because I’d get glass French doors on either side. One side led into the scared, but after I’d looked a long time, my Grandma dining room and the other side into the living room. On would suggest I look in the basement and there he’d be, the far side of the living room there was a fireplace and tending his African Violets. I can still remember the on either side of the fireplace there were more glass smell of the basement. It smelled of coal, starch, gas and French doors leading out to a glass sunroom. The bluing. Grandpa was a very patient man. He was almost sunroom had wind-out windows and an outside entry. bald and would play beauty parlor with me. I used to jab The living room and dining room had wall sconces that him with bobbie pins and make curls out of just a few looked like two candles. We only lit them at Christmas hairs on his head. time when mom had decorated them with greens and ribbons. The kitchen was another big one with an icebox. KATELYN: So after that you moved where? It was built in so we couldn’t get rid of it and we used it every now and then. There was a table in the middle that NAN: The first house we lived in Bryan was quite old and we never ate at because there was a big separate nook had been redone just before we moved in. Believe it or that would seat about eight people. This was in a separate not, the walls had been stuccoed!! This time besides room off the kitchen which had a whole wall of glass bloody elbows, we also had to vacuum up sand a lot. I doors and shelves and a clothes shoot as well as a trash remember it had a very large ugly back yard and the shoot and you know, I don’t know what happened to the garage was a shed back on the alley... which was a really trash we put down there. Hum!!! The stairway led up to boring alley. My sister and I shared a large bedroom. It a landing where there was a big window seat and went all the way across the front of the house so she could bookshelves. This was my favorite place to be. I could have her bed way over on one side and I could have my read and still watch everything going on. There were four  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home bedrooms and one bathroom upstairs. The bathtub had soup. It was a nice community. While we were there four showerheads in it, which I thought was pretty nifty. they built a community pool and I spent most of my There was a big deck off my parent’s room and my summer time there. I’d ride my bike out at one o’clock grandma and I shared a deck. I wasn’t supposed to go out when the pool opened, come home for dinner, then go there as there was no railing, but there was a pear tree that back until the pool closed. Before the pool, when I was over hung the deck so I’d go out a pick a pear to eat. I younger, we’d pack lunches and get on our bikes and just also slipped down that tree a couple of times when I was go someplace and come home for dinner. No body ever supposed to be in my room. worried about us. We’d find a stream and make little The oddest thing about that house was the back boats, or take books and read. We did lots of exploring. hall. It had seven doors in it. One to the garage, one to the back yard, one to the living room, one to the KATELYN: Did you live there until you went away to basement, one to the front hall, one to the kitchen and college? one to the powder room. Oh yeah, it had a three car garage too, back when most families only had one car and NAN: No, we moved to Ann Arbor when I was about 12. that was during the war years and we usually didn’t have a Dad changed jobs and started his own business when we car at all because Dad needed it. So we walked every moved to Ann Arbor. place we went or rode our bikes. KATELYN: Was there anything about the house in Bryan KATELYN: Do you remember anything about Bryan and that you didn’t like? In terms of storage or being scared or the community where you played outside of the house? anything like that?

NAN: Bryan was a little town of about 5000 people. NAN: The basement was kind of scary. It had a coal bin There was a city square and a courthouse in the square. and a trash/ashbin and a cistern. I always found the Almost anything commercial was on one of the four cistern sort of spooky. You had to climb up a few steps to blocks around the square. When we moved there they see inside it and I used to scare myself by taking a flash were celebrating the fact that they finally had a population light down there and looking into the cistern. Don’t of 5000, which in Ohio, made them a city. It was pretty know what I thought I’d see in there, but it was dark and much a farming community. Toledo was only about 60 smelled like iron and that dead calm but funky noise of miles away and Fort Wayne Indiana was not very far away still water. But that was all about that house that wasn’t and that’s where we did most of our shopping for just down right pleasant. Oh yeah, there was a den everything other than groceries. We always went to Fort upstairs too. It was between my sisters and my bedrooms Wayne at Christmas time because the decorations were so and it was so cold that no one ever used it. One of those wonderful. And of course, we went back to Toledo often rooms you get all fixed up and no one will go in it. to see our grandparents and our cousins. KATELYN: What was your favorite place in that house? KATELYN: Did you walk to school? NAN: That wonderful window seat. I’d take some food NAN: Indeed we did. There was only one high school, and I could settle there all day with a good book. which contained the junior high as well, and there were two elementary schools that went up to grade six. I KATELYN: So then you moved to Ann Arbor. Describe attended both elementary schools as we moved from one those houses. end of town to the other. You can imagine that was only about six blocks. We always went home for lunch, NAN: Well that was the first house my parents owned. baloney or toasted cheese sandwiches and Campbell’s That was the only house I ever lived in in Ann Arbor. It  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home was pretty exciting, to be moving to Ann Arbor with the NAN: Yeah University of Michigan from this little town in Ohio. By then, my sister was about to be married. She’d been away KATELYN: So do you remember where you lived when at college and when her soldier came home they were you were in college? married and I had my own room. My gramma moved with us again. NAN: Well, I first went to school in Chicago and that The house was a Cape Cod with three bedrooms room was a dump. It was in an old brown-stone that had and bath upstairs, living room, dining room and kitchen been a guesthouse from the Potter-Palmer mansion. It was on the main floor. The man we bought from was a one room. I had a bed and a chest of drawers and a closet horticulturist at the University of Michigan so the yard was and it was an institutional brown with high windows and truly magnificent. We had a hedge of peonies that the a bathroom down the hall. Most of us shared a bath; University asked for every year to decorate the stage there were a few private baths. But I can just imagine during graduation…remember this was in the 40’s and what that house looked like when it was new, and it there weren’t millions of students there then. We had a would have been beautiful. It had a spiral staircase that small pond full of gold fish that just slept away the winter went up three stories and I lived on the third floor. The in there. Dad put a metal pipe in the pond and that was living room was beautiful and very formal and we all ate all they needed. breakfast in the lovely dining room there, however, we At this time, everyone had a recreation room and were on our own for the rest of the meals. We were about Dad wanted one and he wanted pine paneling. This was a block off the lake. I was in secretarial school. We had to just after the war and for some reason full-length pine take the bus into, oh almost to the loop and we went to paneling wasn’t available so they used half-length pine school in one building, no campus. I remember we all and put a shelf all around where the panels met. This was had to wear hats and we all bought little felt hats that we really cool. They did a lot of entertaining at football could fold up and put in our purses. So when we got off games and the rec. room was full every Saturday of a the city bus about a block from school, we’d plop those home game. The shelf was wide enough to hold glasses little hats on our heads and go to school. and everyone smoked then so the shelf held ashtrays too. He put in a bar and a half bath, mom decorated and it KATELYN: When you weren’t going to school in Chicago was a really great room. It had a fireplace. They did a did you go out a lot? nice job. For my 16th birthday, my mom and dad let me NAN: Well, I didn’t have a really big bedroom but we’d decorate my own room. That had a window seat in it. I gather in someone else’s bedroom that was bigger, but we did it all in green chintz with lavender piping. I had twin worked hard during the week. We always had lots of beds that went into a corner in a “U” with a table between homework. But on the weekends we’d go out. We’d them that my uncle had made. He refinished a desk for usually sleep in and then take off. On nice weekends me, too. The skirts on the beds and the drapes and the we’d be gone all day and just walk. We’d usually have skirt on my chair were all white chintz with big bunches one good meal a day. We were close to the zoo and of of violets on them. That fabric still exists today in fabric course the Art Institute. Navy Pier… We really did do shops. The window seat had a green pad with lavender Chicago. And we dated. Great Lakes Navel Academy piping on it, too. That sat back in a dormer. The walls was there and there were boys there from Ann Arbor that I were violet and I loved that room!! I had some built in knew and I dated them. drawers too with a shelf on top. KATELYN: While you were at college in Chicago did you KATELYN: You lived there until you went to college, right? still consider your parents house home?

 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home NAN: Yes. strapless polka dot dress with a red ruffle down the front. My roommate came home before I did that night and was KATELYN: You went home for holidays and stuff? anxiously awaiting my return to find out what had happened to the curtain. In just the last month I’ve been NAN: Yeah, I’ll tell you a fun thing to do, in those days the on Bowling Green’s campus and it’s turned into a lovely trains were still wonderful. I could get on a train Friday school. That funny dorm is still there right in the middle of after school and go home for the whole weekend and campus. It looks like a cement wedding cake, so there there was always a party on the train because kids were must more to the building than I thought when I was living going back and forth from Ann Arbor, so it was fun just to there. take the Back and forth, much less go home for the weekend. KATELYN: Then you came home for the summer. Of those places you lived after you moved out of your home, what NAN: Ok, so you were there for a year? stands out the most?

NAN: I was there for as little less than a year. When I went NAN: The color brown!! Chicago. By far. That house to Chicago it was because I was madly in love and I wasn’t wonderful when I lived there, but I’m sure it was didn’t want to go to college I wanted to get married, and beautiful in its day and just being in Chicago on my own by the time I was finished at school in Chicago, I was no at age 18 was pretty great and it’s still our favorite city. longer madly in love, I didn’t want to get married and I did want to go to college. Because of the timing, I went to KATELYN: I can imagine how fun that was. Eastern Michigan for just a semester just to keep moving and I lived at home. That was not my most favorite NAN: Yeah, it was fun. semester in the whole world. KATELYN: So, you went to Bowling Green for a year… KATELYN: Well, with the parents and…. NAN: Yes, then I came home and got a good job with a NAN: Yeah, I’d been on my own for a year and I was travel agency in Ann Arbor. I almost went back for commuting and I didn’t have a car and I had to go to summer school but my very best friend in the whole world school with whoever was driving and come home when was getting married that summer and I decided to stay they came home and sometimes that was a long day. around for the festivities. One of the groomsmen who had been a fraternity brother of the groom’s at Michigan, KATELYN: Yeah, so after that? stopped by to meet my friend who was working at the same agency, and it was Grandpa. We immediately NAN: After that I enrolled at Bowling Green State U. in decided this was a go and were married… we met in Bowling Green, Ohio. Lo and behold, my roommate was August and were married in December; we married on a good friend I had known in school in Bryan. The dorm our seventh date. was very old and our room there was no big deal. Bunk beds, double desk, small closet, two chests of drawers and KATELYN: You were married on your seventh date? bathroom down the hall. The windows were almost floor to ceiling and Mom made us bedspreads and curtains. NAN: Yes we were, that was very careless. We were very They were white with big red polka dots on them and a lucky, you know that’s just not…and at the time we wide red ruffle. I remember I was invited to go to a thought our parents were crazy to be so concerned. Hawaiian party and couldn’t find anything to wear, so I Because we were in love!! wore one of the curtains wrapped around me ie: a 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: So you were living at home curtains for the living room. I was working. And the big tornado came. Somewhere I have pictures of those NAN: Yeah, in the bedroom with the violets. curtains, made the day before, draped over the front of Mom’s car and hanging on the 2 x 4 that had gone KATELYN: I’ll bet it was fun to be living in a room you through the front of the car. That was a Gunnison home, decorated when you were 16 (sarcasm). which is a pre-fab house. It was on a corner and had a split rail fence. It had two bedrooms, a living room, a NAN: *Laughs* Yeah! Then we got married in December bathroom and a kitchen with a little place to eat. and moved to the third floor in an old house in Worcester, Mass. One of the biggest kitchens I’ve ever seen. All the NAN: So you only lived there for…? lights worked from a pull cord. It had two bedrooms but we only used one because the other was too cold. We’d NAN: I don’t think we were there longer than a week. flip a coin in the morning, we were both working, and the loser had to go into the cold bedroom where the only KATELYN: Before it was gone. closet was, and get out clothes for the day. The heat pipe in that room came up the outside of the house…..don’t NAN: Yeah with everything that we owned in the world. It ask. was just gone.

KATELYN: Grandpa said you kept a turkey there. KATELYN: Well it was more the stuff in the house; I mean you didn’t have much attachment to the house. Or were NAN: We did. The company Grandpa was working for you attached to the house? gave everyone as frozen turkey at Christmas. Grandpa (Bob) came home (to Ann Arbor) to get married, so he just NAN: No not a bit. The wind tossed a footlocker that was put the turkey in the back bedroom and we kept it there filled with engineering books of grandpas and the living until we were ready to cook it. It stayed hard as a rock. room rug somehow wrapped around it. After the tornado, And in the bedroom where we slept it snowed in between I found the footlocker wrapped up in the rug, sitting on the window and the sill. Bob complained once to the our slab with a vase which had been a wedding present landlady about the cold and she told him to wear his from Aunt Gae and Uncle Denny sitting on top of it smoking jacket if he was so cold. shining in the sun. The day before, a neighbor had brought over a bouquet of roses from his garden to KATELYN: If you’re cold put more clothes on!!! *Laughs* welcome us to the neighborhood and I had put then in the So then you bought a house. vase and put the vase on the coffee table…never saw the coffee table again. When my sister called, she said, “Boy I NAN: Yeah we bought a house in Holden, Mass. We had sure hope you still have that vase.” And we did. Of course no furniture and we had lots of wedding presents. You she had no idea how wiped out we were. know things you don’t need, but pretties. We had friends who had just broken up his mom’s house and that KATELYN: The champagne glass…. furniture was in storage and they offered it to us, so we used it to furnish our house. NAN: What champagne glass? I don’t know how long grandpa stayed there. I don’t think he spent more than a couple of nights in that KATELYN: You were saying the other night that we were house. My mom and grandma came to stay with me and drinking out of a champagne glass that went through the help make drapes and stuff. So Grandpa went on a field tornado. trip to Chicago, and my mom and grandma made  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home NAN: Oh yeah, I had two champagne glasses that my uncle had cut. He worked at Libby Owens Ford in Toledo NAN: Dropping seed in the piano but we never saw and cut glass for a living. Yes, I had two of them and one anything else dropped. of them made it through. The dress I wore to our wedding rehearsal was flapping in the breeze from a telephone KATELYN: Oh, they took the birds with them, they weren’t pole. Oh, and when I went to college we used to send free range… our laundry home in laundry boxes so our mothers would iron them and starch them and send them back. I had two NAN: There were holes pecked in the lampshades. They of those. One had my wedding dress in it and the other had a big tropical fish tank and that was all they asked us was filled with my silver. I found both of those boxes to do while we were there, just feed the fish. Caper was about four blocks away. When we were transferred to their daughter’s name, which I thought was kind of a neat California we sent 230 pounds of stuff by railway express name, and she had a shed in the back yard that was and that’s all we owned in the whole world except for a locked but I peeked in the windows and it was filled with few items of clothing we picked up at the Salvation Army, butterflies. We didn’t think much about it but later we and after it arrived we threw away most of it. But the found out it was worth a great deal of money. It was immediate reaction was to hang on to anything that was connected to the house with two tin cans and a piece of ours. ...But the next house we lived was a house still in string. Worcester. This family was just wonderful. The kids came into the house that summer looking for a nozzle for the KATELYN: So you did live in Worcester after the tornado. hose because they were building a tennis court. Their parents said they would pay for the court if the kids did NAN: Yeah, well we had to go someplace. One of the the research and labor. So that’s what they were doing. local bank presidents called the company Grandpa Their summer place was on the ocean, and the last we worked for, and said “Do you have anyone who needs heard from them they had done the same thing housing that won’t steal the silver? We’re going to be concerning a sailboat. The kids wanted a boat so the folks gone all summer if they need a place to live.” said ok, we’ll pay for it and you build it. So they built the boat and when it was finished they had a big party on it KATELYN: What was that like? and it sunk. They had a man who came in and cleaned for us. NAN: 44 Fruit Street was that address. It was just a big There was a bell under my chair in the dining room so I wonderful house, probably another all time favorite could summon someone in the kitchen but there was no house. They had three children and they had a ton of one in the kitchen to help. money. They had a stage in the basement with curtains so the kids could have plays, they had a big grand piano in KATELYN: But if you had someone to help… the living room that was full of birdseed ‘cause they had a lot birds flying around the house. They had a huge…. NAN: Grandpa thought it was pretty funny to summon me when he was ready for his oatmeal. So it was just a big KATELYN: Were birds living in the house? wonderful house. I met her and she said she thought we were about the same size and offered any clothes that I NAN: No they were at the lake (with the family). But they might want to wear. Fantastic people. did have birds living in the house when they were at home. KATELYN: Wow

KATELYN: Dropping seeds in the piano.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home NAN: And then we rented an apartment that we never KATELYN: South Pasadena. When you went did you drive, lived in because Grandpa was transferred to the West fly, take a train? Coast. So never even spent a night there. We still didn’t have any furniture. NAN: We drove and the company sent our 230 pounds by train. We took our time driving. You know we’d been KATELYN: But you looked for it. If this house was your all through a lot by then. We were young and resilient but it time favorite what was your favorite part of that house? was still a shock to lose everything we had. The company gave us a lot of time to travel the country. We went to NAN: I think it was the atmosphere more than the way Colorado Springs, well we stopped in Ann Arbor and the house was laid out. There was so much love in this Detroit to see our families and we spent a night or two at house. There were five of everything, so they must have Cooper’s cottage in Indiana and just kind of wended our all participated in whatever they did. The library had way West. While we were looking for a place to live we books like we might have in our library but also there stayed at a hotel near Santa Anita racetrack. You know, were books Mr. Ashburn had written when he was a you have to remember that this was 50 years ago and this young man traveling in Europe between college and place had a pool! And that was big time. And then we profession. The family had them published. The family found a little apartment, a little one-bedroom apartment, had tons of money but they used it so beautifully and in South Pasadena and settled down for a while. wisely. It was just a comfortable house. The kitchen was all brick and that was kind of neat. KATELYN: After the apartment… you moved to South Pasadena, isn’t that where the bungalow was? KATELYN: You mean brick walls? NAN: Yeah, it was like a motel court. NAN: Yeah, it had a butler’s pantry and that was all brick. Maybe it was a favorite because it was a world I wasn’t KATELYN: I’m picturing a little house like… familiar with. I can describe the dining room and the kitchen but I don’t remember the bedrooms or the NAN: No, Yeah, It was separate all by itself. They were bathrooms. little separate houses. There were four down each side and two across the back. With a walk up the middle. Just KATELYN: I think it’s funny that you remember it and little tiny houses. Grandpa didn’t. KATELYN: Did you know your neighbors there? NAN: Yeah it’s funny that that slipped his mind. NAN: Remember the other night I was telling you about KATELYN: How long did you spend there, the summer? the lady who sat in the sun and combed her hair as she held the curls in her hand. NAN: No not even the summer. The tornado came in June and we were in California by August. I turned 21 that KATELYN: Oh yeah. summer in the middle of Kansas close to nowhere. NAN: She was our next-door neighbor. KATELYN: So then you moved to Pasadena. KATELYN: At that place? Interesting. And when you lived NAN: South Pasadena. there, Grandpa says he doesn’t remember much about those places because he was working. What did you do

 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home there during the day? Did you shop, did you walk, did KATELYN: I kept thinking they were a horizontal thing. you drive? NAN: When I saw that, I thought, in that same house NAN: We only had one car but I could walk to any place I between the kitchen and the front hall were big squares wanted to in South Pasadena. I kind of sat and stared into that went up to the ceiling big open squares about this space when we got there. We had to buy a lot of big. I could put stuff on them. furnishings and on top of that I think I reacted slowly to the tornado. I remember the house well. It was a cute KATELYN: He was telling me about that. Sort of an artifact house. It had lots of tile, ceramic tile, and I wasn’t used bookshelf wall. Maybe you could draw what you need to to that back here in the Midwest. Lots of California tile. draw to show me what you’re trying to communicate with The kitchen sink was on a slant in a corner and that was me. all tile. Kind of a triangle over the sink. There were windows on two sides of the triangle and it was a great NAN DRAWS AND TALKS TO HERSELF, then describes place for plants. It was a one person kitchen. what she has drawn.

KATELYN: Grandpa said it was just a little one-bedroom NAN: It was just a normal kitchen with an eating area and house and you kept bumping into each other. would you believe gray tile. Would you believe that? Gray tile again. Gray and burgundy. I think he put some NAN: Yes, it was pretty snuggy in most of the rooms, but of that lattice work on the back porch. then I kind of came to and got a job, don’t laugh, as a bookkeeper. KATELYN: So before you adopted Daddy, you lived there for a little while with Grandpa. KATELYN: Nothing wrong with that. NAN: Well we lived there a couple of years before we got NAN: Well, I didn’t know one end of a bookkeeper from your daddy. I painted all of that pink. I’m sorry but I did. the other, but I managed to get through that. Then I went I painted this whole combed redwood wall pink. to work for architects in Pasadena. And then we bought our house in Pasadena. KATELYN: We were talking about that, Grandpa said it was combed plywood. KATELYN: The one on the mountain? That’s where the pass through thing was. NAN: Maybe it was plywood but it squeaked when it Can you explain. Grandpa was talking about a courtyard contracted. The redwood was on the outside of the house and sliding thing and I still don’t get it. It sounds like and it creaked and he was gone a lot and I was scared to louvers that affected the light somehow and I still don’t death at night. That was the only house I was ever really understand how that worked. frightened in.

NAN: This was outside, it went on top of the porch KATELYN: Really, because the redwood squeaked ?

KATELYN: Oh so….Now it makes sense. NAN: Well the whole thing just spooked me and then we had Santa Anna winds and they would just blow and blow NAN: We made them and we could move them to make and that darned lattice work would flap, too. shade because we were right at the foot of Mount Wilson and it got very hot. KATELYN: So the features that Grandpa thought were nice, you really didn’t like very much.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: I’ve never been to Pasadena so I don’t know… NAN: That’s kind of true. NAN: Well, it was flat in spots but not where we lived. It KATELYN: Yeah, because he didn’t really have much to say rained a lot. It either rained or it shined. There was no in- about the house except about the great view of the between. mountains. KATELYN: So, changes you made in this place. You NAN: Beautiful. Mount Wilson would have been right up painted it all pink? here. NAN: We painted it all pink and brown except for your KATELYN: But he wasn’t there because he was off dad’s room and that was yellow. We wallpapered the working. kitchen. Then Grandpa got transferred to San Diego. The house wasn’t selling so I decided the house would sell if NAN: Yeah, he was gone a lot. the bathroom was wallpapered. I had never wallpapered by myself in my whole life. I was doing it to surprise him. KATELYN: And you were left to your own devices. So what It was such a mess. I did the ceiling. By now we had Pat did you do when Grandpa wasn’t there? so we had two little babies. One just under a year and one newly born. I’d get the wallpaper up here and it NAN: Well I worked until Tom came then I stayed home would fall down and hit me in the back of the head and and took care of Tom. I’d get it up again and it would hit me in the face. I got it done and the house sold. I’m not sure it was because of KATELYN: Was there a lot to do in Pasadena? What about the wallpaper and I’m pretty sure it fell off the wall very neighbors? soon after we left. We lived there for a year or two before Tom was born. NAN: Eventually, I got involved in an organization called the Junior Shakespeare club. I never knew why it was KATELYN: And you put up those things in front? called that. I took Grampa with me one day to tryouts for a big annual play they put on. I thought he could get a NAN: We put in a really nice brick planter along the job pulling the curtains or something behind stage and it driveway. I don’t know that we added…… would be something we could do together. He ended up getting a part and I didn’t. We went to a lot of theater in KATELYN: But things you did to make it feel more like Los Angeles, too. We had fun doing that. We had your home. Obviously when you moved…….. dad then and we spent a small fortune on baby sitters about that time. We had good neighbors. We’d just put NAN: I think we painted everything. Of course we the kids in the car and off we’d go. In those days we just painted the bedrooms for the new babies. I was still put the kids in the car with no car seats or seat belts for sewing in those days and I made curtains. anyone. KATELYN: So then you moved to San Diego. KATELYN: So there wasn’t a lot of walking where you lived? NAN: Yes, we moved to a house in La Mesa and that was in the San Diego area. That was kind of an interesting NAN: No, because it was really hilly. Pushing the kids in a house. There were three separate yards. One in the back stroller was tough work because we were in the foothills. sort of a laundry hanging area, one on the side off the living room, and one on the bedroom side of the house  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home that was just a mud hole. They all had high fences. They all had gates but not gates you could see through. The NAN: I remember the wallpaper in the family room had one off the living area was really pretty. It had a banana sailboats on it and the fireplace was two sided and we tree and passion flowers, it was really pretty. Then off the could light it with a gas jet. I’d never seen that before and kitchen we had a big birdcage that was attached to the I thought it was pretty impressive. It was much easier to end of the garage. build fires. It had those high windows, which I don’t like but it gave us more wall space and probably kept the KATELYN: That was the one with the parakeets? house cooler. It had a pretty kitchen and family room all together, which I really liked. NAN: We bought a ton of birds. KATELYN: Kitchen and family room all together? KATELYN: Oh you bought the birds? Grandpa thought they were there when you moved in. NAN: It was “L” shaped and I could keep my eye on everyone at the same time. We didn’t do much to the NAN: No, I think we bought the birds. Tom and Pat inside because it was all new, but we had to landscape it. would stand in that window for hours watching the birds. So we designed a wonderful patio with a fire-pit that Then when we wanted to clean the cage we just said, would also hold water and float lilies and all that sort of “Look out birds,” and we turned the hose on the cage, the stuff. birds flew to the top of the cage and the job was done. But somehow, the cage got left open and there were KATELYN: Did it really work as a fire-pit? parakeets all over San Diego. We probably had about ten birds. And we had George, our poodle, then. The back of NAN: Yeah, it worked as a fire-pit but it didn’t hold water. the house was where the clothesline was and it was The contractor kept messing up the surface of the patio, surrounded by a high fence, and then on the other side we the concrete wasn’t right so he put a cap on it and that had the high fence and the mud hole. We have some wasn’t right and it got to be a real pain in the neck. It had wonderful pictures of your dad playing out there with the a brick bench/wall all the way around. It was a semi hose and squishing around in the mud. That was an ok kidney shape and the fire-pit worked really well. We house but it was a very strange house. could sit around it and it was really neat.

KATELYN: You didn’t make a lot of changes to that house KATELYN: What about the water? because you were renting it. NAN: It didn’t hold water. We put in a big fence there. NAN: No, and we were happy to move out. We bought a And we put in the yard. Grandpa was still traveling a lot house in El Cajon, which was farther out near the desert. then and I had to stay home and move in the hoses and I That was brand new. hated that. We were very proud of the yard, we loved it. The house sat up on a hill just down the hill from an olive KATELYN: Grandpa said you had to pick some of the and an orange grove and when the orange trees were in finishing. flower it was almost too sweet. Overpowering.

NAN: Yeah we had to choose some of the colors and KATELYN: That would kill me. carpeting. NAN: It was on a hill so it was hard for the kids to play KATELYN: Grandpa couldn’t remember any of it, can you outside. Your dad had a police car, which we had taken remember what you chose? out of someone’s trash and Pat had a trike and I worried  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home about them all time because if their little feet got off the didn’t mind the sun, but the rainy season in southern pedals, they would just be gone. Down the hill and away. California with two small children and a big dog without a husband around wasn’t much fun. The clothes never KATELYN: So it was kind of a suburb again. dried. The dog was always soggy. It was fairly warm, so the kids could go out and play in the rain, but they still NAN: Yes. My mom and dad came out to visit us shortly had to come in and change their clothes and be dried off. after we moved in. My dad loved to garden and he bought us a lot of plants. All along the front of the house KATELYN: And you still only had one car, right? he planted Nandina (a sort of small short bamboo) and gardenia bushes. In the morning when the gardenias NAN: No I got a car when I went to work. I had a black bloomed, I would fill a basket with gardenias and take Chevy convertible with red leather seats and it looked like them to all our neighbors. They smelled heavenly and a big bathtub. It was so wonderful. were beautiful. KATELYN: So you did have the freedom to drive around. KATELYN: Did that house start any traditions? NAN: I did, yes. We went to San Diego children’s zoo NAN: Yeah, because this was kind of our first Christmas about once a month. The Children’s Zoo was spectacular. with both children. We decided that Christmas morning The Navy was there and Coronado and Balboa Park. We was the time to open gifts, Santa came on Christmas Eve. did a lot of exploring in San Diego. In the summer we Milk and cookies and carrots were left on the hearth and went to a lot of theater in the park and we square danced were, of course, gone in the morning. As the kids grew every week and we also danced exhibition square dance older and wiser, a glass of bourbon was also put out for in Balboa Park a couple of times. The horticulture in the Santa. It was at this house where we began to hide Easter park was beautiful. Eggs outside on Easter morning. We hung stockings on KATELYN: Then Grandpa got a job in Michigan. the fireplace, in fact the stockings we’re all using my mom made. Grandpa and I always shared a stocking because NAN: He switched jobs. people kept having babies and mother was always one behind, so we just decided to share, besides, they KATELYN: He was tired of the sun and the traveling. stretched really well. We usually had Thanksgiving with someone else. One year I remember seeing about four NAN: Well, this was an opportunity to come back nearer neighbors up the hill barbequing turkeys outside. It the family and go to work with Grandpa and Uncle smelled like turkey, it was wonderful. Denny. We decided that’s what we wanted to do. So we sold everything and moved again. KATELYN: So you were there until you went to Michigan. Grandpa said he got sick of the sunshine. KATELYN: Didn’t bring any of your furniture or anything?

NAN: Yes, he did. We’ve laughed about that since NAN: Oh no, I was thinking of my convertible. We sold because there have been times we’d really like some of my car to the girl who baby sat for us. She paid for the car that sunshine. with cash. I don’t remember how much we asked for it, but I still remember that big stack of bills. Probably one KATELYN: Did you get sick of it too? or two hundred dollars.

NAN: Not really, but I was ready to move on. I guess I KATELYN: She got that money baby sitting? was young enough and restless enough, I didn’t care. I  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home NAN: Well, she sat for a lot of other people, not just us. The movers came and we took our time with that trip too, KATELYN: This was Cascadia Meadows? going across the country was kind of fun with the two little kids and the dog. NAN: Yeah…Cascadia Meadows.

KATELYN: What are the things that you sold or that were KATELYN: So it was just a rectangular house do you important that you brought with you? remember materials or anything that stand out from that house? NAN: We brought almost everything with us except my convertible. NAN: No. It was just a house. It had a big back yard with a little bit of landscaping …no it was just a house. KATELYN: You didn’t have many heirlooms at that point other than the silver. KATELYN: What did you think about living in Grand Rapids at that time? NAN: No we didn’t, we had pretty much replaced everything by then. China was replaced with Russell NAN: We adapted to Grand Rapids right away. We really Wright and it wasn’t as classy as it had been but we had liked Grand Rapids. Having a sister there helped us meet all we needed. some people. I got busy right away and made some friends, I joined a hospital guild at the hospital where you KATELYN: Ok, so when you moved to Grand Rapids did were born, no, where Michael was born, you were born in you look for a house with Grandpa? Kalamazoo. We liked the school system, we liked our neighbors, we liked everything about it. That was an easy NAN: No Grandpa came back alone to be sure that was transition. what he wanted to do career-wise and he came back to California and exclaimed over how green Michigan was. KATELYN: After this house that you rented you decided to He was really impressed with the green and the blue of buy a house? the lakes as he flew into the airport in Detroit. I think he found this house. Either he did or Aunt Gae did, because NAN: That was the house in Ada and that was a nice they lived in Grand Rapids then, and we took the house house. It was a tri-level and it was brand new. sight unseen. Our house wasn’t available yet, so we lived with Aunt Gae and Uncle Denny for a week. You can KATELYN: You had it built for you? imagine that. Pat was the youngest, Tom and Bill were about the same age, and there were the other three NAN: No, we bought it before it was finished. That was a cousins and George, of course. It was a wild week. Aunt really nice house. I think it was our very first dining room, Gae and Uncle Denny were moving to Plymouth so there I mean a separate room in which to dine. We had a big were lots of parties and new people to meet. By the time kitchen that was very pretty with sliding doors out to the they left we still couldn’t get into our house so we stayed back yard and a barbeque in the kitchen which we used a in a lovely garden apartment that belonged to friends of lot, and that backed up to the fireplace in the family Gae and Denny. We stayed there for about a week and room, which was down a short flight of steps. There was then we could finally moved into our rented house. That room on that level for an office for Grandpa because he house was a rectangular house with three bedrooms, one had to have an office someplace. There were three bathroom, living room, dining room, kitchen. It didn’t bedrooms. have a lot of personality…on Kenmore in Grand Rapids, not Ada.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: Do you recall the builder, the American Indian, catch both the front walk and the driveway so they could builder doing a bookcase? wind through the trees rather than go straight and we kind of rued that in the winter when we were trying to back the NAN: Yeah, we decided we wanted a bookshelf in the cars out through the trees, but it was pretty and it worked. living room with a window…I’ve got a thing about window seats I guess. You know talking like this is really KATELYN: So it was still kind of like a subdivision. interesting. NAN: It was an area of all separate builders. There might KATELYN: I know, I’m really picking up patterns here. have been a few houses built by the same builders, but there was no pattern at all. NAN: Yeah, we had kind of a long living room and we could afford the space to build bookcases and a window KATELYN: But nothing like a downtown? seat. So we called Dan the builder and told him we wanted bookcases and a window seat and he knew what NAN: No, our closest down town would have been out we wanted to do. There was no conversation, I guess it there by Ada and there was nothing down there. There was still his house, but what he did is what we wanted so were a few utility stores in Cascade. it was ok. He did a lot of good things in that house. He They had just built the first school in Forest Hills and… used every bit of available space. His wife was a real baker and because of her, he put in a butcher block in KATELYN: The kids rode the bus? the kitchen that was about this much lower than the counters so it was easier to roll out pastry. That house NAN: Yes the kids rode the bus. The first year that the kids had lots of well placed windows. Good use of glass went to separate schools, we lost Pat. She got on the doors across the back looking out into the woods. And wrong bus. We were pretty frantic for a while but she we did the landscaping there, too. showed up.

KATELYN: Do you remember what color it was? KATELYN: You found her.

NAN: Yeah, our bedroom was kind of yellow and was NAN: The kids could walk to school from the house on wallpapered with pretty yellow paper with little birds on Kenmore. They just walked through a field and were at it. The living room and the dining room had white walls school. Cascade was where we would run from the house and we had the floors in the dining room finished, no to the drug store, the gas station and the church. carpeting in the dining room. In the living room we had braided carpeting which was red and blue and white and KATELYN: Did you go to church the whole time or no? brown and most of the other colors were bright blue and red. NAN: In Worcester we lived just down the street from an Episcopal church and we went there probably about KATELYN: What about the outside? twice. I don’t think we went to church in California at all. In Grand Rapids we went to Grace Church, Gerald Ford’s NAN: Brick and redwood church, and then when we moved to Ada, we found a little mission church that we really loved and we went to KATELYN: Brick? church there.

NAN: Yeah brick, with a little winding path through the KATELYN: So Cascade probably was closer and Ada was trees from the front door to the driveway. We were able to kind of out in the middle of nowhere.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home were sand traps and they had let their kids play in them. NAN: Yeah. 28th street ends in Cascade and we were We probably would have let our kids do that if they’d probably three or four block up from there. been younger. It was fun. We did a little entertaining on it, not as much as thought we’d do, but some. That was a KATELYN: Ok, so after Ada you moved to Plymouth to neat house. It was one of those you read about and Ridgewood, right? people say we never added the second bathroom but we decided to do something else and no one ever NAN: Yes. complained. We had one bathroom and two teen-agers and that’s when we started to sail. We were all sailing KATELYN: So Grandpa said he came first and he picked competitively and we bare boated in the islands. It was a out the house. How did you pick out that house? cute little house.

NAN: By then Gae and Denny were here (in Plymouth) KATELYN: You made changes to it, do you remember what and they were looking for a house for us. I stayed in Ada those changes were? because the kids were in school. There was a builders strike and we had decided not to live in Plymouth NAN: We really didn’t do much to that, outside of the because Grandpa and Uncle Denny were going to be yard. We had to get the golf course into shape and we put partners and we thought it would be a really good idea a big planting area in front with some really cool lights not to live in the same town. But things were getting tight. along the walk. They were cylindrical with holes in them We had sold our house in Ada and the kids came in and and they were all different heights. We put in a brick sort looked at houses with us. Pat never expressed much of an of patio/walk, and the lights cast pretty shadows on the opinion of where she wanted to live, but your Dad found walk. We added new awnings. That house was kind of a two or three houses he really felt we needed to move into, colonial. The living room was all white with black that they were very important, one was in Dearborn I hardware and bookcases on either side of the fireplace. remember. Then Grandpa found the house on Ridgewood and he came home to describe it and said it KATELYN: Did that house have a lot of windows? Do you was a small house etc. By that time we were all playing remember a place in that house that you especially liked? golf. We belonged to a little country club in Grand Rapids and we liked the game. Well, we kind of listened NAN: Yeah, there was a glass sun room off the back and to Grandpa until he said this house sat on three acres and we usually gathered there. We had some built-ins built had a six hole golf course on it, so we were pretty while were there. We’ve had something built in almost impressed with that. We all just sort of fell in love with every house we’ve lived in. At this house, we had a big the property and it did have a six hole golf course on it. chest of drawers with a shelf on top built into our bedroom. It had a very small kitchen and we had KATELYN: He said three. radiators there. The kids thought those were great. A good place to dry mittens and boots. NAN: No there were six. Three down each side. It was just a pitch and putt course. The man who built it had KATELYN: So you lived on Ridgewood until the kids went been a horticulturist at the University, (I wonder if he ever to college. Right? knew the man who owned our house in Ann Arbor) and each green was surrounded with something special, lilacs NAN: Yes, they both left for college when we lived on or spice trees and that sort of thing and each hole had Ridgewood. water on it. Score cards and pencils and flags. The people we bought from had kind of let it go to pot. There KATELYN: Why did you move? 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home

NAN: Well, Grandpa thought the house was falling apart NAN: We added the brick walk and we widened that. and he was tired of putting it together again. With the Grandpa has a thing about narrow walks. kids gone that was an awful lot of property to take care of. There was a riding mower job every week and the leaves KATELYN: You’ve put in a brick walk almost every place had to be racked, although we were able to have bonfires you’ve lived. then and that was fun, and the snow had to be plowed. We had a plow but it was too much to take care of. We NAN: Outside lights. We’ve replaced almost all the just didn’t want to do it any more. So we bought this hardware just because it was looking pretty cruddy. The house in the spring before your mom and dad were house was all gold, and dirty orange and green when we married. moved in. We’ve redone the entire kitchen, and two bathrooms, but still its more cosmetic, carpeting and KATELYN: When you looked for a house, what did you wallpaper and paint. Grandpa built shelves in the look for other than a smaller yard. basement and we had a cedar closet added as well as a large closet for each of us all in the basement. We redid NAN: We wanted a lot less property and everything the the family room and replaced the carpeting with Pergo. realtor showed us was either too big or not very warm. We couldn’t find anything. Everything he showed us was KATELYN: You painted the fireplace. much bigger. I walked into this, and just fell in love with this house. Grandpa wasn’t with me and he liked it but NAN: We painted the fireplace and the fireplace wall and he wasn’t as wild about it as I was. Friends would drive that was a tough struggle getting Grandpa to agree to by and say, “Oh, you bought a nice little house”. Then, painting the brick and paneling, but he likes it now. when they came inside they would be amazed at how much bigger it is from the inside. This house is much KATELYN: The windows by the chairs in the living room. larger than the house on Ridgewood, but it doesn’t look it from the outside. And we’ve done a million things to this NAN: We did take the original windows out. They didn’t house but we’ve been here for thirty years. open and they had big ugly uprights between them. We had that all redone. We put in a lot of new windows, but KATELYN: There’s the updating, but there are the initial we didn’t change the style of anything except the things you do when you move into a house to make it windows in the living room. yours. KATELYN: The bookshelves NAN: Outside again. We enlarged the patio and put in steps going down into the yard, actually I think we’ve NAN: Oh yes, the bookshelves. added two patios. We put the raised garden in the backyard, in fact when we moved in there was only grass KATELYN: I was talking to Grandpa and he said, “We half way back in the back yard, and they had planted two didn’t make any changes”, and I said, “Oh yes, you did”. dogwood trees way in the back of the yard in the mud. I don’t know why but they hadn’t done any other NAN: Yeah, you’re right, you’re good. But no window landscaping. There was just a big black pot of geraniums seats, but we have our window seat in the living room. in the front when we moved in. Grandpa built the planter along the front porch. KATELYN: Yeah, that’s what that is.

KATELYN: The brick walk NAN: That’s, as far as we’re concerned…  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home

KATELYN: How long have you had those chairs? NAN: It’s a night room. We’ve talked about the possibility of windows on either side of the fireplace. That might NAN: Those chairs were my parents. work.

KATELYN: You mean they made it through the tornado? KATELYN: But I think it’s ok that way, as a night room…

NAN: No we didn’t take those until after both mom and NAN: Well yeah, that’s the way we use it, but if I read, I dad died. Your dad and your Aunt Pat used to get into as read in the living room except at night when I read in the much trouble from their grandpa as you and Michael got family room. into with your grandpa from spinning in those chairs. When Mother bought those they were a hot pink silk just KATELYN: How does the architecture of this house support absolutely wild. Then on Ridgewood they were a nubby or deny your idea of home. I asked grampa what one white with a yellow velvet binding. What’s on them now piece could I take away that would make it not home any is about the fourth change just in this house. more.

KATELYN: What are your favorite features of this house? NAN: Yeah, that’s hard to answer after 30 years. The back hall, I don’t like the back hall. NAN: Outside and the living room. I really love the living room. I love the color, I love the way it looks now KATELYN: No, what could you take away and make it not with that window and those chairs. I’d like to do home any more. something with our bedroom. I don’t know what. Move furniture around or something. It’s a big room and we’re NAN: I don’t know, One of the problems with the family not using it very efficiently. room is the fireplace and the fireplace makes the rest of the house cold when we use it so we don’t use it and we KATELYN: What’s the least favorite thing about this house? both kind of enjoy a fire, so maybe a gas fireplace would be nice. NAN: My least favorite thing about this house is probably the back hall where the laundry room is. I’d KATELYN: It’s cold back here anyway even during the day. like that to be bigger. I’d like a place to iron. I iron in the kitchen now. I’d like a place where I could leave my NAN: Yeah, this time of the day it really gets cold back ironing board up if I wanted to. It’s too dark to iron in the here. I don’t know what would make it not home. We’ve family room. I can’t see well enough in that room to iron. been here so long, everything is ours. The wall colors and furnishings and carpeting… KATELYN: What would you change that you haven’t changed yet? KATELYN: If I took away that green bathroom, would it still be your home? NAN: I dream of sliding glass doors off our bedroom and a porch that would extend from the existing porch across NAN: Yes. Oh yeah. Take it away!!! the back of the house and we’ve talked about skylites in the family room. It’s a dark room. We don’t use that KATELYN: What about those chairs? room in the daytime. NAN: Couldn’t do that. KATELYN: It’s a night room.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: Then it’s not home. NAN: They’re too low, they’re uncomfortable. NAN: Our grandchildren wouldn’t come visit us any more *Laughs*. Some of the furniture could go. We have an KATELYN: Five words that mean home to you. awful lot of furniture in the house that belonged to our parents. In the living room the only thing that is ours that NAN: Five words that mean home to me. Well, the first we bought is the antique library table and the green chair. one that comes to mind is Bob. Is that fair? Everything else belonged to our parents. No, no that’s not true. KATELYN: That’s fair. People are fair. Events are fair.

KATELYN: The couch? That big coffee table belonged to NAN: Well, Thanksgiving, that’s the one time of year we your parents? usually are all together. Actually those two chairs. They’ve gotten to be kind of a funny thing those chairs. … NAN: No that didn’t either. Plymouth..

KATELYN: See there’s not as much as you thought. KATELYN: You wouldn’t leave Plymouth?

NAN: Both chairs in the family room did. One to my NAN: I think Grandpa would, but I don’t think I would. I parents and one to parents of friends. don’t think we would separate over that, but….and my garden, I guess my garden, that’s home and those things KATELYN: I thought they were new. Did you get them basically have nothing to do with this house. reupholstered? KATELYN: That’s true. NAN: Yeah they’ve been reupholstered, but they’re old, they’re very old, they’re not antiques, just old. They’re NAN: I could pack all of that up. Grandpa, Thanksgiving, going out. the garden….

KATELYN: You’re getting rid of those chairs? KATELYN: the chairs

NAN: Yes, they’re next on my list, they’re uncomfortable. I NAN: The chairs, my garden and Plymouth. I could pack could take everything out of this room and it wouldn’t all those things up and move someplace else. I don’t bother me. want to do that though.

KATELYN: It’s been like this as long as I can remember. KATELYN: Can you decide what your ideal home place There’s always been some sort of bed here. would be with no budget, wherever you want to go and whatever you want to do? At this point in your life. NAN: Yeah, it’s kind of piece meal back here. And that’s just a door. A piece of wood on top of two filing NAN: I wouldn’t change much from what we have now. cabinets. Grandpa has a nice desk. I’d like more room. I’d finish the basement with lots of storage, and I’d put in that big long porch across the back, NAN: See, still have two window seats. (Referring to the with part of it covered and sliding doors making a private window seats in the office and the guest bedroom) porch off our bedroom.

KATELYN: Nobody sits there, tho.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: Would you like to be closer to things you could walk to? Grandpa says you can walk to downtown Plymouth, but I’ve never been here when we’ve walked down there.

NAN: We used to walk a lot. We’d walk down town at least once a week to the band concert or to get an ice cream cone. We sometimes think it would be fun to move into one of those little old houses closer to down town Plymouth, but we don’t want to redo a house again. We know our neighbors, we’re happy here. My working in town helped a lot. We got to know lot of people. If we had it to do all over again, I wouldn’t be surprised if knowing what we know today, we would have moved away from Plymouth when Grandpa retired. See, he’s been retired for almost twenty years. We thought at the time that this was the place to stay because this is where our support group was, but in the meantime our support group has either moved or died, so we can’t depend on our support group. We’re the support group for our support group. We’re the healthiest ones so far, knock on wood. We’re the soup makers and care takers. And most of our friends go to Florida all winter so we don’t see them.

KATELYN: That Michigan winter thing. Winter’s no fun.

NAN: Well, you know, we live a different kind of life from most of our friends now. We get so we’re anxious for everyone to get out of town, and then we just do our own thing and then by the end of winter we’re anxious for them all to come home. So we kind of have the best of both worlds.

 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home Interview Three the powerful fertilizer that dog piddle is, instead of brown Subject: Tom Cooper spots, he had little green mountains. Interviewer: Katelyn Cooper on November 25, 2007 KATELYN: From the nitrogen. KATELYN: Tell me about the earliest home you remember. TOM: That was a neighborhood we moved into that had a TOM: Well, I know we lived in California and in the lot of kids. I remember we built a fort in the backyard and mountains and all that stuff, but the earliest home I one-day we came out and there were kids working on the remember was in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Which was a fort. I remember Dad didn’t trust us with saws, only house we were renting. hammer and nails and there was a piece of wood on the front like plywood and we were trying to use a claw KATELYN: You don’t remember anything from California? hammer to try to make it shorter. It was a project that was not very well organized and took many days. I looked out TOM: No. one day and the kids were hacking away at it and I thought they were trying to finish it, but found out later KATELYN: Not at all? they were just being mean, and trying to wreck it. But that was the first place that I really had any memories of. I TOM: No. didn’t like moving into a neighborhood that was established with groups of kids that tended to be mean. KATELYN: You were there until you were in the 7th grade. KATELYN: Because it was a rental house? TOM: No California was until I was five. The only thing I remember was George, our standard poodle, could leap a TOM: No, just because they were lousy kids. six-foot fence. On garbage day she would take off and pick people’s garbage. So I think Mom or Dad strung a KATELYN: That was Cascadia Meadows? string with tin cans on it so they could hear when she went over the fence. And that’s about it. It’s not really a TOM: Yes home thing it’s just kind of a memory thing. I have no recollection of the drive across the country. When we KATELYN: You walked to school, (yes) Do you remember moved to Grand Rapids we lived in a rented house. I anything about the house itself? The rooms you liked? can’t remember the street but I know where it is. It was green, It was near the mausoleum and we could walk to TOM: The basement. I liked the basement because our school. The house had a basement and I remember Mom neighbors got a new TV so we got their old TV. So that used to iron shirts in the basement, and I still remember was my first exposure to, what I later learned were the smell of starch on hot iron, which is a pretty relaxation oscillators. As you change channels… Back memorable thing. I remember George would go outside then systems were not in any kind of good lock to each and pee on the neighbor’s yard. I remember one of my other, and as you changed channels, the picture would first memories of putting something together out of the kind of collapse, so you had to adjust knobs on the side of blue. The neighbor legitimately complained about the the TV set. I got very good at not knowing what the knobs brown spots on his yard after George had piddled on his were, but knowing which ones to twist and how much yard. Dog piddle tends to do that, so I said if you run a and which way was the mystery of making the TV work. hose on it right away, it will dilute it and it won’t be a Whenever we had to change channels it got to be my job problem. He did that and between the extra water and because I was the least impatient and faster about making the TV work. I remember later that we got a newer TV.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home But that was the first TV that was large. I think mom had the upstairs bedrooms and mom got commercial grade red a small 13-inch TV. Everything was black and white nylon, practically bullet proof carpet and covered over but I do remember that TV. When the neighbors got a new those hardwood floors. It had a sweeping driveway and TV and we got their old one for the basement. At that the sidewalk that lead to the driveway was also kind of time there might have been three TV stations in Grand curved. My cousins from Colorado gave me a skateboard Rapids. Or there might have been only two and that was (they were way ahead of the curve in Colorado). I had my first experience with TVs in general. It was kind of that skateboard for years and years and years. It was one amusing. that had metal wheels and if you leaned it over too far the metal wheels would dig into the board and that would KATELYN: Why in the basement? No antenna? stop the wheels. The fact that it was a curved driveway coupled with the fact that it was a ”T” driveway made for TOM: I think it worked on rabbit ears. I’m pretty sure it lots of interesting skate-board-flying-out-from-under-you, was in the basement. I don’t think we had another room trying-to-stay-up maneuvers. for that. My bedroom looked out to the back. (the fort I also remember, in the summer time, I don’t thing) I remember a sidewalk out front and then I remember when, or how old I was then, but the green of remember this house was green and the folks painted the the trees was…. it’s something I’ve scene since, but house. I don’t think we had a fireplace. There wasn’t a Michigan trees with the right combination of weather place in that house where I really felt attached to. and water and sunlight wind up making this incredible, deep, almost fairy land green that’s very comforting. KATELYN: And then you moved. There’s only a few other times I remember seeing the leaves in that deep right green. And that’s a very early TOM: To Sheffield. I remember looking at that house. memory of that space. We got there early, the builder said he was going to have an open house, and we were driving around, and we got KATELYN: Do you remember your bedroom in that there early, he was going to have an open house that day. house? That was a relatively new subdivision and it was extremely wooded, lots of oak trees, tri-level house, TOM: The bedroom. There was an adventure with the hardwood floors, basement, family room with a fireplace. bedroom. Mom and Dad decided it was silly to buy And that was a big deal. cheap furniture and continue to replace it as it broke down, so they bought a “Ranch Oak” bed, a “Ranch Oak” KATELYN: Was the fireplace stone? desk and a “Ranch Oak” dresser and the bed and dresser to this day are still around. The dresser is in Michael’s TOM: It was kind of a reddish brick, sort of sandstone and room and the bed is in the basement somewhere. Mom that house had a fireplace that shared the flue with a got them on sale because Grand Rapids is a furniture barbecue in the kitchen. So if you had a fire in the family capitol. And they were all excited about the desk because room and opened the flue in the barbecue, it drew smoke it was a place for me to do my homework, and never paid into the kitchen. Because he cut corners. That was my attention to the fact that the desk was a left-handed desk. introduction to Grand Rapids Builders that were famous Mom being left handed. There was a fair amount of for cutting corners. consternation as to why I didn’t do my homework at my I don’t remember if there was a third fireplace desk. And the bottom line was whenever you write at a there or not. I have more memories of the basement. left-handed desk, when you are right-handed (we didn’t Because it had kind of an area where I could tinker with have computers but we had typewriters but I didn’t know things, but that came later. The family room was brown how to type), you end up with your arm unsupported on tile. There were hardwood floors in the dining room and that side of the desk because the drawers were on the left  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home rather than on the right. It was extremely painful and TOM: Brown, I think it was some kind of siding. I aggravating to write on and therefore I didn’t. It took a remember putting in the yard was an adventure because long time to figure out that was the issue. When you were the guy who put in the yard was kind of a happy-go-lucky trying to write anything your arm was completely sort of landscaper. I remember he had left a truck parked unsupported. You have to support your arm from your over the entire winter on the back street, open, not very shoulder. And doing a lot of cursive writing, as that was interested in doing his job. He was kind of a hand-to- another thing they were making us do. The Grand Rapids mouth landscaper. We wound up doing the backyard school system was all about making children do things ourselves, the front yard, he was supposed to put in some instead of a little more freedom. quality dirt and plant grass. Dad’s always been a little I also remember doing a science experiment, and making obsessed with grass. a mess in the bedroom and maybe burning that red carpet And being in the middle of an Oak Forest it’s very in that adventure. The bed was solid, I was reasonably hard to make grass grow. You just don’t get that much comfortable. light. And raking leaves was an adventure. Back then the I had a trombone. It seems like we spent an awful entire neighborhood would rake their leaves to the curb lot of years in that house, but I don’t think we did. There and then burn them, so that was all kinds of excitement are a lot of memories. I really liked the neighborhood for years, with burning leaves. I remember riding my bike because we moved in early and then other kids moved in down the street and the smoke from burning oak leaves and that made it easier for me because they were the new and turning on the bike light and distinctly seeing the kids moving in to the neighborhood. There were a group beam of light cutting through the smoke. As you rode of kids who played baseball incessantly and I didn’t have around. any interest in that so didn‘t hang out with them. Then the But the house itself was a tri-level. I think there Blackports moved in and Steve became one of my best was some brick trim. Sliding glass doors were a big thing, buddies. And his brother David was pretty cool. But we being able to watch the birds in the back yard, a back moved out before going much further than Junior high-ish. deck I can’t remember the details. There wasn’t a house We move out and moved to Plymouth. that backed up to ours. So, I remember getting a BB gun The other thing that was remarkable about that and spending hours and hours shooting at the tin can house was that it was a tri-level and you were always wind chimes that mom had put up in the back yard. They forced to make a decision where you were going to go to made fabulous targets for shooting off the hip with a BB the bathroom. One of the typical Grand Rapids builder’s gun. Actually I still have that little BB gun. It was very things about tri levels is that they couldn’t figure out how accurate except for the drop, I don’t know if it still works, to put a bathroom on the main living floor. but I spent hours and hours shooting at cans, and leaves and trees. KATELYN: Like our old house. KATELYN: Do you remember anything about Grand TOM: Yes, and after we moved out we figured out how to Rapids as child? You didn’t walk to school. put a bathroom on the main floor. The builders in Grand Rapids, when it comes to design were not very TOM: No we took a bus. And that brings up a whole imaginative and they tended to do things like everyone series of memories. We caught a bus out on the main else did. The builder promised he would never build street. It wasn’t too much of a walk for us. The bus system another house like that but a few years later he built one also took three or four kids who went to Catholic school. just like ours on the street behind us. The bus driver was extremely discriminatory. She didn’t want any noise on the bus and she always insisted the KATELYN: Do you know what color it was? Catholic kids sit behind her because they were “good kids” and the rest of us were just animals. One day she  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home pulled over in the rain because she thought the noise level fields on. And it wasn’t developed close to us so there was in the bus got too loud. She made everyone but the nobody to complain about the roaming the hills with the Catholic kids get off the bus and stand in the rain. I don’t bikes. think she could keep her job for more than about four minutes in today’s environment. KATELYN: Ok and then you moved in 7th grade to KATELYN: So did you ever go downtown Grand Rapids? Plymouth. Why? You guys were out in Ada? TOM: Grandpa Obee who started the business. When TOM: Ada was, well, there were a few things about Ada mom and dad got married Dad went to work for Norton as a town. We really lived in Cascade. And Ada wasn’t far Company. That’s why we were in California. I think Dad away. We could ride our bikes down a giant hill and that had been offered a job in sales working for Obee/McCord hill’s still there today. And we could go down to the drug but wanted to make his own way initially, and when we store, which was just across the river over a bridge. There moved to Grand Rapids, he was salesman for the West was a gas station and a little bit of a shopping area and a Side of the state. He did a lot of driving. I still remember giant gravel pit. The gravel pit was pretty much off limits, some of the cars he drove. He would drive 30,000 to except on the fourth of July when the fire department 50,000 miles a year. So he was turning cars over at a would launch fireworks for Cascade 4th of July into the pretty good clip. He was a stanch fan of GM back then. gravel pit area. That actually continued up until you guys. When Grandpa passed on, he became a junior partner We took you to Cascade once to see the fireworks at the with Uncle Denny. So we had to move to the other side gravel pit. In the meantime that’s all been leveled and of the state where the business was located. I think they developed. And 28th street has been slightly rearranged. hired someone to be a salesperson for the territory that But basically the hilly community, it’s still got a lot of Oak dad used to have. (Katelyn states dad was still doing the leaves, power used to go out a lot, because I don’t think west side of the state at first) But he still had a large the tree trimming was up to snuff. There was a Cascade territory. Dad did an awful lot of driving. I learned an dam, and the rumor back then, and it was probably true, awful lot about his style of driving on the trips we took. was you could buy the Dam for one dollar. But the deal was you had to maintain it. KATELYN: Talk about your involvement with the house I remember fishing off of the dam with fishing hunting. poles. I remember going down to the Dam, I had a Zebco (rod and reel). I found out later what Dad thought about TOM: We always had involvement. I remember doing fishing was not the right way to do it. It was mostly the whole house-hunting thing. I remember a nice house bluegills and if you load the worm on the way he said to that was over near the golf course, that had a Michigan do it the fish just would pick the worm off. Fishing never basement and about 35 cats and pine wood paneling, and became a passion of any sort. It was one of those things I the experience of opening the door to the basement and just never learned how to do it the right way. I found out being absolutely bowled over by the smell of cat piss. later that Dad’s dad wasn’t interested in fishing, he was And deciding we had had enough of that house. Some of interested in sitting in the boat and relaxing, which had to the other houses we looked at the memories have faded, be hell on small children. but the cat piss one lingers. We all trooped through these But the house was a nice house and still is. I houses together. And then we found the one that was on enjoyed the time we spent there mostly because of the Ridgewood, which had a palatial back yard that backed neighborhood (the being there first and everybody else up to the Western Electric property. And one of the more coming later). I had a very good friend, and his folks had striking things about that was, Pat and I had had riding mini bikes and later motorbikes that we could roam the lessons and had some friends in the Cascade area that had  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home horses. So it was kind of a dream of ours to actually some And yet it was another adventure of moving into a day own horses. And the original rules for Plymouth were neighborhood with established kids, and they played a lot if you owned two acres of land that your house was on of baseball (in the summer) and if I wanted to hang out you could own a horse. And the way Ridgewood was with the kids I finally had to learn to play baseball. And so originally platted they were two-acre lots. With that in I was the butt of many jokes until I became at least mind but when they incorporated the street to the city it marginally adequate at baseball. They played hockey, and took off like .2 acres and then the lots became 1.8 acres I never got really good at hockey. After I got into high and therefore you couldn’t have a horse anymore and that school I found another group of friends to hang out with was kind of disappointing. that got me more into technical stuff, and I got away from It was a single story, aluminum sided white house the short sighted group of the kids that had been in the with a basement built for entertaining. The people who neighborhood. It’s always a hard thing to move into a owned it before us were really into partying and golf. It neighborhood where the kids have already got things had a six-hole golf course in the backyard. If you played established and may or may not be interested in sharing. it the way they laid it out you could actually play 18 Or hanging out or caring or whatever. holes. The backyard went down through an old ravine for drainage and then flattened out in the back. We had a KATELYN: Were there any rooms in the house that you neighbor who was a fanatic about golf and Mr. Taylor had were particularly attached to and why? put in a real, done the right way, full drainage, bent grass, right mower, putting green. The people in the TOM: The whole shuffle board court, entertaining thing neighborhood were kind of nutty about golf. So I learned that looked out from the basement was really cool, but we to play golf (sort of) and had some lessons. By the time never really entertained with it, I mean it was remarkable. we moved into Plymouth we thought moving into a house And then there was a workshop and I learned to do film with a golf course was pretty cool. We had to get a tractor developing. The Moons lent us an enlarger, (that I think is to mow the lawn. still in the basement). The way the basement was laid out The house was really comfortable from the you could close off areas. The people who built this house standpoint that it had canvas shades over the windows, were very handy, they used sort of a beaver board and awnings. It was a single story. The main living area had a built their own storage areas and it was dark enough that fireplace and it had another family room. That was you could work on film, putting it into the stainless film another feature of our house in Ada, it had a lower level tanks, because it was dark enough in the middle of the family room with a fireplace and we did a lot of living in day when you closed the door. So I think my favorite it. So, this house in Plymouth had a big three-sided rooms were the back-sunroom-family room and the glassed in sunroom off the back of the house. The house basement and my bedroom. I really liked my bedroom was heated with radiators, with four or five zones, and it because it looked out the front of the house and the trees wasn’t very well insulated but unless it was unusually were very large and still are and very glorious. It was just cold, the boiler was big enough that the house was pretty a very neat and comfortable house. So um those were my comfy. The basement had another workshop area and the three favorite places in the house. Just a basic ranch with furnace and plumbing were a mystery that the local a garage, straight away driveway. There were issues, some plumbers wouldn’t have anything to do with. Mom finally hidden things. There was a tank in the front that used to talked one plumber into straightening out some of the hold oil for the furnace. It wasn’t sealed around it properly pluming. It had a water softener and a well. It had a 180 so when it rained real hard, it would run in through the foot deep well. I remember some adventures with wells. basement wall, and eventually we figured that out and got And a septic field, I remember an adventure with the the tank out of there and got the holes patched. So they septic field in that house. wouldn’t leak water any more. We had some adventures with the lawn mower tractor. So I learned how to drive  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home with the lawn mower, because driving the lawn mower as and we kind of hung out as a group. But there was always fast as it would go, to get the lawn mowed in as little time some friction from the group as a whole. When we got to as possible, makes you an extremely precise driver. High School in 10th grade I got the announcement about the radio station and signed up for that. Which turned out KATELYN: (laughs) yeah, I can imagine. This is the house to be a career. Somewhere in there, Eric had a bunch of that you grew up in. What do you remember about what very creative friends that hung out together. About four or you did outside of the house? five guys and four or five girls. They’d grown up together with theater and were extremely musically talented. They TOM: Well, we were there during Jr. high and high approached me because they knew I knew something school. In Grand Rapids I started band and I was a big about photography and they wanted to have a period fish in a small pond kind of thing. The band director was picture taken. I think for Carla’s birthday. So they dressed pretty pleased that there were two of us who played up as the Furbulcle Family, which was a running joke they trombone. I wanted to play clarinet because Dad had had had. They were all from different families, but they dressed a clarinet and I thought that would be pretty cool. I was in up in costume as this large fictional family. So I took the braces…. I got braces just as we were leaving Grand pictures, for Carla, as she was not in the picture. So Rapids and the orthodontist, who to this day I think is a basically what I got involved with was this other group of total jerk, said “no woodwinds”. For the way my bite was. kids which were already good friends. Two of them are no And back then the attitude about doctors were that longer with us. Karen and Dave. doctors were in control (total trust). I enjoyed playing the trombone, especially in Grand Rapids. Then when we got KATELYN: Karen Klinhecksel? to Plymouth in junior high, the music program was much more competitive than Grand Rapids, and I went from TOM: Karen Eddy. Someone you have never met. She got being one of two trombone players that were pretty good, off in sort of a right wing Christian reform group after high to 5th or 6th chair. The braces and the mouthpiece and the school and did a total left turn on reality and unfortunately lack of really wanting to practice, plus the you know, you died of cancer a few years after that. really weren’t that good, kind of culminated with “ok, In high school we had modular scheduling, which you’re kind of done with the trombone for now or forever allowed me, in my senior year to take nine classes. as it may be”. Also, a trombone isn’t big enough to have Second semester I had a schedule conflict with welding one at home and one at school so you had to lug the and my welding instructor said well what day is the stupid thing back and forth to school on the bus with you. problem, and day five was the problem and he said how I would have been much happier with a flute or clarinet about you come day 1.2.3 so on day 2 he gave me the day and would probably have stuck with it longer, but the 3 lesson and on day 3 I would be with my class but be doctor said no woodwinds, which ruled all that stuff out. one lesson ahead. He cut us a bunch of slack so I would Which is why when we went through the whole braces up getting a full year of welding instead of a half a year experience with you and Michael we decided that what and still enjoy welding. And I spent a whole lot of time ever instrument you wanted to play we were going to with the radio station which turned out to be a career support you and the doctor could just adjust. I was more a thing. firm believer that you have an interest in something you are going to take it further than “Oh you are now joining KATELYN: What about Sailing? the band and this is your assigned instrument.” And obviously I didn’t stick with it much beyond junior high. TOM: Sailing? Sailing. When did sailing start, Oh god, What we did, first my sister and I moved into the we were busy kids. We went to a boat show and Dad neighborhood, and tried to fit in with the neighborhood bought a boat. Yes it was the Detroit boat show. He had kids, met Mary Beth she had a pool and lots of friends, thoroughly enjoyed sailing I think, between hitches in the 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home Army. I remember some of his stories about sailing with a time when I thought some day we’d get on a boat and sail gal on an E-scow in the Chicago, Evanston area and he around, and make that our home but we have too much enjoyed sailing and thought it would be something we stuff. One of the things about being on a boat is you have could share. We bought a Challenger 15 at the boat show to be a minimalist in terms of stuff. There’s not much from O’rouke I think was his name, the manufacture of the space for stuff. It runs counter, if you want a lot of stuff boat. That lead to needing someplace to put the boat. And then being on a boat is not the place you want to be. If there is a Yacht Club out on Portage Lake. So we rented a you have enough money to be on a big enough boat to slip there and spent summers there and had some really have a lot of stuff then you probably have an awful lot of awful first adventures, with rushing home from work and money and the boat might be an entertainment and not a rushing out there just as the wind in Michigan dies. home. Eventually we got a Sunfish which was one of the classes they raced out there. Pat and I both went into more formal KATELYN: A lot of your child hood memories effect what training and learned racing. Then Dad sold the you look for in a home… Challenger and bought a Flying Scot and that was another class they raced out there. And we did some of that and TOM: Things that have always been in our homes, summer courses and then we raced in the Sears Cup and fireplaces, A room, A group room eventually we went down to the Islands and chartered Not a family room or living room, but a room where stuff larger and larger boats to take vacations on at Christmas gets done, a work shop area of one kind or other, have and sailed around the Virgin Islands. always had that, a lot of them (workshops) have been in basements, and until I put my foot down, I spent many KATELYN: Do you remember anything about the rooms on years working in a basement at Western. Television the boats you were sailing on? getting relegated to the basement. It was totally no light and where I work now, in the engineering area, there is no TOM: The Flying Scot is an 18-foot boat so it really outside light. Hate to work in dark places. So when it doesn’t have a room. The boats that we rented in the came time to put a workshop up in the basement, I put a Virgin Islands were bigger. I think the first one was 28 Feet table up but I’ve never done any work on it, I finally put and the last one was 41 Feet. In order to keep you out of my foot down and said NO I’m not doing any more work trouble they tended to lop (cut) from 6 to 8 feet off the in a basement. Working in a garage doesn’t bother me, but mast so you didn’t have to be so much of a sailor when if it’s space I control I’ve gotten old and cranky and I’ve the winds got really high because you didn’t have as much got to have outside light. sail as the boats were originally designed for. KATELYN: Were there any places in Ridgewood or the KATELYN: Ah other places that seriously affected, have negatively impacted your idea of home space? Other than the rotten TOM: A sailboat being a v-shaped adventure. One of the kids… more memorable things I remember was trying to sleep in a hammock. On one of the boats, I tied the hammock into TOM: Nothing really about the space, I remember when the rigging in the main steering area and when we were at we tried to sell the house on Sheffield I mentioned the (anchor) that was kind of cool. The living space on a cute little feature of the smoke in the kitchen to a sailboat is more about the outside rather than the inside. perspective homebuyer, probably not a good idea. Let More connected with the wind and the waves and going them find that out on their own. Nothing that I can places. There is a fair amount of architecture in space negatively remember about the space itself, but the utilization in a boat, but we really didn’t have any control negative experiences tended to be about people cutting when we were renting them. There was a big period of  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home corners. When they built something or when they TOM: I think Lark has them. Anyway, we took a board changed something. that was either 12 foot 8 or 12 foot six and jammed it in between 12 foot walls, that’s the curve that the arch was, KATELYN: Things built badly. and after we had them glued and screwed together we tried to get the wood wet so it would bend better and that TOM: Not built badly from a structural standpoint, but just meant running the shower flat out and it was an amusing trimming corners. The house on Ridgewood in Plymouth, adventure. We sliced the wood up with a circular saw in the oil storage, when they took it out they didn’t finish the the hallway, of the dorm. And we very much tried to job and left the pipe stubs in the wall and covered it up adhere to the rule not to make any holes in the walls to with paneling, and so when it rained the basement hang anything, but we still managed to cram so much in flooded, and the basement was designed as a living space that room, especially third year with Lark, that it took a for entertaining, not as a “this is going to flood” storage truck to empty the room. Lark filled a truck completely space, and yet it did. The stuff that’s been negative in all twice when he moved out. the places I’ve lived is because people have cut corners not so much on how the space was laid out but by KATELYN: How did you get so much stuff in the room? cheapening or cutting corners on the infrastructure. TOM: Well if you build shelves that were jammed in KATELYN: So when you were old enough to go to college between the main beam… you moved out of Ridgewood home right? KATELYN: What kind of a truck? TOM: Right. TOM: A pick-up. KATELYN: What do you remember about living in college? KATELYN: Oh I was thinking of a moving truck. TOM: Well, three years in the dorms and the first ones… TOM: Well I filled a u-haul trailer completely. I had KATELYN: Things you did to make the room homier? home built speakers in all four corners and enough power in the amplifiers. And all that sort of stuff if we had ipods TOM: Well lots, in a nutshell. We were in a 12 x 12 back then I’m sure we could have made peoples ears space with a bathroom shared with suitemates. I had bleed. The limit on the sound was, you could make so probably two of the greatest suitemates you could ask for, much noise with the stereo, it wasn’t a problem so much for three years. The fourth year, I lived in an apartment with tape, but you could make so much noise with the with a high school friend. stereo, with a record it couldn’t be played properly as the But the dorm living was literally a 12 x 12 box sound pushed the needle around and making the sound and by then I was fully into “stuff”. We started by sort of very strange and loud. cobbling together lofts. And it culminated, when I had Larken as a roommate, and we literally built out of clear KATELYN: Those speakers are still around, aren’t they? pine, arches, which exist to this day that were five laminates thick of absolute clear pine that was 1/2 of an TOM: The big speakers are sold, but some of the smaller inch and they were glued and screwed together. ones still exist. Those big ones that you know, they were the smaller speakers. KATELYN: Where are those arches? KATELYN: So between living in the dorm, Ridgewood wasn’t home any more, your mom and dad moved.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home and there was an aquarium in that apartment that was TOM: Yeah, mom and dad moved to this house. from a previous roommate.

KATELYN: Did you consider this house home? KATELYN: Did Mary Beth spend a lot of time in that apartment? TOM: No the dorms were home. I’m trying to remember… we still lived on Ridgewood. I do have a TOM: Yeah, MB spent a lot of time there. That was the cat memory of coming back from college during the summer that she nursed through distemper. and bringing stuff home and that being homey but I can’t remember where it was. It must have been Ridgewood. I KATELYN: That was Jib? think what made that more home was that I set up some space in the basement, I think the sound equipment it TOM: No, we had Jib for a month or two while mom and must have been in the basement of the house on dad went to Florida. We brought her to Kalamazoo. And Ridgewood, I do remember there was light and their was Jawa was the cat that was Craig’s cat that mom referred sound, and putting it up in a basement of the house on to…. Jib taught Jawa an awful lot about being a cat. That Ridgewood. The entertainment room as it were, had a was almost the start of “up is good” Jawa used to chase Jib window that looked out into a gully in the side yard. And all over. I used to feed Jib on the table that’s now in the it was a source of natural light. So it wasn’t a basementy basement. I took two thirds of a sheet of birch plywood feeling basement, kind of. and that was my desk in my bedroom and it had a wooden frame and stainless legs that came out of some KATELYN: That was Ridgewood? restaurant or something, and that was the desk. Back then I fed Jib on computer paper. It was like 11 x 17 and came TOM: Well this was the first house that Pat and I weren’t fan-folded with tear off lines from the line printers. And involved with the process of buying the house. Mom and depending on how badly you wrote your programs you Dad decided that Ridgewood was too much and they could end up with reams of it. were going to move somewhere else and this is where And that’s what I would feed Jib on and that was they picked. This makes sense for them because it’s on fabulous because when she made a mess with her food I one floor……It’s a great big house. Yeah Pat and I did would just tear off another piece or two and fold it up and have bedrooms here, but we never really felt connected to throw it away. But I fed her up there so she could eat in them. We felt connected to the family but not to the peace without Jawa bothering her. house. I really don’t know how Pat felt. My room as it were…We were only here in the summer and once KATELYN: Living in Kalamazoo in college, what do you college was done I got married and we started our own remember about it? housing adventure, with all our stuff. TOM: I really liked Kalamazoo it was kind of a mini KATELYN: Stuff from college and home. city…because Plymouth is, well Plymouth is on the edge of everything, there’s a lot to do but it didn’t seem like it TOM: Two bedrooms and some of the stuff Mary Beth was very metropolitan. Ann Arbor was always the place moved out from her home. Yeah the dorms were home to aspire to in terms of a lot more tolerant attitude of and I did spend one year in an apartment with Craig everything and just the nature of the city itself. When you Doste. And that was kind of like, I got… well I actually go to Ann Arbor you would go there to the art fair or an slept on a day bed and Craig had a loft. That was a nice event, and it was a lot more driven by the arts. Kalamazoo two-bedroom apartment. Some of the things we built, we had the same kind of feeling, to me. When I first got to built year three, made a coffee table out of a marble slab college I made the decision not to have a car on campus,  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home which was a wise decision, and my parents supported that KATELYN: Do you remember if you could walk around and you could buy a bus pass and I ended up becoming from your apartment, was it in a place where you could extremely social with the bus drivers. To the point, I knew walk from or were you driving at that point? all of them and they knew me. Sometimes if I didn’t have something to do I would ride home with them. Well, I TOM: Strictly driving. The apartment that I lived in the last mean ride the bus and then they’d go off shift and then I’d year of college was far enough away that that was a ride to the bus garage and then go home with the bus driving adventure but I lived for a very short time in an drivers. A hang-out kind of a thing. We became very apartment that was close enough to campus to actually friendly with a bunch of the bus drivers. We had mutual walk for the summer term and I actually did. But then I interest in some things. I haven’t been on enough public actually bought a car that was a 63 Valiant that had a bad transportation to know if you can strike up a conversation rear differential. I bought it from somebody, for not very with the drivers. The drivers I hung out with were much money. assigned to the campus routes. So that made sense, and Anyway but as far as the apartment we lived in I you could get out to the mall and downtown and get a remember more of its architecture three stories with the transfer. With a bus pass you could go anywhere in the windows on the top floor cut out of the roof. Dormer kind system assuming you had enough time to kill to get there. of thing and when it was really windy the rooms got really cold and the heat didn’t keep up. When it got cold in the KATELYN: OK so then you got married to Mom, what did dorm we did some things, used window fans to actually you look for to live in? force heat out of the radiators. The apartment had a kitchen, dining room, and I think we changed the dinning TOM: Well initially we decided we wanted to live in an room light, it had a carport, a dish washer, two bedrooms, apartment and there were some apartments out Gull Lake a dining area but other than that it was totally (road) that we wound up living in and we picked one that unremarkable. was in the middle of a three story, and the manager of the apartment was above and the maintenance man was KATELYN: So then when you started looking for a house below. Part of the reason I thought the middle was a good what were you looking for? idea, it was cheaper to heat with people above and below, and there weren’t too many steps. That was a two- TOM: Mostly something I could afford. bedroom apartment, but by then we had an accumulation of stuff and one room was literally filled KATELYN: Mary Beth was telling me that she was working with stuff. at the lighting store.

KATELYN: You had too much stuff. TOM: She was working at the lighting store.

TOM: I’ll always have too much stuff but a lot of it was KATELYN: and you were working… technology stuff. But we figured we were only going to live in the apartment for a year and then find a house and TOM: I was working for Western as a television engineer that’s exactly what we did. So the apartment had I can’t remember I think we got the cats while we were there and KATELYN: That was in the basement with the yellow wall? that was Chauncy and his sister. Missen, was a medium to long hair, Chauncy was a fabulous cat always was, brother TOM: Yep. Well the yellow wall didn’t come until, and sister. We might have gotten them after the apartment, apparently when the place had been built, it had missed but the apartment was pretty unremarkable. the painting cycle and so the walls down there were all still primer, basically, and now it was on the painting cycle  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home and that was allegedly my space. So we could pick out somebody got a bug (to replace it) it would be operating one of about six “accent” colors and yellow was the only today. one that didn’t make me want to vomit. But it was very We did an awful lot of work on that house. We nice because when you’ve got a wall that’s 8 or 9 feet tall completely painted the inside and then began on the and 30 feet wide painted yellow, you wander into that roof. While the roof was partly off the roommate that I room and there’s no way that the yellow can’t improve had in the apartment said he had worked construction your mood, even years later when I visited the place, the and said we could put a new roof on inside of a week. yellow walk was still there and it did a nice job of Promised he would help with the roof but he really didn’t improving your mood. help that much. I knew nothing about how long roofing takes but I knew there were cedar shakes and two old KATELYN: So you looked into houses you could afford but roofs up there that needed to come off and that turned obviously you had some idea of what you were looking into just one bloody disaster because most of the roof for? was off when a torrential downpour happened. There was literally water and dirt running down the walls after TOM: We wanted a fireplace, a formal dining room, we had painted and that sort of thing. The whole roof enough space to start a family, in the city was just fine, it project took a lot more than a month and knowing what I could use some fixing up but more along the lines of that know about it now I would have done it in sections and was great. If it needed some work that was ok. A basic used more tarp, but this was my first roofing, major starter place. If it had some character that was great. The roofing adventure and I wanted it done right. I know a lot house we found was a 2 story, four square, three dormers more now about roofing and I would have used attic. architectural shingles now as being a hipped roof with The family that had lived there had one bathroom dormers the three tab shingles coupled with a lack of upstairs and one bath off the back addition it had a technique generates a huge amount of waste. Even though sunroom that had been closed in off the second story architectural shingles cost more it would have gone faster which we got to through a back bedroom. And and been less waste. underneath that it had a den that had been added. That But that poor house, heating, plumbing and was where my first workshop was. roofing and painting and drilling (venting) the siding and then getting it insulated. We used spray-in foam KATELYN: Above ground? insulation, which is no longer used because it contains formaldehyde. It was a nifty house. We had a fireplace in TOM: Above ground, not in the basement. The basement the living room and we spent a lot of time in the living was not a Michigan basement. They cut corners and used room. A classic American design built in 1910 or 12. The the dirt out of a hole and done a light mix with (Portland) formal dining room had a window seat dormer. cement so if you touched the walls very hard they would crumble and fall in, but it was really thick. It was as close KATELYN: Do you remember any of the furnishings? to a Michigan basement as you could get without being a Michigan basement. We had a giant octopus gas furnace. TOM: Oak finish downstairs, cheaper wood upstairs. It had been coal, but had been converted to gas, which The Oak was finished dark varnish. We rebuilt the we eventually replaced with forced air. Lynn’s brother windows in the dining room so that the sash cords helped us put it in. We kept the ducting large, didn’t worked. All of that stuff worked when we left. The other believe the horse crap about small ducts and hi-velocity stuff was kind of a lost cause, windows were painted and heating systems. If the house had been built for gravity getting them to work with the original sash weights was feed, I figured leave the ducting large. The used furnace more work than we were going to do. And we subscribed that we put in was built like a battle ship and unless to the “OLD HOUSE JOURNAL” and learned a lot. There  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home were push button switches knob and tube electric. There TOM: Originally we were going to get a smaller one but was gas piping still in the walls because when they built at the last minute we got a better deal on the larger one. the house originally they didn’t know which was going to We probably should have gotten a smaller one. But we go, gas or electric. The neighbors’ house next door had literally cut up through the ceiling and installed a wood- been built with more money and had nice trim downstairs burning fireplace upstairs. Which turned out to make too and upstairs. Ours only had the good trim downstairs. much heat when you fired it up. When we tore up the carpeting to put down new carpeting we discovered the hardwood floors went KATELYN: Was the fireplace in the middle of the house in around the rim of the room so we could use area rugs that house? but it wasn’t hardwood throughout. The dining room might have been hardwood floors. We redid the kitchen, TOM: The original fireplace was in the middle of the which was a disaster. We went to one of the “Color” tile house, the primary fireplace, and it did a good job of places to learn how to do the tile floor in the bathroom keeping the house toasty. Neither fire place had make-up and that turned out to be a disaster because they lied. air, and the we should have gotten the smaller one for And if we got too much water on the walls in the upstairs as you could really over do it with a fire upstairs. bathroom we could literally watch it going down to the Every house up to that point had a real wood burning kitchen window below. The people at Color Tile said “Oh fireplace that tended to get used. yeah, yeah just put this up on the plaster”, but No, No, no, you really can’t do that. It had an original tub with KATELYN: So I was born. The first child. How did that original plumbing that came up through the floor and we house accommodate or not accommodate that? left that in place. With one of the stand drains outside the tub. It was just a nice classic American house. When it TOM: Well because we had the cut between the two was originally built they didn’t spend a lot of money (front upstairs rooms) You were born in August and it was upstairs, the downstairs was nice but not all the good trim hot, we put you in your crib right next door so when you was there. We did put a ceiling fan in the stairwell, classic would wake up I would climb out of bed and get you and Hunter cast iron and it helped to bring the heat back give you to mom and I’d go back to sleep and after she got down from upstairs. Nifty house. done feeding you and changing you and doing whatever else you needed she put you back into bed and I’d already KATELYN: so… gone back to sleep by then. The other thing was it was hot hot hot in August and you didn’t do real well in the heat. TOM: One other feature I totally forgot. Since Mom And within the week after you were born I went out and worked in a fireplace and lighting store, we got a heck of got a window air conditioner and put it in so it would a deal on a silicone carbide freestanding wood burner. cool the front two (joined) bedrooms in the house. And We cut an arch between the front two bedrooms with a you slept better and when you slept better, I slept better. saber saw and filled it in to make our living space bigger That was really the last change we had there. and our bedroom was on the right and on the left side we Mom stopped working and by then I had secured a job at added kind of a sitting room-fireplace. The fireplace was the TV station in Grand Rapids and I was driving every kind of a large round, it was almost like a Marvin the day. I worked second shift then. I left about one in the martin shaped thing. That was a long story that we won’t afternoon and the shift got done eight hours later so I go into, but the people that made the fireplaces had made worked from 2 to 10 and then I would drive home and go the first containers that became atomic bombs. to sleep about 11 and then start all over again next day. And then we decided the driving was silly, that we would KATELYN: Interesting. sell our house in Kalamazoo and find a house in Grand Rapids because there wasn’t anything keeping us in  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home Kalamazoo. Back then when your mom was working at found a house on the north side of town and it didn’t the lighting company and I was working at Western, she need much. We were kind of burned out on the entire was actually making more money than I was at the major home repair we’d done on the house in University. So when I landed the job at Channel 17, we Kalamazoo. I was not interested in starting that whole could afford for her not to work so that was the plan at process all over again. that point. And then we started the whole house search again in Grand Rapids. We started on the south side of KATELYN: You were thinking about building then? town, in the Kentwood area, we did not like the school system or the housing or the sameness of the subdivisions TOM: Oh yes, there’s a whole building adventure there. down there. We kind of worked our way out to Jennison; Well some of these building adventures actually started in decided those people were crazy. We worked clockwise high school. Well your mom and I decided that we were around the quadrants, and then when we looked in going to get married when we were still in high school. Northview we heard some things about the school system. We both had a lot of involvement with each other, with We heard they had thrown out the PTA earlier. They didn’t what we wanted to do with our futures and it always like their agenda and formed their own teachers, parent intrigued me that silos were really cool and being by that (organization) or whatever they called it. Which told me time basically mechanical in nature I thought if you the parents in Northview were a lot more involved in their could obtain three of the glazed brick silos that with school system. I’d been through the Forest Hills school proper redoing of the insides you could turn into pretty system. It was a good system if your teachers decided you cool housing. Circular rooms, circular staircases, linking were rich and smart. But if they thought you weren’t rich them together so that you got walkways between them so or smart then they didn’t pay a lot of attention to you. My your room is not limited to a particular space. As I recall grades went up a full grade in the Plymouth system. With that had an air space between it so you could force me doing nothing different. Just the perception my insulate it. Basically kicked around the idea that it might teachers had of me in Grand Rapids was enough that they be good idea of alternative housing. I actually had a tended to grade against you…. , Even though I was in a friend in high school that had a friend who was an bigger tougher school district. architect and she convinced him to draw up something and he basically drew a round house thinking it would be KATELYN: When you were little? the same thing.

TOM: No, the Plymouth system was bigger and tougher, KATELYN: No. but the teachers were fair in terms of the grading and I somewhere along the line was labeled as a student that TOM: I’m looking at it from the standpoint that the wasn’t living up to their potential or what ever. physical challenge of turning three silos into a house and he was looking at it from the standpoint that this was a KATELYN: So you had a prejudice against Grand Rapids round house and was the same thing. Totally different Public schools? approaches. At the time we were looking for a house your mom was working in Kalamazoo and I was working TOM: Forest Hills actually. I think Forest Hills was pretty in Grand Rapids and we were driving around looking for good but I’d kind of forgotten about that. I really didn’t something in-between, and found a lot that looked out have an interest because Forest Hills was always kind of over lake Allegan , Kalamazoo River and we had done hands off. The parents never really had that much to do some investigation on underground housing and there is with the school system, and when we found out the a method they used called sliding form casting. Had parents were basically two feet involved with the talked to some people who built housing partially Northview schools, we thought that was a good thing. We underground to take advantage of the lower thermal  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home extremes. The land we were looking at had a southern KATELYN: It violates your idea of home. It was just exposure so we designed a two story house that wasn’t Christmas lights, wasn’t it? particularly huge but it had three bedrooms and a fireplace in the center that was part of the glass wall and TOM: No they stole an air compressor and a welder out of a great view of the lake, plus at that time I had an the garage. And the Christmas lights. And there were interest in airplanes and was thinking of even building a people in the neighborhood all the time so it wasn’t like is plane. Mom had learned to fly but with my diabetes I was was uninhabited. They just pulled up and exited. never going to get medical and I had picked out a plane So after we burned out on that house and the that was a Seawind 2000, a plane that could land on disappointment of the rain ruining all the work we and water and on land. our parents had done, the next house we were looking for So when we were looking at this piece of land after we decided Northview was the place we wanted to there was part of it that jutted into the lake, and would live, we found that house with a great family room off have made a marvelous place for a beach area and a the back that the previous owners had added with a hanger with an approach to the water. We bid on the land fireplace in it. The one place I didn’t like in that house and our real estate agent said we should put in the bid was the basement, once again Grand Rapids builders that we had riparian rights, that we actually owned to the cutting corners, the basement had a 7 foot ceiling and I water and that lot didn’t have those rights. There was put a workshop down there and I didn’t like working willow scrub where I wanted to put a hanger and beach down there because A. it was a basement and the ceilings and that would have run up with the DNR, DEQ and were too close. And when they built the room off the back Consumers Power who owned that part of the lot. So we they did another ridiculous thing. Plainfield Township were able to back out of it due to the water edge rights didn’t allow you to build an addition on a slab so they put thing. Then we found out the river was contaminated with in a four-foot crawl space and sealed it up. So it was like PCB’s. So the location turned out to be a disappointment. duh, like how much more would it have been to go down The house would have been really cool and we had like three feet more of concrete and slab the thing and you planed to have the Garage up the hill at the back and had would have had more storage space under the great family a tunnel, stairs from the Garage to the back entrance of room off the back. the house. KATELYN: Well, there’s a reason for that. When you build KATELYN: The idea was a cool idea. an addition next to an existing foundation it can cause serious problems and that could have collapsed that TOM: Our very first house in Kalamazoo was also a whole side of the house. traditional 50 foot lot with a front porch with a swing on it and that idea of neighborhood thing and we did spend a TOM: Well they wound up digging down to under the fair amount of time on the front porch. The garage was frost layer anyway. around the back, one track by the house and a two-car Some of the brick work on the fireplace. The garage and rolling doors. In order to secure the doors fireplace was in a dumb place also it was on the end of after one Christmas when stuff was stolen out of it we the house, instead of in the center, where it would have modified it and actually built something out of fabulous provided some warmth to the house, As is was it was a steel and put a giant lock on it and you wouldn’t be able giant cold sink. to get into that garage without some serious messing That family room was definitely the best feature. around. When someone steals from your house it changes The bedrooms were small but livable. Yes it was vinyl your perception of accessibility. sided and the roof wasn’t in horrible shape when we moved in, the electrical was pretty reasonable, the plumbing was made out of copper including the drain  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home plumbing. (We had had the adventure in Kalamazoo with mixed metal plumbing) KATELYN: What did you do when we first moved into that So here we were in a house that was reasonably well house? Before you built the studio. Did you paint? built. With only a few goofy things. It was big enough to raise a family in. Seemed like a reasonable neighborhood. TOM: No, we didn’t have to do anything. The decorating Didn’t have sidewalks, that would have been nice but we wasn’t hideous, the floor and carpets were in pretty good could live without it. The houses were far enough from the shape. Your mom eventually decided to paint. Maybe she road so the SUV in front yard didn’t become the focal painted right off the bat, I can’t remember. That’s the point. Here we were again in a tri-level where again you story of the pink living room, I never liked the color but are forced to make a decision when you go to the your mother and grandmother on your mother’s side bathroom, whether to go up or down. I don’t mind tri- decided it was a fabulous color and I just kept my mouth levels but you really need to put a bathroom on the main shut. I think we tore the ceramic sink out and put in the living floor, and figure out how to do that. Dish Master and a stainless sink.

KATELYN: Would you seek out a tri-level? KATELYN: What’s a Dish Master?

TOM: I had lived in two tri-levels and I like the tri-level TOM: The Dish Master’s the thing with the soap and the except for the bathroom thing. So, after thinking about brush on it. We’ve put one of those in every house your the plumbing thing, after moving out, I might seek out a mom and I have ever lived in. tri-level and just deal with the bathroom issue later. I know what it takes to make it work and take advantage of KATELYN: Even the house in Kalamazoo? the situation later when buying, driving the price down on a tri, by using the “there’s no bathroom on the main floor.” TOM: Even the one in Kalamazoo. When we did the You’re going to take a hit and I’m going to deal with it kitchen in Kalamazoo we put in a dishwasher and a Dish later. Master. And a special sink. GE made kind of a stepped That house originally had a hot tub, but they took ultra small dishwasher and a stepped ultra small sink so it with them when they left. the two of them would actually go over each other. Because the area we had to put in a dishwasher was KATELYN: They took the hot tub? behind the door and there wasn’t a lot of space without completely redoing the kitchen so we managed to jamb it TOM: It was on a slab outside by the back door. It was into that space. And a garbage disposal. That was another originally a one car under which we decided we could amusing story. We got to redo the plumbing. Your father put up with until we decided what we wanted to do. So put way too many potatoes down the new garbage when your mom got into pottery that’s when we disposal. It didn’t bother the disposal but it sure clogged investigated and came up with the idea of putting a up the plumbing. garage on. And turning the one car under into a pottery studio. The advantage was that it really didn’t increase KATELYN: What else did we do to the house on Wabash? the living space, the disadvantage was that we traipsed the dust from the pottery studio into the house every TOM: Well basically we coasted for a few years. Then I time you came in from the garage. So when we had an got a call from your mom that the furnace had given it up. opportunity to do it over in the house we are currently It was a hot summer and we had been running the air in, we put the garage between the house and the studio conditioner for quite a few days. Once again Grand rather than having the studio attached directly to the Rapids builders had cut corners. Instead of putting in a house. proper condensate drain, they just punched a hole in the  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home floor and the water had finally saturated the ground under KATELYN: Yes, I remember that. You’re living in a different the basement where it couldn’t absorb any more water, part of Grand Rapids from where you lived when you flooding the basement, and this caused the bottom of the were growing up, right? furnace to rust out. So then we had to decide what to do. It turned out a furnace contractor who lived on the street TOM: My time in Grand Rapids was in the Cascade area. said he’d sell us a furnace at 10% over his cost so we Cascade has some very fond memories except for the bought a furnace from him one year, with part of the air school system. It was part of the Forest Hills School conditioner on it and the next year we bought the air system, and I learned later from some friends that moved conditioner (outside) unit to go with it. He let me borrow into the Forest Hills school system. Up against “we don’t the torch and tools and other things necessary to make the think you’re smart and you obviously don’t have money installation. We went from a 2 and a half-ton unit to a 4- and your not worth anything,” kind of attitude that comes ton unit and it did a not-short cycle, that is one of the big from both the kids and teachers. This reaffirmed our concerns of big air conditioners. It was large enough; it decision of not moving into the Forest Hill system was a did a very nice job. The other thing we did is somewhere good idea. The Northview school system is made up of a along the way we ended up with neon. I made the big mix. There’s not a large Hispanic or black population decision that I thought it would be really cool to have a and my sense is that it really doesn’t seem to matter that neon sculpture and mom went along with it. And we put a much to the kids. From the kids stand point they’re more neon sculpture on the fireplace in the family room. Not accepting. Yah, you still have the clicks that you get only on the fireplace but transitioned to the ceiling. We everywhere. It’s a lot more generally accepting then the did get the roof replaced and we added the studio by one I went to in Forest Hills. adding the garage. We did a lot of the work ourselves in By the time I got to Plymouth, Plymouth was so terms of the electrical and the roofing on the garage. And big that you could have that click mentality and it didn’t got it (the garage) for less money. We actually paid to have matter because you got to a campus with 3000 kids. And the roofing redone and that was a tear off and put all you don’t really care what your neighbors think because down. Did some painting and mowed the lawn. there are other things to do and other people to hang out with. Mostly what drew us to Northview was the fact that KATELYN: Built the tree fort in the back. the parents seem to be really involved and the schools welcomed their involvement. TOM: Yeah, for you kids, that was an adventure. Put in the posts with Bill (Jung) and that was seriously over designed. KATELYN: You were working at Fox. We were going to put in a giant slide. But that never materialized; we did put a slide in at Bills house. TOM: Actually I worked 14 years at Amway. I worked at Fox when we moved up here then I did about 6 months- KATELYN: I remember we could just climb up in it. almost a year of free lance where I was working part time at Fox, part time at Radio Bible class and part time at TOM: The tree house? The other down side of that Amway. So I literally did a couple of days a week at each particular location was it was on the north side of a south place so I could fix things. So eventually it turned into a facing hill. The house faced northeast so it wasn’t the best full time job with Amway and I thought I was going to sun and all the TV antennas for transmissions were retire from Amway. After working at Amway for 14 years, through the dirt. So we made a decision to get rid of the brothers and sisters decided they couldn’t get along cable, to save money we bought our big antenna and it with each other any longer. Since one sister would not would only get one TV station. leave, and since they had to downsize anyway, they just 86’s all her departments. And the sister who was left didn’t have anyone to manage. That’s one of the down sides of 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home family companies. There was the whole thing with move (sell) was a reduction in price and painting every Grandpa’s Family Company trying to move that forward thing (eggshell). So we painted everything a flat color and and the situation that mom and dad wound up in. Dad reduced the price and we were out of that house. definitely got the short end of that stick. The house that we picked out is the house that But, even when I was working full time at Amway we’re in now. You know we took you kids around and we I continued to work part time at Channel 17 for six more were really really interested in that house that was on the years. Until finally they had to downsize and there were pond because it had the potential for geothermal, it did no hard feelings there. Then Channel 17 was bought by have riparian rights, but once again there were some Tribune, they said we’re going to build a newsroom, and things about the way that house was built that drove me asked Greg and Lynn if they knew anyone in the area who crazy. could help wire the new facility and I wound up being They’d done it in a rush. All the concrete around part of the local hired help to wire the new place. Things the entire thing had heaved. Somebody had again cut a at that time were getting brown and mushy at Amway and corner somewhere. When it was built originally. It was oil I went to Dale and asked about full time. One of the heat, there was no gas heat available, and the possibility people that was employed at the station was going to of there being gas was an iffy thing. It had a fabulous move on, so a full time position opened up and that’s amount of land and a great boulevard (through the fields) what I wound up moving into. and acceptable space that could be turned into Mom’s studio. One of the other downsides was they were going KATELYN: And that happened? to take the tractor with them, and it would have been a whole other adventure to try to figure out how to make the TOM: No we moved to the new house when I still worked paths (nature, boulevard) doing the lawn and all that stuff, for Amway. We moved off of Wabash when I was still and it was much more money than we could afford. working at Amway. I would drive from the north end of Especially because we were looking at: the fireplace town, to the plant and it was a very pleasant drive about wasn’t built right, the concrete had heaved, and the that time our work shifted to 52nd Street. My route furnace was questionable. It had been built in the 60’s changed to using the expressway. So we moved into the when insulation wasn’t a big concern so we were worried house we’re currently in while I was employed by Amway. about what our energy costs for heating would be. It was really a cool space in terms of what your views were, but KATELYN: So what motivated the move from Wabash? one of the other things I didn’t like was I don’t like dealing with the Beltline. So I would have had to do a Beltline left TOM: Basically we decided the house wasn’t big enough, every single morning to go to work or I would have had to we needed more space for stuff and I’d absolutely had it go down Hoag and after a couple of trips down Hoag, I with the 7 foot ceilings in basement. Your mom’s decided it was too dangerous and in any kind of business was ramping up and she needed more space for inclement weather I was going to spend more time in the her studio and the dust from the studio--- it was time we ditch than anywhere else. I was still working for Amway just needed a bigger place. We’d been in that house a lot so I would have had to go out that way to get to Amway. longer than we had expected to be in it. So, between all those factors, even though we thought it Part of the trouble with selling that was that we was really cool, and we didn’t want to low ball, and once had done such a job of making it our own. Between the again, even after all those years, we still didn’t want to get way we’d redecorated things, the studio there, the colors into a place that was immediately a fixer-upper without a of the walls that mom had decided on, and the neon’s fixer-upper price and that was a fixer-upper. and stuff, people looking at the house trying to figure out When we walked into the place we’re in now, how to make it their home couldn’t see past what we’d even though it looked kind of plain from the outside it done to make it our home. So what made that house had that great entry way, and that’s what sold us on it,  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home you know looking up the stairs and at that point I KATELYN: Neighborhood association. grabbed the (stair) rails and they didn’t creak and snort and carry on. They’re still much tighter than a lot of other TOM: Whatever, it’s a contract that lasts ten years and things, but there is that one spot up by the bedroom that’s certain things are agreed to. just stupidly fastened, but the main pillars that go into the floor do not move like other Grand Rapids builder done KATELYN: Right. rails. I learned later that Jim(the builder) cut corners in other places but it didn’t seem like we couldn’t deal with TOM: Some of what was in the original association what issues presented later. agreement was actually Plainfield township code and regulations and some of it was actually pretty excessive. KATELYN: So, what other houses? We looked at a bunch (The stuff Julie’s husband got put in) of other houses, we looked for a place for moms’ studio, So what have we done to that space to make it where it was reasonable route to work, and was in your more of a home? The process of painting goes on, the price range. carpeting we put in is very much like the carpeting we put in Kalamazoo in terms of color and texture and style TOM: And we wanted to stay in the Northview school which is something we did there that we liked. AND district. You guys had a pretty stable group of friends and STUFF. You know, made changes to the infrastructure, we we didn’t want to pull you out of Northview. Cause I’d like to do the hobby things so you helped me do the been moved from…I’d been pulled from one school whole rewire the garage, we paid to have the house system and put into another, and admittedly that was an rewired somewhere near code. Instead of where he improvement. But moving from Forest Hills to Plymouth trimmed corners. You don’t put in a house that big with a schools…I was much better off for that move, with the 100-amp service. We still haven’t dealt with some of the radio station, it was a much much better move than it things…we liked the bathroom the big master bathroom seemed at the time. It didn’t seem that with what you and the shower that’s in the bathroom but because Jim guys were involved in there was really any down- side to trimmed a corner again. The tile leaks and we haven’t keeping you in the same school district. So with those fixed the tile yet but we avoided the leaking tile by criteria, more space, something we could afford. When putting a curtain inside the shower because otherwise it we originally read the ad, they had misplaced the decimal rains in the living room. So once again the things that are point. It read 8.3 acres instead of .83 acres. So we’re frustrating about a home have to do with builders cutting looking at a fabulous amount of land on 4 Mile and it corners. Not so much the design of the place. must be way out. KATELYN: What’s your favorite place in that house? KATELYN: Well when you got there… TOM: The living space, basically the living room. That TOM: When we got there they said the ad had screwed house does not have a designated family room and that’s up. It had a hot tub which we thought was really cool, the same thing as the house in Kalamazoo. We found our we learned about that later (that it had a botched install), favorite space in the house in Kalamazoo was the living the foyer was great, it was in our price range, the land area. In Kalamazoo that included the front porch. This was big enough we knew we could put a studio in later house, the porch is nice but it needs to be bigger. But without creating any setback issues, it was far enough off basically my favorite place is the living room area. The the road, that it was not a big deal and still in the computers are there, we can relax on the couch and Northview School District. And the surprise to us was it read, the TV has finally moved into the living room. was in a condo association. The studio’s pretty cool. That’s one thing we learned being a general contractor these “expensive  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home features” that builders talk about. In the scale of things, done the contracting ourselves. Of course it still is not they’re not much money. $200 extra for sky lights that are finished as the trim around the windows is not done…. fabulous and change the entire feeling of the room, on a $10,000 project is… why are we even sneezing at that. KATELYN: Where you live now, what you like about it We did the plumbing and electrical and we were hoping what you don’t like about it. How does the architecture of not to have a dry wall story when we did the studio, but that house support your idea of home? Favorite features that didn’t come true. And working with the kids, the and least favorite features. mentoring thing, on the robotics team, on one hand it was nice being able to work on it at home and getting Lark’s TOM: I like the living room, like our fake fireplace. The help. But on the other hand it kind of burned us out and dislikes of the house stem from corners the builder cut. we still haven’t cleaned up the remains dealing with We still like that foyer, mom and I are kicking around robots. maybe firing up the neon sculpture and maybe we could make it work on the bathroom wall. Back of the wall that KATELYN: You’ve done all these projects in that house. runs along outside where your bathroom is. So it would Do you have any particular attachment to that house or is light up that whole foyer space. We like some of the it just the things in the house that….. features in terms of the windows, wooden windows double hung glass. The walkout thing, the space to do TOM: Well, the thing that struck us was the entryway projects. and the stairs …and the bedrooms are comfortable and reasonably large. We like where we are and we like the KATELYN: The big garage? land, we like the woods. And the house and its setting, architecturally it’s not a remarkable house it has more to TOM: Well, the big garage and the studio too. Since do with it’s interior and we’ve added some remarkable I’ve taken up the shooting and reloading thing I’ve been features when we added the studio. We really made the reloading in the studio. I’ve got a small amount of space in studio work from a visual standpoint based on a there. Mom’s not doing pottery in there now. When we suggestion from an architect, that you didn’t want to have first built that room it was a “hobby room”. Since you that much roof exposed and in a line. The original plan guys are gone and mom’s not interested in working by was just to match the roof to the garage and his complaint herself any more, I can go out there and fiddle around for was, and it was legitimate, that it was going to be just an half an hour or an hour and half and turn out some awful lot of roof with no break. The simplistic answer was bullets. It’s a complicated enough process (that having a to turn the roof and I said “no” I’m not paying all that quiet space helps) The ability to move from one shiny extra money just to turn the roof, when we can achieve thing to another. And to have project space to do those the same thing by stepping it. We were very fortunate, as kinds of things in. So in terms of our interests and our the guys who built and framed it and sided it and roofed it ability to do them somewhere in the house has made it had done it as a bid job. If it had been a time job the other home. I have this philosophy at work that I don’t know mistake about placing the foundation the wrong way three anyone’s extension numbers, whenever I want to meet inches generated a lot more work for those guys. It wasn’t with someone I walk to where they are and meet them really clear when we explained plan for tying the new face to face. One, to get a little exercise and two, so as I room into the garage, and the guy laying out the answer their questions I can see their face and tell if they foundations didn’t do the job right. And then the other are tracking my answer. So whether I want to live in a features of the studio with the in-floor heat, the one simple single floor house as I get older I’m not really sure. I like air conditioner, leaving the kilns in the back of the garage. the idea of at least having to go up and down a flight of A lot of things that we had learned along the way made it steps and get some exercise at some time or other. a much nicer space for a lot less money than if we hadn’t  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home If we were going to have an ideal house handed that in houses we’ve appreciated. Like the house on the to us, the features would have to be a living space with a pond had the great view and great open spaces. And the view, natural light, sky lights kind of thing, a porch would looking out. That’s hit us twice. That’s how we designed be nice. But it’s got to be more like a traditional porch the underground house with a great view of Lake with some width, not just tacked on as an after thought. Allegan. My folks here have a great view of their backyard. So having that look out over the distance kind KATELYN: What’s wrong with the current porch? of thing is a nice thing to have. Woods, definitely, fireplaces yes, I like to do fireplace responsibly in terms TOM: Well, we screened in our front porch but it really of capturing the heat that’s generated and radiate it into needs to be about two feet wider to be a truly useful the house and there are ways to do that sort of thing like porch, again, it was cutting corners. It wouldn’t have a fireplace on the inside wall and a fireplace on the been a big deal to push the porch out another few feet but outside wall. Put the fireplace in the center of the house it would have taken more time and materials. My favorite and actually use some of that heat that was generated amusement thing is that he spent more money on from burning that wood. The in-floor heat feature, that expensive high quality dimmer switches than he did on we have in the studio, that’s a fabulous thing and that the central electrical box. At first glance it looks really leads to other things about using heat pumps rather than nice, but it’s like the fireplace. It looks good at first burning gas. And the other things I’ve learned about pine glance, and at second glance its ok, but it’s essentially resins and how they reduce energy usage. Incorporating concrete that’s been painted. But it’s not an honest-to- both excessive features and green features together and god field stone fireplace. Because Mom’s dad was you can wind up with a space that isn’t a big hit on the involved in the gravel pit, in all the houses they lived they environment but is still extremely comfortable. It’s just a had access to all the stone they needed and were patient matter of the choices you make along the way. When we enough for the artisans to do honest-to-god fieldstone. So built the studio we spent a big amount of money on our fireplace is a reminder of that, but it’s a less expensive insulation and the way that was constructed the plastic version of doing it the right way. Or the true way would siding and then OSB , and blown in cellulose, double be more descriptive. I do like the fact that it is an overlay aluminum sided foam, then drywall gets you the vapor (on the wall) If you were to build that in the full blown barrier on the inside where it’s supposed to be. So it’s tradition of brick and stone fireplace method it would extremely quiet out there. Using cellulose that way is have gone through the walk in space below it and it better than fiberglass and yes fiberglass is better than air would have had to be properly supported. And that space but it’s not better than cutting a corner and doing it would have been ok, but it would change the walkout right. The concept of building partway underground gives from the basement. And the bottom line could have been you less thermal load. My housing experience has been good having an upstairs fireplace and a downstairs pretty much in Michigan. So my understanding about heat fireplace. The downside of our fireplace on Wabash was and cold comes from that. We own a heat, fresh-air they trimmed a corner and there was no way to get the exchanger that we have never made the effort to install, ashes out easily. We actually had to vacuum the ashes out we did have a window one on Wabash that died and we from the ash door of the fireplace. There was outside air got one in the basement as a warranty thing. The house we that came in that way. (Good feature) are in now the ducting wasn’t done right and it’s too small and adding the air exchanger would be a large challenge. KATELYN: If you were to design the house, as you wanted it to be with out concern for budget. KATELYN: Would you stay in Michigan or would you go elsewhere? TOM: Well, if budget were no problem it would probably be a mix of all the features or incorporating all the features  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home TOM: Where we go is mostly determined by what work TOM: In General to everything, to a space that makes you we can find. Mom’s going to want four seasons so feel comfortable or a space that you have made that obviously we’re not going to pack up and move to Florida. makes you feel comfortable. A place that is comfortable I think Florida’s a lost cause anyway. in terms of physical needs. It keeps you warm; it keeps you out of the rain… KATELYN: Economics make a difference. KATELYN: Shelter? TOM: Where you can get work. If you’re independently wealthy, yes I would stay in Michigan, it doesn’t matter, TOM: Shelter, a place to go to. Well, also a place for my we are comfortable here. The outskirts of Chicago aren’t stuff. all bad and I have relatives in Colorado and that’s not all bad. Mom’s going to push back on a place that doesn’t KATELYN: Stuff? have four seasons. And that can be achieved in places like Northern California if you’re up at the proper elevations TOM: Stuff in terms of hobbies and interests, books, you get four seasons. If I’m still working… I thoroughly computer a place where things…that are work or things enjoy how close I am to my work. I found it amusing to that aren’t work, reading, reading things on the find out how close it was to work. I was still driving to computer. Building something, fixing something, or Amway and since I’ve changed jobs I’m closer to work recreating stuff. now. I’ve kicked around the idea of using a small electric Well a place for family, for cats, for kids, for kids’ car or converting something to plug-in to get around, but friends, cats friends…something that gives you a sense of I need something to carry my tools around. I do need to community and that can be affected by architecture and occasionally go a field, but most days I don’t travel very attitude of your neighbors. Where we are now our new far and something that can go 50 miles on a charge would neighbors are very friendly and personable, and it’s an be fine. extended family and it’s very amusing. A sense of community. If you have people around KATELYN: So you couldn’t walk to work because of the you who are easy to talk to and who share some of your tools? interests that can be good. The current place where we live the architecture of it doesn’t lend itself to extend the TOM: Well, if work is close enough that I don’t have to community much beyond the home. You can bring things transport great amounts of tools, I could walk to work. in to your home, but it’s more of an active thing. But where we live, nothing is set up for that sort of thing. Where we lived in Kalamazoo was more If I were working in a facility that was reasonably level traditional model with the houses in the front and the and there was pedestrian access designed from the get go, garages in the back. We did have more interactions with to get to work. Then I could walk to work Really there isn’t our neighbors and that had benefits and side benefits. a sidewalk between home and work. Amusing things like the cats with the neighbor’s dogs. We all got along. Depending on where your house is in KATELYN: What are five words that describe home for relation to other houses determines the ease of creating a you? larger neighborhood. But in this day and age sometimes you create neighborhoods in other ways and not always TOM: A feeling of belonging. directly through housing, it may be more wasteful that way (transportation). KATELYN: to the house or to community?

 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home Interview Four room kind of a room, and then we had a room that had a Subject: Mary Beth Cooper fireplace in it. It was all tiled floor, there was no carpeting or anything downstairs. And there was a Interviewer: Katelyn Cooper on November 26, 2007 shower downstairs that my dad used. I guess the fireplace was kind of a gathering place. We liked that, it was a KATELYN: Tell me about your earliest memory of home. hearth you could sit on, we always had fires in the evening, in the winter. The garage was detached, it wasn't MARY BETH: Well, my earliest home was in Plymouth, attached to the house it sat back behind the house, and on Brownell Street. It was a dirt road… Um I probably my mom always had gardens, always had flowers on both remember more about the outside spaces than the inside sides of the driveway. They lined the driveway on both spaces, but I had some good and bad spots within the sides. house that I remember pretty vividly. I don’t even know what style you would call it…but it was KATELYN: Do you remember any changes they made to a house that my parents built. My brother and I were the house? After they built it, or? upstairs, had our bedrooms upstairs, and my parents’ bedroom was on the main floor and we had a basement, MARY BETH: I don't remember any changes that they a full basement.. And um…the stairways were in the made. I remember my mom telling me that they didn't center of the house so that we had a core that went have carpeting when they first built the house. I think they around so that you could walk all the way around the built the house probably about five years before I was interior on the first floor. You walked around this column born. And the, at that time in the really early fifties, you that was the stairs column in the center. know they didn't have a lot of money, it was a big stretch Um… Big porches on both the front and back, a to build a house and my parents did a lot of the work, big cement porch with stairs down. and my mom painted the floors because they couldn't The bedroom that I slept in had dormer windows. have carpeting, so the floors were painted. When I lived And the things that frightened me as a little girl… (Well I there, I remembered carpeting on the main room, the moved out, I moved from there at the end of third grade, main floor, so that was probably a change. I don't so what is that like 8 years old?) So the bed that I slept in, remember how much of the upstairs they finished when the headboard of the bed was right next door, right next to they built the house, I think that was kind of an ongoing a door that led into the attic space. It was a little half door project until my brother and I were old enough to be that you opened to get into the attic space, and that was upstairs. When my parents built the house I think he was a right next to the head of my bed, and I remember being baby so they might not have even finished the upstairs. I afraid of that door and what was behind that door. And can't remember anything that they changed, as far as the other thing that I had was that there were heat registers major changes or like remodeling or anything or that type, that came up from the lower level and one of them was while we lived there. And they were probably in that under my desk and it didn’t have a grate or any cover on it house, eight years of my life, probably somewhere around …it was just a hole… and that scared me too. I can twelve to thirteen years; I think, we'll have to look at that remember that. And there was a bathroom up there…I picture, because I don't remember the date at which they think we just had a shower in the upstairs bathroom, I built it, but I have a photograph of it in construction. don’t remember a bathtub in the upstairs bathroom, and to be honest I can’t tell you where the downstairs bathroom KATELYN: Do you remember any of the materials, like was, it would have been on the main floor….. probably tactile responses to anything in the house? What it felt next to the master bedroom, but I don’t have a memory of like, “looked like” is not all I want. the downstairs bathroom. The basement had more of a rec  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home MARY BETH: Well, the fireplace, it stands out because it was sandstone. It had a neat texture to look at, and it was MARY BETH: Well, probably my favorite place would be all different lines, horizontal lines, I remember, and they my next door neighbor's. I lived next to an older couple, weren't just straight across like brick would be; it was in that took care of a boy that had Muscular Dystrophy. And lots of different pieces; and it wasn't smooth, you could we spent a lot of time, with them. They had a garden, he feel it - the texture of sandstone - there's a, it's not rough was a janitor at the elementary school so we all knew and cold like a, It's not as cold as a regular stone, like a him, and I think probably I don't have particular granite stone, it feels more velvety, I guess, it's the only attachment to particular places but to the people that word I can think of. The shower in the basement, I can were there. And the people that I remember were remember the shower in the basement because it was typically older than my parents. It wasn't the moms and cement; it had a cement floor so it was real smooth it dads of kids my age that I remember so vividly, it's the was that polished cement tub thing, and it was always people that didn't have their own children and were like really smooth on your feet. grandmas and grandpas around for us, that we would go to visit and we would spend a lot of time with, up and KATELYN: What was your favorite place in that home, and down the street. I was telling you about the park we used why was it really special? to play in. We would go to the end of the street where it dead ended and go down the hill and we were into Hines MARY BETH: Um, my favorite place in the home ... Well I Park, and the trees were all very overgrown and we could was only in the basement if people went to the basement, have a fort and we felt like we were off in the jungle you know as a kid you didn't always go to the basement somewhere and we were completely away from because it was dark, so it was only a favorite place if civilization and that was always kind of a big deal and people were there. I can remember very distinctly being kind of fun, to make-believe and go with the group. I can't there, being in the basement, my mom would iron in the give you a specific place - it's all kind of wound together. basement and I was there when Robert Kennedy's funeral, I mean, I was probably five, I think, but I KATELYN: From there, did you walk to school; ride the remember being down there, watching on it television. bus? Oh, that was the other thing. Our family was the first family on the block to get a color television. So when the MARY BETH: I was able to walk to school. The elementary Wizard of Oz was being broadcast, all the neighborhood school was not very far, it was probably maybe half a mile kids came to our house and sat in the basement and from where that house was. We rode the bus as watched the Wizard of Oz. That was a big deal. But I kindergartners, and I think after first grade we were probably spent the majority of my time upstairs, allowed to walk, we didn't have to walk. There was a bus somewhere between the dining room and the living room, that came by but it was a big deal, and we felt so grown- they kind of merged in to each other at that central core up if your parents let you walk or ride your bike, to where they went around the stairway. And I spent a lot of school. It was close enough that it was doable, but I don't time outside. You know, my range outside was much think the school system made you do it (walk) when you broader between all the friends, the neighborhood was were very young. Because I do remember riding the bus such that there were a lot of kids close in age, and we for kindergarten. Right at the end of my street there was a kind of roamed and went from place to place. corner hardware store, and there was a little party store were we would collect pop bottles, and take them in the KATELYN: So what was your favorite place outside of the wagon down to the store and turn them in and get penny home. the surrounding community is part of it. And so, candy. We did that a lot when I was little. special to you, more special to you than actually being in a house, what was that?  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: And then you moved. Do you remember why you moved? KATELYN: So it was a different School?

MARY BETH: I think my parents were ready for a bigger MARY BETH: Different school, yeah. We moved to house, wanted more space. I think that my dad showering Ridgewood and had ... it was a fabulous house. There in the basement was getting old. I think that their income were some things about it that were really cool. In the level increased and they wanted a nicer, bigger place with upstairs, their were a line of closets, lots of doors along more space. When I go back and look at this house in my one wall, to a space that was all connected. When it was memory it's a lot bigger, and the space is a lot bigger than empty you could get in one end of the closets and could it really is. The yards were tiny, and the houses were very crawl all the way to end of the hall. I mean the house close together; and being on the dirt road, that wasn't was 45 feet long or something. So these closets were all necessarily a plus. And the home they moved into, it had connected. It was really kind of cool. And then the attic an in-ground pool, and two and a half acres of land, it was there too, but it was separate from the closet. It was was big, it was - an extra bedroom. My first house was like behind the closet. All of a sudden the attic wasn’t right three bedrooms, and a den; and the next house we lived beside my head. (Next to my bed like in the house on in was four bedrooms and a den, so all of a sudden we Brownell). That was kind of nice. gained an extra bedroom; it was bigger, it was a lot bigger. KATELYN: so what was your room like in that house? KATELYN: Were you involved in the house hunting? MARY BETH: Um, my room was long and narrow. I can MARY BETH: No, no, not at all. In our family, there was remember one of the things my mother did just before we a ... they didn't even talk about it, as I recall. I think it was decided to move...just before they decided to buy a new kind of a "We're moving. Pack your room." And I was house, they redecorated my bedroom. So I guess there quite young. I was eight, nine. I can remember not was something they did, um in the old house, they wanting to move, I didn't want to leave the school I was painted it lavender, I had a lavender room. And so part of in, I didn't want to leave my best friends, it was a the bribe to move to a new house went something like traumatic thing. I had a really tough year in fourth grade. I “Oh it will be fine, you will like it there, you can have a didn't like the teacher I had, they wouldn't use my name, I canopy bed”. You know that was something, as a little girl, had to go by a different name, it was very frustrating that I thought was so cool. I really wanted to have a canopy first year. Because there was another little girl in my class bed. Unfortunately, the bedroom that was going to be my whose name was Mary Beth, and the teacher normally, if bedroom, in the new house, the ceiling was not high she had two Jimmies, one would be Jimmy S, and one enough to put in a canopy bed. I don’t know if it was would be Jimmy Y. Both the other Mary Beth and I had really low, I mean, I look back at that and I think it had the same last initial, so that wasn't going to work. So she to have been an 8 foot ceiling, they didn’t build a house was Mary Beth, and I was Beth. So there were a lot of without an 8 foot ceiling? I guess I don’t really know. things that weren't good. But it was paneling, natural pine wood paneling on the walls, and their was no way it was going to be painted KATELYN: Where did you move to? lavender! You know they weren’t going to paint the wood paneling. So all of a sudden, here I am in my new room MARY BETH: We didn't move far, we moved to the other and it’s not girly at all! The family that had lived there end of town, basically. We were on the east side of town before had all boys. So that was kind of an abrupt change of Plymouth and we moved to the west side of town of of plan. Now what will we do? They let me decorate later, Plymouth. A matter of maybe five miles, it wasn’t a great I mean I don’t think we decorated when we first moved, distance. but later I was able to pick out my own carpeting and pick  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home out new colors. And you know I think I put in hot pink KATELYN: What was your favorite place in that home and curtains and bed spread with big white daisies with green why was it so? centers on it, and the carpeting was green.. I mean it was pretty over the top, which is why I hate pink now, I mean MARY BETH: Ah, probably the family room. It was all you know I hate pink..(laughs). My bedroom was at the windows on the back side. It looked over the back yard top of the stairs. You went up the stairs and to the left was and pool and it had a field stone fireplace. Um one my bed room. And to get into my room was a pocket whole wall was field stone and it was wood floor. I think door, which was kind of cool. I’ve always liked pocket the walls were kind of a rough sawn cedar. So there were doors. It was long and narrow so there were only a couple a lot of textures, the floors being wood, it was the only of ways you could put the furniture in. It had a built in time I remember being on a wood floor and mom had a desk and book shelf area, which was really kind of nice. big, not a rag rug, but it was a big spiral, so that had all And I mentioned the pine paneling, which I hated at first, the bumps when you walked over it. A braided rug. but I lived there through my high school years and I I had an aquarium in that room, that was mine really loved that paneling by the end. One of the things and that was always where we put our Christmas tree. I you could do with it was hang things on it with a thumb don’t know, it was just a more friendly room. It was the tack, and it didn’t really ruin the wood. And it was easy room you spent time in, the living room was the formal to put something on the wall and it was very warm, very room and the living room also had the piano. Which I comfortable didn’t want to play, but I had to take lessons, that was never my favorite space. Other than when I wanted to KATELYN: Floor to Ceiling, kind of thing? watch the boy across the street, and then it was kind of my favorite room (ha, ha). MARY BETH: Yeah. It’s hard to pick a favorite because I spent time in a lot a places. I loved my bedroom after I lived there a KATELYN: When you moved in, what changes did your while, I really enjoyed being there. It was just nice parents make to make in more like home? because my bedroom had a big, almost picture window sized, window that looked out across the back yard. The MARY BETH: I think they changed colors, I think they family room roof was flat and it was outside my bedroom painted. My mom really loved wallpaper. And I window, so that was a room that the previous owner had remember changing wallpaper in the front foyer hall, and added on. From my bedroom you could walk out onto I remember changing the bathroom. We even papered that roof. Can’t say they wanted me to do that very often, the ceiling in the main bathroom on the main floor. And but when I looked out my window, what I saw were the um, the kitchen, they completely redid the paper in the fields and the woods and things that were behind the kitchen. The kitchen had the knotty pine cabinetry very house. There were no buildings there so I was looking off much like what was in my bedroom into the wide open world, kind of the same idea as when I don’t remember any major, you know, rip out a I would go down and be in our own little jungle. It was wall or any of that type of thing. My parents were more kind of fun to not have buildings or people, just open apt to change decoration, change decor or change space, it was just woods and fields and nature. upholstery on their furniture than to change solid features in the house. There were a lot of built-ins, that particular KATELYN: So what was living on Ridgewood like? Did you house had a lot of built-in storage, and nooks and storage ride the bus to school? and book shelves. And that sort of thing… They might have painted the fireplace. It was painted in my memory MARY BETH: I rode the bus. From our house we had to but I don’t remember if it was painted when we moved in. walk to the end of the street, it was kind of a big long asphalt street. And we walked to the very end and the bus  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home came down the main road and stopped at the end of our enough. So I’m sure she thought that was a pretty negative street. So it was probably half to three quarters of a mile thing. We had a laundry shoot that was pretty cool, from long the street. And we lived near the end of it. the second floor you could throw towels in from the There were a lot of kids that were my age. Um I bathroom and they would go all the way to the basement made some good friends when I was there so I had to the laundry, which I thought was pretty awesome, playmates. We spent a lot of time playing up and down the street, bikes and roller skates and all sorts of things KATELYN: Except she didn’t do the laundry there anyway. going between each others’ homes. We sometimes walked across the lawns but usually we walked on the street we MARY BETH: But still all the laundry got collected there didn’t walk across lawns too much. We spent an awful lot anyway, you know up and down the stairs. There were of time behind our homes in this kind of big empty field things about living there that I didn’t recognize what a and we played back there. But the lady that owned it pain in the butt they were. You know to haul things up and didn’t like it and she’d come and chase us down with her down the stairs. My mom tried to do laundry there but it car and chase us off. It was really scary. She watched my was such a problem, and the possibly of hooking up to the girlfriend and I come back from playing there, (this was sewers was offered to the neighbor hood, and the my best friend from my old neighbor hood), and this neighbors turned it down because it was going to be too woman saw us, and she came driving down the road to expensive and they didn’t want to do it. So that was a chase us. She scarred the daylights out of us, and we ran negative. home and ran into the house and this woman actually I said we had an in ground pool. There was a came to the front door and yelled at my mother, for us separate building that was attached to a second garage being on her property. You know, “private property and that had a screen porch, a bathroom, and a changing rar, rar, rar!!” ...she was really a crazy lady. But we went room. That was out in the side yard, it wasn’t in the main back there anyway. We played back there but we were house. We used that building for changing for the pool, careful to not to be visible. Not be seen. and my girlfriends and I spent a lot of time sleeping out there on the porch. It was like camping out. That was a lot KATELYN: Were there any negative aspects of that house of fun. that made it less your house… that you didn’t like? I can’t think of any negatives to me , um, things that were a problem.. MARY BETH: That probably is the house that I remember as my growing up house because most of the years that I KATELYN: How do you remember growing up in was there were the years that you, the growing up years Plymouth? that you remember most, fourth grade through my senior year in high school. And my best friend was there, lived MARY BETH: I always liked Plymouth. I always thought on the same street. I did all my “coming of age” and of it as a pretty small town, and it was when I was that growing up was in that house, so I have a lot of pretty age. I can remember there were two movie theaters, well strong memories. My mother has different memories of actually, by the time I was really old enough to do much that house because the laundry room was in the basement with the movie theaters there was only one left. We had and the house was on septic and drain fields and that sort two at one time right downtown. One burned down when of thing. We didn’t have a sewer hook up and it never I was probably 7 or 8. So we had every thing that we worked properly. And so my mom, for the years that we needed right in the down town area. We had an ice lived in that house, took the laundry to a laundromat. She cream parlor, we had a movie theater. I remember riding couldn’t wash there even though she had a washing my bike with my girlfriends down to the school to play machine and dryer in the basement. She couldn’t use it tennis. I went downtown to buy my shoes. We shopped because however the drainage system didn’t work well in town. Everything was pretty contained within the 
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home downtown community. There was a full ladies clothing and move it. That was kind of traumatic, but it was store, it was called Dunnings. It was where every girl in exciting for me to be going away to school and it was town went to get measured for their first bra. It was that exciting that my folks were getting a new house. My kind of a community kind of thing. mom was having some pretty extreme surgery as well, she There was a candy store downtown and we used to go had cancer. It was kind of an upheaval year. My boy friend down and buy chocolate from this candy store. There was had gone away to college, he was gone my senior year of a donut shop. There were at least two jewelers that my high school. I graduated early, in February, so I didn’t stay parents always used. My mom would say “ I’m going to go connected to my friends for the last several months of high down to Bitners and get my watch fixed”. That was all school. Most of my friends were in school until June. right downtown, all of those places, and I knew where everything was. If I needed to get flowers for mother’s day, Katelyn: How did you do that? I went down to the flower shop in the downtown area. I didn’t go out to the mall. I did go to the mall with my MARY BETH: I had enough credits to graduate after the girlfriend and her mother on the weekend. But if you first semester. wanted something during the daylight hours, I don’t remember the down town area being open so much at Katelyn: That must have been fun. night, you shopped in town. We had a dime store, like a Kmart, it was a “Kresgees 5 and 10 cent store”, and we MARY BETH: The teachers had a strike that year so used to ride our bikes down to buy yarn to knit with, and classes started three weeks late, you know there was kind comic books, and all of that kind of stuff. I bought turtles of a lot of stuff going on. But my parents built a new and fish too, and that was all at the dime store down house and I was able to pick all the colors for the room town. I mean it was all pretty centralized. The bank was that would be my room even though I really never lived down there and my best friend’s father worked at the bank there other than summers and vacation time. I never on the corner of Main Street. really had any strong feelings about my place in that house other than I called it home. It wasn’t really KATELYN: So when you were old enough to leave for “home” because I didn’t really live there, never put any college, tell me why you went to college where you went? roots there. But it wasn’t far out of the Plymouth community so it was still coming back to Plymouth. I still MARY BETH: I wanted to work as a seamstress. That was came back to my hometown, that didn’t change. something I had learned in High School and I wanted to work in the design part of clothing. Not so much doing KATELYN: OK, so where did you live at college? the designs, but doing the work with the designers to make the first garment. So I started looking around at MARY BETH: I lived in the dorm. The first two years I colleges and I never looked beyond Michigan. It never lived in the dormitory. And I picked a dorm that was co- entered my mind to go out of state. That wasn’t the usual ed. Two rooms were joined by a bathroom, so there were thing then, so I looked at which school in Michigan would two girls in each of the two rooms, four of us that shared offer the program I thought I needed. And there were only the bathroom between. So from the hallway, when you two. Michigan State and Western and I made a choice for walked down the hall, two rooms were girls, two rooms Western because I thought Michigan State was too big a were boys, two rooms were girls, and so on. And it was school. I didn’t want to go to such a big school. I liked really nice. I liked it better than when I visited friends on that Western was smaller and Kalamazoo was smaller. all-girl floors. There is no way I would ever live on an all- That was kind of my choice. That last year of high girl floor, talk about catty! The co-ed mix kind of School, my parents built a new house. So before I went balanced things out, it seemed more realistic, more like off to college I had to pack up all of my life in this place what real life is to have it set up that way. I lived on the  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home 4th floor, so I was up on the top, which was kind of cool. I lived on the corner. We looked out over a parking lot, MARY BETH: Ah… we really liked Kalamazoo. It was, I but if you looked kind of kitty-corner there was a grassy guess, a bigger town than Plymouth was, but it still felt area with a pond. There were swans that lived in the small town. Things were close, you could do things close pond, so I didn’t ever loose that being able to be out in by. By that time the malls were popular. When you the wide world feeling. I guess that was always wanted to get things you went to the mall. But we rode something I was interested in having. That kind of space. the busses. We rode all the busses. I’m trying to That was the first two years. The last year that I was in remember…I don’t know if I had my car the first year or college I lived in an apartment with some girlfriends. not…I don’t think so, I don’t think I brought my car until the second year. But, even when we had a car, we didn’t KATELYN: So, when you were away at college, even drive it. We’d get on the bus. We knew all the bus drivers though your parents had moved, you still considered that that drove all the campus busses, you got a bus pass for home? campus. And it wasn’t a big stretch to transfer to a city bus to go downtown, or to go out to the mall or other MARY BETH: Yes places. So we made use of that. The community for the college, pretty much KATELYN: So when you were living there, what did you everything you needed was on campus, with the do to the dorms or the apartment to make it more yours? exception of a decent grocery store. So we’d head out on the bus to the grocery store, because we cooked in our MARY BETH: Ah, the dorms that we lived in, you were rooms and then of course in the apartment we had to do allowed to paint the walls. When you first came to all our own food. Yeah, I got kind of attached to school in the fall, as you moved in, you could paint the Kalamazoo. A lot of neat old houses. I always thought entire room , or you could paint one wall. They had… old houses were neat. And they had a big historical well, you could only pick from the colors that they district in downtown Kalamazoo, and they maintained offered. They supplied the paint, you did the painting, the homes. They were available to tour, I took a class and but only one of their colors. We painted our room we did stuff with the older Victorian Homes. There was a orange. A bright, bright orange. I can remember doing really good art center downtown, although I don’t really that. remember doing much with the art center while I was in Let’s see, we built a loft for my roommate, over college… that was later. the desks. So her bed was up high. The desks were built- But…when it got time to settle, that’s where we in so you couldn’t move the desks. My bed was on the settled, so…we liked Kalamazoo. floor. We got rid of all the bed frames and stacked the two twin mattresses. So I was on the floor and she had a KATELYN: So, the apartment that you moved out to, what double bed mattress up on this big loft thing. So that was did you do to that apartment? Did you spend time there how we got around the dormitory look. I can’t remember or did you spend time somewhere else? what else we did, we put posters up but it was pretty plain. I don’t remember it being so very wonderful…but MARY BETH: Ah…I don’t remember doing anything to we got to paint it! There was color… it was definitely that apartment. It was a place. I don’t really have any colorful. It was very different whey you guys got to attachment. I could tell you that it had a balcony. I didn’t college and you couldn’t do any of that. like one of my roommates, so I didn’t want to stay there very much. I wasn’t there very much. I spent more time KATELYN: So living in Kalamazoo, while you were in in your dad’s apartment than I did in mine probably. college, what did you do in Kalamazoo, did you start to Well , he had a cat…that was part of it (chuckles) put down roots in Kalamazoo?  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: Jawa, right? stairs. There were no windows, whatsoever, in the studio that we worked in. It was not a very uplifting building, MARY BETH: Yeah, he started out with us as a kitten with you didn’t get any creative energy out of the building, out distemper. That was kind of a traumatic thing. But he was of the space. That was kind of frustrating. I didn’t take a cool cat so it was all right. any of the art history classes, and all the other classes that My apartment was walking distance to campus. I I probably should have. But, that’s the way it goes. could get to any classes. I had a car but I didn’t need it So that hall wasn’t great, but there was a really for anything. It was just on the edge of campus so I cool place on campus that I used to love…a circled area could walk anywhere I needed to go. Your dad’s of stairs that were built in a waterfall pattern. And we apartment was out farther. He had to drive in to campus. sat on that. It was a hike to walk from where his apartment was, I suppose you could, but it was probably 5 miles. It wasn’t KATELYN : Amphitheater? typical that we would walk in. But you would just drive in and park and be there for the whole day. Or take the MARY BETH: Yeah, kind of an amphitheater sort of a bus. I’m not so sure that he didn’t take the bus, I don’t thing. But it was just a place between these halls…and remember. That was one thing that was nice about the these halls. It was just stairs, so it wasn’t designed to be community of Kalamazoo. You could get anywhere you an amphitheater for performance, just stairs…a way to go wanted to go in the city on a bus. You didn’t have to have from this place to that place. Instead of putting in one a car. The public transportation was set up really good. boring staircase…it kind of converged…you could come And we would travel to and from Plymouth on the from 3 or 4 directions to this area, and you went down train. We sometimes took the bus, but we would more and it narrowed right down to one and you just had two often take the train. Kalamazoo had a cool train station. exits out. I thought that was a cool place to sit and be. I The train station in Ann Arbor was awesome too, and we’d spent time there. transport back and forth on the train. Um…any other places on campus that I really liked…

KATELYN: So, were there any places where you went to KATELYN: Or in Kalamazoo? school, buildings or classrooms that you were attached to? I mean, you started doing pottery in college, right? MARY BETH: In Kalamazoo, hmmm… The business college for campus was in the older part of campus. Any MARY BETH: I did do some pottery in college. It was of the business classes that you took were not on the kind of a sideline. My first suitemates in college, one of main, newer part of campus, where the newer buildings gals that was my suitemate was a potter. She was also were. And they were more modern …cold. The business pre-med. Which was kind of a strange combination. She classes were in the old part…and they had big tall cool would come home and describe the cadaver that they had wooden doors. They were brick buildings. The buildings dissected that day which was kind of gruesome. She was had a lot more character. also a potter and I said “oh, well I did that in highschool,” From that older part of campus, you could walk so she introduced me to the professors that did clay, and I down the hill into an older section of Kalamazoo. There circumvented the normal process. You had to be an art was a neat little restaurant that we went to called…oh my major, and you had to take all these prerequisites before goodness…what was it?…it was on Vine…I don’t you got in, and they sort of made an exception, and I was remember the name…but we could get these really able to just take clay classes. I was able to go in and yummy sandwiches, and they had Russian tea…which work and fire the kiln. It was…as often art departments was basically tang and instant tea and something are… in the basement of a dingy hall. You know, you else….the tea was really tasty…doesn’t sound good but it don’t want to have to take all that clay and stuff up was.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home We would go there, and you would climb up of “that” was here (Plymouth). these back stairs that were in this rickety old building. And you would get upstairs where the restaurant was and it KATELYN: Yes, but Kalamazoo was a smaller community, was furnished with mismatched chairs, old oak chairs and so it was more centralized. tables, and nothing matched. It was kind of hippie, I guess is the best word. But they had the best food, and it MARY BETH: Seemed more centralized, and the classes was cheap. It was kind of a campus hangout sort of place. that I was taking in college required me to do some of A lot of student housing in that area, because the houses those things, so I was more involved. were old and kind of run down, so they rented them out to students, cheap. But they were the really neat old KATELYN: OK, so after you graduated from college, what houses, built in the early 1900’s. They had so much more happened then? character, they were a lot more fun to look at and be in. Tall ceilings, and the floors creaked… I never lived in one MARY BETH: When I graduated from college I moved of those as a student, I had a friend who did, but I never back to the house that my parents had built when I was a got to. I lived in a very conventional, boring apartment. senior in high school. And lived there until I got married, On campus… (chuckle)… I wasn’t thinking I should have which was 4 or 5 months. It wasn’t very long… and then found a cool place to live. your dad and I lived in an apartment.

KATELYN: So before you married Tom, of the places that KATELYN: Do you remember anything from the house you lived after you moved out of home in Plymouth, your parents built as standing out? which one stands out the most? Either good or bad… made the biggest impression on you as a home? MARY BETH: My mom was a big gardener, so she always had these really cool gardens. And the year that we MARY BETH: From college until I got married….There decided to get married, I said I wanted to be married wasn’t anything that stood out about the places that I there…at that house, outside. So my mom and I spent lived… either good or bad… they were just…well it was the summer working on the gardens in the backyard. We almost like living in the dorm. The places didn’t stand out. made a patio out of slices of trunks of trees with flowers I really liked Kalamazoo, the town, the community I guess planted between them. It had a staircase made of would be more of a plus… railroad ties, that came down from the garage on the side of the house to this backyard area. That was where my KATELYN: You liked it better than Plymouth? You formed a dad and I walked down those stairs for me to be married, stronger attachment to it than Plymouth? across that patio area. Most of our guests stood to watch us get married, other than a few chairs we put up for my MARY BETH: Not stronger, but equal. I was very older aunts and so forth. But basically they stood in that comfortable in Kalamazoo, there were a lot of things area (patio). We made an archway of grapevines and we about Kalamazoo that reminded me, probably, of living in were married right there outside. That was all I remember Plymouth. One of the things that I thought was better, and about the house at that time. At a later date, they added a years later found out that it was all here (Plymouth) if I’d 3-season porch, on the backside of the house. been looking, …I thought ”Oh in Kalamazoo we have so much more culture…so much more…plays and music and KATELYN: So then you got married and moved into an performers” and things coming to that community that I apartment, right? was exposed to. I think that it was more that I was now exposed to it (in Kalamazoo) than that it wasn’t here (in Plymouth). Because between Ann Arbor and Detroit…all  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home MARY BETH: Yeah, we rented a two bedroom apartment our first mortgage was at 11 percent. So even though the on the outskirts of Kalamazoo. Your dad worked in house was in a range that we could afford the mortgage Kalamazoo at the university, and I had a job lined was ridiculous. But that’s what they were, and if you up….we were married in August and my job didn’t start didn’t want to live in an apartment; seemed silly to put until October. And we were deciding what would be money into an apartment that you didn’t get any return next, but you know an apartment was all you could afford out of…so it was important to find a house. The house we on one paycheck. And it wasn’t anything real special, bought needed EVERYTHING. (Chuckle) It had never much like my college apartment….an apartment is and been very updated. But it had a lot of really cool apartment is an apartment…it wasn’t anything fabulous. features. It had two oak window seats, a gorgeous one in the dining room and one in the stairway. They were KATELYN: Did you do anything to make it homey? Did beautiful…all that nice oak trim was great. But there you bring things from home? were a lot of things that house desperately needed. It hadn’t been cared for very well, hadn’t been loved very MARY BETH: Yeah, we brought some things from home. well. Your dad built a big desk that he put up in the second bedroom. So the second bedroom was more of an office- KATELYN: So what did you do to fix it up? workroom-sewing room- whatever. But we had some of the furniture that we still own, in that apartment. When MARY BETH: Ah …where do we start…we started with my parents built their house my senior year of high the furnace I think. It had one of those old octopus oil school, the other thing I got to pick out was all my burning furnaces in the basement, so we put in a gas bedroom furniture. So then that was MY furniture and furnace. And we had to update the electrical. There were moved with me when I got married. We didn’t paint walls electrical wires that they had just kind of taped together, in that apartment, I don’t think you could, I don’t going to the basement. And that house had those dumb remember painting anything. So I don’t think we were stairs that I hated. allowed to. I hung pictures on the wall. There wasn’t a whole lot you could do. Unfortunately with an apartment KATELYN: Oh those with the open… you can’t do a whole lot of personalizing. MARY BETH: The “reach through and grab you” open KATELYN: OK, so when you started looking for houses, stairs…that was not a plus. But that was the way it was. what did you look for? Ha ha . The basement was not a Michigan basement, in that it wasn’t dirt, it was cement, but it was cold, damp MARY BETH: Well…we really liked the old houses. We and kind of creepy…it was not a very nice basement. both were kind of taken with the housed that we toured But that’s where I did our laundry, that’s where the as students that were downtown in the historic district of laundry room was. Kalamazoo. So when we started looking for houses, Um…where did we start…we painted a lot. We that’s kind of what we were looking for. We liked the changed carpeting. idea of being closer to downtown, closer to the university, where we were familiar with where things KATELYN: Did you paint colors…or? were. We knew the grocery stores we liked, we knew the little restaurants we liked…so we wanted to be closer MARY BETH: Well… this house went the opposite of most to that downtown area. And we liked the old houses, so houses which you buy. You know most houses you move we just started looking that way…and found one that was in and they’re white and then you put color in. This house in our price range…that’s always a huge factor. At the had the most god-awful colors you could ever imagine. time, the mortgage rates were incredibly ridiculous. I think I’m not sure if I even have any pictures…I ‘m not sure  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home what color the living room was…but it was not very room and watch the water run down the stairs, just like a pleasant. The upstairs….our bedroom was bright blue. waterfall. It was the most depressing….and there was Bright like bird’s egg-sky-map blue. And the curtains were nothing we could do…..absolutely nothing you could do. red. So that got painted. We bought an awful lot of Because it wasn’t safe to get on the roof to put on tarps, antique white. (laugh) as I recall, because the colors…the there was no way to do that…um…and you just hoped it colors were just….make you want to vomit kind of colors. would quit raining!( Laughs ) There just wasn’t anything They weren’t pleasant at all. And they (previous owners) you could do. We took a broom handle and punched had raised 7 children in this house with one bathroom. holes in our ceilings so we wouldn’t lose our ceilings There was one bathroom. So…the carpeting in the because they were starting to droop. So all of our hard bathroom came out, the flooring in the bathroom came work of cleaning and painting and….well it was kind of out…that was absolutely the first thing that I did. ruined.

KATELYN: Gross! KATELYN: So after that what did you do to fix it?

MARY BETH: When we got possession of the house I put MARY BETH: After that we patched the holes in the my rubber gloves on and I went upstairs and tore the ceiling…and the carpeting that we had in the living room, carpet out and… it was on the curb.. Little boys that I know we replaced, but I don’t think we did it right away missed, it was nasty, bad. because we couldn’t afford to do a lot of things right away. There was plumbing that had to be done. Lots. The ceiling in the kitchen had been damaged before and There were very few outlets anywhere in the house….few the previous owners had put in a drop ceiling, and we electrical outlets. The house was balloon construction, so never changed that. We never liked it, but we never it was great to do the wiring because we could start in the ended up changing the drop ceiling. It was unfortunate… basement and fish it all the way to the attic (laughing). So and it was how they managed it…apparently. The we did all that first, did all the wiring, got wiring bathroom was above the kitchen and apparently that everywhere…did plumbing…a TON of infrastructure that plumbing leaked at some point and ruined the ceiling in we changed. That house was ready for gas or electricity the kitchen. And rather than fix the ceiling the previous (when it was built). We had…..in the bedroom there was owners just put in a drop ceiling. “We’ll just cover it, no central ceiling fixture, it was on the wall…and the we’ll just hide it”. So…we lived with that, we never piping was still there for gas too. The house was built in changed that. 1911, and they really weren’t sure that that electric stuff There was a back hall, and…I think we put…I was going to fly, so they put in gas as well. And it was can’t remember…there was just a toilet in the back hall off plaster and lath, the walls. The ceilings were plaster and the kitchen. I think that was there when we bought the lath. The roof needed to be replaced before we moved house. But we changed the hall to that toilet into a pantry in…we had a month between the time we got possession and put a door on it, just an accordion door. But the of the house and we had to be out of our apartment. So house had a lot of really neat oak woodwork in the we took that month and painted. Grandma and Grandpa downstairs area. The upstairs was all painted W came up and we painted EVERYTHING. And cleaned (woodwork) and we tried stripping it and it wasn’t nice the carpets, and did all this work. Then daddy and his wood. They did that, they put the nice wood downstairs friend started working on the roof. The shingling…you and then upstairs used a cheaper material. know we had to strip off the old shingles down to the We had three bedrooms in the house, the main roof boards…. And 3 days before we were supposed to part…it was a four square. Three bedrooms upstairs, a move into the house we got 3 inches of rain in 24 hours. bathroom and a doorway to the attic. The bedroom that And we only had about half of the roof back on…I think. was our bedroom, was the largest and the bedroom that So we had water pouring in. I could stand in the living shared a wall with that was tiny, tiny, tiny. It might have  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home been 8 by 10, very tiny. There were tiny closets, like 3’ by on the other side of us had 4 or 5 kids and they were all 4’, in each bedroom…pretty tiny. We wanted our brats. No one had any pride in their house, kind of trashy, bedroom to be even bigger, so we cut and archway in some of the houses weren’t kept up. They didn’t mow the that adjoining wall, and made that a master suite. And lawn and they left junk around all the time. It wasn’t put a fireplace in that part, the smaller bedroom. very nice on either side of us. The neighbor that lived right across the street, that we became friends with, they KATELYN: So it was like a sitting area? were nice…we liked them a lot. They were older, didn’t have any children, she had a nice big garden. I MARY BETH: Yeah, a sitting area…until you were born, befriended her and helped her with her kitty. She didn’t and then it was a baby room. (chuckle) drive, so I would take her places sometimes, when I was We had a small loveseat, and the fireplace. It was very home. But I worked….that was a house where your dad cozy, really nice. and I both worked (full time) and not long after we moved there he started driving to Grand Rapids. I worked retail, KATELYN: So then there were only two bedrooms? so I worked odd hours, nights, weekends. So we didn’t have….ok we’re both home on a weekend so lets do this. MARY BETH: Yes…two bedrooms. There was a room off We had to cram all those projects in wherever we could. the dining room downstairs that could have been a And a lot of them were…you know…the whole house is bedroom. But we used it as a den/office sort of a thing. torn up (laughs) we’re gonna redo “this” so we had stuff It was your daddy’s room…he had all his “stuff” out everywhere! there. Electronic stuff (KATELYN: workshop area?) Yes. We tried to make the yard. I really liked the backyard because it was more private. We had a big KATELYN: What was your favorite space in that house? hedge along one side of the yard that kind of separated And why. you from the neighbor, and on the other side was the garage. So you had more of a private space in the back. MARY BETH: The window seat in the dining room was That was nice. I had roses that were beautiful, a really my favorite place. Because I could sit there and look out pretty rose garden. Some of the roses were really old, the window, it was all that natural wood, and I just liked had been there forever. Fragrant and beautiful. We that. It (the house) had a great front porch too. If that planted a magnolia tree. We liked that outside space, it house had been somewhere else, I would have liked it was small and manageable. We used a little push mower. better. That’s probably my favorite house of the ones The front porch was big enough that I could have we’ve (dad and I together) lived in. a porch swing. That was something I really liked. I would sit on the porch swing, I loved to sit on the porch swing… KATELYN: But the place wasn’t so good…so what… but the neighborhood wasn’t as nice as it could have describe the place. been. That made it more negative…I would have spent more time there…. MARY BETH: It wasn’t so good. It was kind of a mixed bag, mixed community. On one side of us we had a KATELYN: If there was something to watch from the porch house that was being rented out, and the neighbors that swing.. lived there were transient, it wasn’t…you didn’t become attached to any of the neighbors there because they didn’t MARY BETH: Yes. We decorated our bushes on the front, stay long, or they weren’t around. They kept their dog out around the front porch, for Christmas…put lights out…and on a chain, they never did anything with him and that someone stole the lights. So that was kind of crappy. You upset me. It was a great big husky, beautiful dog and it didn’t feel safe, comfortable…I don’t know… it was not a was just chained in the yard all the time. The neighbors ….it wasn’t like Plymouth. In Plymouth if you had a  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home porch like that, you wouldn’t even lock your door. You a fair amount of money into it. (KATELYN: sweat equity) could just sit out there, and be there, and it would be And I think we only sold it for about 10 thousand dollars different. I never left that house unlocked. It was always more than what we bought it for. Which was probably locked. Two streets over and one street down was the pretty close to what we spent on the improvements, house that all the local Hell’s Angels motorcycle guys roofing, electrical, plumbing, insulation and everything. lived in. Not that motorcycle guys were bad, but… So in looking for a new house, there were a lot of things that we had done in this house that we were not going to KATELYN: But their house could be junky… do in the next house. We weren’t going to buy a house that needed a MARY BETH: Yeah. furnace. We weren’t going to buy a house that needed a new roof. We weren’t going to buy a house that the KATELYN: So when it was time to start looking for… I windows were so old that they were either painted shut or guess…you moved… they didn’t work. There were things…that house had a lot of character, but there were a lot of things about it…it MARY BETH: Well we had to move… What happened, wasn’t energy efficient, it wasn’t economical. Many of the we liked that house. And there were many times that your features that you like about an old house aren’t dad and I talked about, gee we really like this house… economical I guess. When we needed to find a new however… there were things that we couldn’t make better. house, there were a couple of factors…now that we had One of the things that we did while we lived there was you, schools became a big issue. When we knew we insulate the house. It was cold, it was not well insulated were going to move to Grand Rapids, because that’s you know, that balloon construction. So we had it where dad’s job was, and they (Amway) would move us , insulated. At the time, daddy did the research and we did that was a big thing. We started looking around at the urea-formaldehyde foam insulation. Which is a different areas. Who has the best school system? Is it a fabulous improvement over what we had. community that we like? Could we live here? And…we looked in Jenison for about a nanosecond, and said KATELYN: But it’s formaldehyde! “absolutely not, we don’t want to live there!” We didn’t like the whole Forest Hills thing, we MARY BETH: Well, he found a company that was doing it didn’t want anything to do with it. It was too snooty… correctly. That’s what the big hubbub came from. When too…I don’t know. Northview kind of fit us. We liked the they had problems with it was when they didn’t do the school system, we liked the area, we could relate to the mixture right, then the formaldehyde leached into the size of the community. The house we found was in a sort home and it was a big problem. There were places where of a subdivision, separated from all the businesses, like we they had to take it out because they had done it wrong were used to. We could walk to the grocery store from and it was hazardous to your health. So we thought we the house we lived in Kalamazoo. And we did, we walked had done a good thing by insulating, but it made it a little to the grocery store sometimes. That was the only thing more difficult to sell the house because we had to disclose that was close enough to walk to in Kalamazoo. that (the urea-formaldehyde insulation). You had to So there were lots of things that we said “absolutely not” disclose on your sales information. I still believe that the to, we were not going to buy and old house again, we guy who did ours did it right. And if you did it right, then were going to buy a newer house. it was safe. There were so many contractors that said “oh yeah, I can do that” and they did a bad job and then you KATELYN: Well also you were imagining that lake house… had huge problems. So when we got ready to sell… We the things you thought of before you bought that house, didn’t make as much money on that house as we thought the silo houses…talk about those.. we should have because we put an awful lot of time and  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home MARY BETH: Yeah, that’s true. The silo house, hmm I be decided before they could even look at our offer. But think that was before we bought the first house actually. yeah, you know, the big fireplace wall (because you That was when we first got married, we thought that remember that house), immediately attracted me. We would be cool. The lake house, we thought of that both decided later that they put it in a stupid place. actually before you were born. That’s when we were Aesthetically, yes it was in the right place…but as far as considering doing that. We thought well, maybe it would heating a house, it was in a stupid place. It wasn’t be nice for me to keep my job in Kalamazoo and daddy to designed for heating, it did the opposite is what it came work his job in Grand Rapids. We’d buy property in down to. between the two places and we could both work. We I had never lived in a tri-level. I mean my houses would commute to our jobs. Allegan was kind of had always been two-storied, with a basement. Having a halfway. I had always thought it would be great to live on little bit nicer basement was nice, because the basement water. Your daddy liked to sail, you know… that we had in Kalamazoo was pretty bad. Pretty non- useable, I mean it was strictly storage. You would never KATELYN: You were flying planes too. use it for anything else.

MARY BETH: Yeah I was flying planes. And so we looked KATELYN: Not that we ever did. at property on water, that’s true we did. At that point the house that we lived in that was MARY BETH: Yeah, but you could have. That basement poorly insulated, was expensive to heat,…and all those was such that you could have. Oh and we thought this factors made us think…. “oh let’s build into the side of place has 3 nice size bedrooms…Michael’s bedroom was the hillside where it will be more energy efficient” quite small but relatively nice sized. And it didn’t need a That’s where that all came from. There’s got to be a way whole lot. We could walk into that house and not HAVE to not spend so much money on heating and cooling a to do anything when we bought it. Which was nice! home, and we’ve got to find a way to make that better. So (chuckle) we didn’t have to update the electrical, update that’s where that idea came from, and unfortunately the the plumbing, furnace was a gas furnace, the windows land that we were going to buy we wouldn’t own all the opened and closed, it was insulated (somewhat). I think way out to the water. So that fizzled pretty fast. And then I we added more insulation somewhere down the road… think we decided that we had to make a choice to move, but that was pretty typical. We got to a point where the idea to build and where do you live while you’re people became more concerned about insulating their building…and then I got pregnant, and decided I wasn’t homes. going to go back to work. So all of a sudden the need to be in between Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids disappeared. KATELYN: So, when you moved in, what did you do to the So then it was “find a place in Grand Rapids”. And it was house? I mean, not a lot because it didn’t need a lot, smarter for us to be closer to where daddy was working. but… He knew the Plainfield area, because he had worked for Fox, the TV station where he is back working now. So I MARY BETH: Ah, what I remember that I did right away is think probably that’s partly why we looked at Northview, that I painted the living room. Finding out later that daddy and that area because he was a little more familiar with it. always hated it, the color. And I changed the wallpaper in The guy that showed us houses showed us quite a few, the kitchen and dining area, because I didn’t like what but it seems to me that when we looked at Wabash we was in there. And…what else did we do… we redid the went right back and looked at it again and said we bathroom, but not right away. We changed the wallpaper, wanted to make an offer on the house. I don’t think it put in a tub surround, had vinyl flooring put in. But I took us very long to decide that, yeah, we like this, let’s think that was later. The tile (bathtub area) was ok for do it. I think there was an offer on the table that had to quite a while, but then we had to fix it, and we ended up  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home putting in the surround. There wasn’t a lot that we did to people in Kalamazoo other than the one neighbor right away. We had been there awhile before we added across the street, the elderly lady. And we spent more the garage, and did other things. time outside. We were in the yard, sat on the porch, were in the backyard. KATELYN: OK. So, when you first moved in how did that accommodate your idea of home? KATELYN: OK. What was your favorite place in that house? MARY BETH: Ah…it was bigger. That was nice. It had a great backyard space. I had a nice little garden that I MARY BETH: The family room was my favorite place. I enjoyed. I had roses and wildflowers and my tulip tree. I just liked the warmth of that room. We spent more time had the things that I thought were important for a there. garden. I did kind of have a window seat, but I had to I guess my master bedroom was always upstairs. make it. (laughs) It was in the living room. I guess the Anytime I had a bedroom it was always upstairs. So that fit living room became more of the adult room or the quiet right in because in that house it was upstairs. I kind of room, and the family room was more of the …when we liked the short stairs, the tri-level. A lot of people say that did any family activities it was always in the family room. you either like a tri-level or you hate it. I liked it, most of But I probably did sit more in the living room didn’t I? I the time. I didn’t like the fact that there was no bathroom spent more time by myself in the living room. Yeah, on the main floor. With the kitchen, dining room and you’re right. living room, no bathroom. We loved the fireplace. We loved having fires. KATELYN: Ok , so then you started doing clay…and what We did that in our first house, we had two fireplaces. else did you do to the house? We always had fires. So that was important. Um what else about that house…. MARY BETH: I…we…redid the kitchen. We had the cupboards all refaced. KATELYN: Well dad was at work, you were left home, what did you do during the day? I mean how about the KATELYN: Do you remember what materials you picked? community, you had to drive to get groceries… MARY BETH: I picked Formica. Off -white with oak trim. MARY BETH: Yeah, I had to drive to get to any retail. The reason that I use a lot of oak, and I know it’s not your But, in this neighborhood, there were other women who favorite wood, but the reason that I have oak is because were home with their kids. So now I lived in a safe the dining room table that we have is oak. It was my neighborhood, I didn’t have to lock the doors. The other grandmothers sister’s table. So I tended to bring that in, families around us had children, were friendly. It was and I always liked oak, it was a wood that I liked. So the much more like the neighborhood I remember as a little cupboards…. Well the kitchen in that house was a stick girl. The very first one Brownell, it was much more like built kitchen. It wasn’t prefab cupboards. They were built that. No sidewalks, and it wasn’t a dirt road, but to fit that kitchen. So when we decided to remodel in otherwise very similar. I felt very comfortable as you kids there…I had already painted (and you might not grew up to let you go anywhere within that neighborhood. remember this) but the cupboard doors had a routed I wasn’t on you to track down where you were, you could design in them and when we bought the house that routed play anywhere and I was pretty comfortable. Where the design was painted gold, so I repainted them all plain off other families were, there were moms or sometimes dads, white. It was just cleaner looking. And paint only works at home. I felt much more attached to people there, to a degree, it chips, it’s not a smooth surface, and it’s hard certainly more than I had in Kalamazoo. I wasn’t attached to clean…lots of reasons that we didn’t like it. The floor in
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home the kitchen was parquet, dark oak parquet. And now that I bathroom. With a shower and a tub! And I was to the think about it, that was one of the first things we did in the point where I wanted a bigger studio. I wanted more house. It was 12 inch tiles, and if you dropped anything space for my work. So those were kind of the motivating on it ,it went in-between all those wood pieces….it was factors for us to find a new place, and the limiting factor not kid friendly, at all. So we took that out when you was that it had to be in the Northview school district. were a baby and had vinyl flooring put in. Just to be able Because we had become comfortable with the Northview to keep it clean with little kids crawling around on it. It schools, and we weren’t going to move you. Daddy had was going to be bad otherwise. not had to move as a teenager, but he had moved enough, The cupboards, when we did those, again it was and changed schools enough, that he was pretty adamant “what can we do that’s going to make it clean and easy to about not changing your schools. So we were pretty maintain and look beautiful?” Because the cupboards together with that, to finding a place that stayed in the were sturdy and built well, not really anything wrong with school district. And we had a budget. We had so much them, it didn’t make sense to rip them out and throw them that we felt we could spend. I wasn’t working, really. My away. We weren’t going to do that so the only other income was always considered the “extra”. We can take a choice was to have them resurfaced. So we had a trip, or we can make a change in the house, or we can company come in that resurfaced the wood faces of the buy furniture. That’s how we always looked at my cupboard frames with Formica, off white, and new doors income, so we had to base our purchase on what we and drawer fronts all the way around. And the doors were could afford. And I think that anybody that doesn’t admit Formica faced with and oak bar at the bottom that became that that is part of their decision making on a house, isn’t the handles. So there were no extra knobs or anything. It being honest. looked really nice. It just made it real clean and simple, because it wasn’t a big kitchen, and it kind of finished it Well there’s the ideal…budget aside.. off. I thought it looked really good to do that. Then we added the garage. That was the biggest MARY BETH: Yeah, and you know, obviously it doesn’t thing that we did, added the two-stall garage on. Because have everything. It’ not the most ideal. when we bought the house, what became my studio, that you remember, was the only garage. It was a single stall KATELYN: Well and it’s not untrue that you can’t get underneath the bedrooms. When we added the two stall everything that you want for the price you want to pay. garage on to that side, we were able to open a heating duct into the old garage space, replace the overhead door MARY BETH: I suppose that’s true. with a wall and window, and then I had my studio space. It could have been very easily converted into living space. KATELYN: If you try hard enough. And if you have a good To be joined with the sewing room/ and daddy’s office enough architect. It’s possible to do it. space in that lower level. But there was no good space to But…. When you started looking for houses, what add a bathroom to that house, and we had two kids did you look for? Other than budget and school district. coming up on teenage and we have one bathroom! Ha What… had you always wanted that you had never had? ha. MARY BETH: Well we kind of wanted four bedrooms. KATELYN: So you decided to move…what was your When we started looking. We made a list of what we motivation to move again? wanted. A basement…largely because we have a lot of stuff. So a basement became something that we MARY BETH: The motivation to move again was…we definitely needed. One of the things that was going to be needed more space, we felt. We needed another full a criteria when we started looking for the house that we bathroom. We needed a bathroom that could be a kid’s are currently in, is that we wanted to have a basement  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home that we could make into kid space. That could be a place like that, I have to have that. that you would bring your friends to hang out. I mean, daddy and I both, as teenagers, spent time hanging out in KATELYN: Talk about the house that we have now. When my finished basement and his finished basement in the you found it, why you chose it. houses that we lived in when we were in high school. And so that was something that we were looking at, you MARY BETH: Ah…When we walked in to that house, I know that’s really nice to have your kids be comfortable really liked the entry. I like the wide-open feeling of the bringing their friends to your house, and being there in a foyer and the staircase. You know, if you look back at the space that’s not in your face. (Laughs) You know, I don’t pictures of the staircase of the first house that we owned it want you all in my living room when I’m trying to read a was an open banister…..I like banisters….don’t ask me book, kind of thing, but I like to have you here. So that why, but I like the wood banister idea. Ah, was something we were looking for. We wanted to have a space that was kid friendly but was separate from the main KATELYN: But that staircase wasn’t in the middle… living area of the house. So a basement was important. We really wanted four bedrooms because I really wanted MARY BETH: No, that one was on the side, but it had an to have a guest room. That was something that I have open…it had a banister, and we put our tree right in that always wanted to have, a place that could be used for my corner…right there in that little banister corner. So, …I parents to come…dad’s parents to come… to be able to don’t know if I could walk into a house (that I might buy) have somebody come and visit and stay all night. I mean, without putting a Christmas tree in it… not sure that I I really never had that at any house that we’ve lived in. So can do that, which is a weird thing… So we walked into that was something we were looking for. that foyer …and it was just really cool, and then you Um…a second full bathroom. That was right up turned and you look at the fireplace. And I grew up with there at the top. Having a bathroom that was the kids two of the houses that lived in with a fieldstone bathroom. Two full bathrooms was a big deal. fireplace….and I know it’s not a REAL fieldstone fireplace A fireplace. Had to have a fireplace. We now, but when you first look at it its like “AH! AH! Is wouldn’t have bought a house without a fireplace. I know that ever cool!” we wouldn’t have. I don’t think I’ve ever lived, other than The high ceilings. We both really liked the high the apartment, in one that hasn’t had a fireplace, at least ceilings (9ft.). The first house we lived in had high one. And I wouldn’t have lived in a subdivision. I was ceilings. (Kalamazoo) You know, built in 1911 they put kind of done with that. The subdivision that you grew up the higher ceilings on the main floor, so we had 9 foot in, that you remember, was the only kind that I probably ceilings on the first floor. So that was a big plus right would like. I liked the idea of the city subdivision that I there, even if the rooms were smaller, you still feel like lived in (Kalamazoo), but it didn’t pan out. I liked that they are bigger because of the high ceilings. We liked idea, but the neighborhood wasn’t nice enough that I felt that. Um…the floor covering was stupid. We hated that safe, I guess. from the very beginning, because what were they When I drive downtown in Plymouth, and I see thinking? It changes three times in ten feet. It wasn’t very those streets where we drove around today with grandma, smart, the way they did the floor covering. The foyer is …I could live there. I COULD live THERE. ceramic tile, and at the time we looked at the house, the dining room was carpeted, the living room was KATELYN: You think? carpeted…those were the same…and the kitchen was vinyl. So you had three different… right in that central MARY BETH: I’m not positive, but I think I could. But I area. sure like having space. I sure like having privacy. Being… to be able to look out my window and see woods. I do  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home I liked the laundry room on the first floor rather than in (beyond purchase price) just to get it to “livable”. Safely the basement…that was nice. And it was really livable. And what we did to the house we are currently convenient to the kitchen. I think that the center of the in, we didn’t HAVE to do any of it, really. Yes, we did kind house is the kitchen. We always spend a ton of time in of have to do something about a studio for me, but to live the kitchen. I always did. I loved the idea of the island… in it, we didn’t have to do anything. it wasn’t in a very smart place… but I looked at it and thought ”Oh my, look at that great big working space, KATELYN: So what have you changed since we moved in? won’t that be nice making Christmas cookies with the kids!” You know those kinds of things go through your MARY BETH: Ah…Since we moved in we have changed mind. flooring. Right away in the dining room and kitchen area. BIG 3 stall garage….oooohhhhh that was a big Since then we have replaced other carpeting, living room, draw. ( KATELYN: lots of storage) LOTS of storage. Nice hallways, stairs. We’ve painted, to make it more ours. big basement. Unfinished, but with potential to be Colors that are more comfortable for us. Added the finished, for that kid room we were thinking of. Having studio. And enclosed the front porch, screened the front space for you guys and friends, as you were growing up, porch. I really like that, I wish it was deeper though. I to come and be there. And all the woods behind the miss the porch swing that I had in the very first house we house. Not have neighbors right on top of you, around had in Kalamazoo. I really liked that whole idea of the your whole house. That was nice. So, it was an instant porch swing. I sort of have it in the glider on the decision. ( KATELYN: OK) Almost…I think we had been screened porch. I can sit on that and “swing” on the front in the house five minutes and dad and I looked at each porch here…and I like having that. other and said “oh yeah, this is it…this is what we’re We don’t use the backyard a whole lot. Not like gonna buy”. (Chuckles) And we had looked at a number we did in the house before this one. But the house before of houses, and I have to admit that the one your thinking this one, the backyard was a play area….it was family about, that you guys saw and that you liked….that we area. And you guys are not home anymore, so we don’t really, really considered…it would have been nice. But it use it. And we built a shed (chuckle) for more storage… just needed so much and we’ve DONE all that. Having We’re going backwards….what we need to do now is haul come from the first house that we had to do the plumbing a dumpster in and GET RID of some of the STUFF!! and the wiring and roofing….it was an awful lot of that kind of stuff that we could see again. And we just didn’t KATELYN: What would you change about the place now, I want to DO all that. mean… How does it NOT suit your life as it is now?

KATELYN: Well, the house that you ended up with didn’t MARY BETH: UM…We really need a den. Or a really turn out to be what you thought it was going to be… workroom or…. We need something in our main living there was still stuff that you had to do to it. You had to space that is separate from……Your dad needs a place finish the basement to get your kid’s room, you had to for his working (electronic) stuff that he does at home. build a studio…so THAT we don’t have. We do not have in this house anywhere. MARY BETH: There were still things that had to be done. But we thought we could see more potential…in the price KATELYN: But you don’t use the studio anymore. range. This is the other thing that you have to consider… the two houses that you’re thinking of…..the one that had MARY BETH: Well, daddy does…for reloading… But I maybe more character, would have cost us to start with, don’t do clay right now. I don’t know if that’s going to be what we ended up putting into the one we bought. And forever. I think that may still happen, my getting back to we would have had to put more into the other one  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home doing clay again. I’m not ready to convert that space, I the kitchen because it is big enough that when everyone guess. is home…we can all be out there. I like having all the (Dad’s space) It has to be close, but separate. The room action out there. I really like it when we pull out the that Grandma and Gramps have in Plymouth (the office), I stools at the island and someone sits there and is talking would like to have a room that is similar to it in our house. to me while I’m cooking, and that’s nice. I don’t cook a The business, day to day stuff that you have to do, that is whole lot anymore… separate from just enjoying your room. And then I spend a lot of time in the living room. I like to I really like the computers in our living room. I sit and look out the window in my new swivel chairs. know they aren’t the most attractive things, but we spend a lot of time using them. So I think that is something that KATELYN: What are your least favorite features and places would always be in our main living area. in the house? I always wanted to have an eating area that’s PART of the kitchen. That is JUST for eating. MARY BETH: The bathroom in the master bedroom. I wouldn’t do that in a million years. I would never do that. KATELYN: Instead of a dining room? If I could do anything right now, I would rip out that jet- swirl hot tub thing and put in a really big shower, big MARY BETH: Well, the dining room… see I never really enough for two people, and make the bedroom bigger so had a FORMAL dining room. In any house dad and I that I could have a comfy chair in there or a little sofa…a owed never had a formal dining room, per se. little reading area. I would really like that, a sitting area in the bedroom. I always thought that would be nice. KATELYN: Was it always attached to the kitchen? KATELYN: You had it, in the house in Kalamazoo. MARY BETH: Yes, it was always attached to the kitchen. Actually, I have to back up a step, the very first house dad MARY BETH: Yes. and I owned did have a formal dining room. The house in Kalamazoo had a formal dining room, but there was no KATELYN: OK. So how does the architecture of the place place to eat in the kitchen. You always ate in the dining you live support or deny your idea of home? Or the room. In every other house we have lived in since then, whole community of Grand Rapids support or deny your there has just been one place to eat, but it has been idea of home? attached to the kitchen. The house that we live in now, they tried to make that room a (formal) dining room. But because it is MARY BETH: um…I very rarely think of the house by attached to the kitchen, it really doesn’t work that way. In what it looks like on the outside….I don’t know if that my view of a formal dining room, it should be completely supports or denies… I really picture myself in an separate from the kitchen. So you can’t see the kitchen extremely contemporary looking house or a very old from that formal dining room. (Not see the cooking mess!) looking house. The front of our house is kind of blah. It doesn’t inspire me, I guess. KATELYN: What are your favorite features in this house? KATELYN: It doesn’t. You’re not attached to the exterior. MARY BETH: The big windows are one of my favorite features. They are oversized. The tall ceilings, because it MARY BETH: I’m NOT attached to the exterior of the just makes the space feel bigger, more comfortable. I house, at all. I found it very interesting, looking through spend most of my time in the kitchen and the living old pictures, that the exterior of the house of the first room. Those are my two favorite places. I think. I like house that dad and I bought in Kalamazoo, is so very  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home much like the exterior of the house that my mother was born in, that I knew as a little girl. I found that very KATELYN: How about as an exterior finish? interesting, when I looked back. My house in Kalamazoo compared to my grandma’s house. MARY BETH: Yes, I do like brick in an exterior finish. If I really like antique furniture and I really like there is some variety to it. I’m thinking about the A-frame contemporary furniture. I like both mixed together in my houses that are on Monroe where there’s an arch…and the houses. You know I think of the inside of our house… bricks go in an arch. without the furniture, if you take the furniture out of it….I think of our house as being pretty contemporary. Not KATELYN: There are lots of cool things that you can do stark, I don’t care for the stark contemporary. But I still with brick. think of it as being pretty contemporary looking to me. I like the mix of painted walls and wood trim. I would MARY BETH: Yeah. If you just make it brick…it’s boring… always want to have some natural wood somewhere in my it’s as boring as siding, to me. If you don’t do some other home. things with it.

KATELYN: Would you continue to choose oak? KATELYN: So craft is obviously a big part of that.

MARY BETH: Not necessarily. Dad and I both really like MARY BETH: Yes. So… cherry. I guess we like wood that has character. I’ve seen some bamboo that just really makes me drool. So I think KATELYN: Do this for me. Give me five words that can that both of us appreciate wood surfaces, and it does not define your idea of home…five words. have to be oak. Oak is kind of the common material that you see everywhere. It seems like it is. An honest-to-god MARY BETH: Um…five words….. stone fireplace would be nice. Real stone. Cozy….Inviting…I want to say “interesting” but that is kind of a weird word, what I mean by “interesting” is “not KATELYN: Would you go with the stacked stone, completely linear boxed”…..Surprising would be a better sandstone like you remember…or would you go with the word, so that it’s not the same, the same, the same… fieldstone? Which do you prefer, not prefer… KATELYN: Interesting is a good word. MARY BETH: I guess what I like about it is the fact that it is not all the same. So…either would work. I wouldn’t MARY BETH: Colorful. I don’t think I could live with all like a brick fireplace because it’s too uniform. What I white again. I’m getting very tired of some of the white liked about the sandstone, even though it was basically a that I have. horizontal look….the blocks were all different sizes and shapes and lengths…so you had a lot of variety to that. KATELYN: When did you live all white? The houses that are made out of stone, so the whole house is stone…we’ve got some in Grand Rapids…..do MARY BETH: Any of the apartments…were white. This you know what I’m talking about? We call them the house, when we first bought it was all white. I have to “wolverine proof” houses? I LOVE that look. I don’t have color. It’s interesting to me that when we picked out know if they do that for a fireplace. The stones are not the carpeting for this house, it is almost identical to the broken or cut, they are just round. All different sizes, very first carpeting that your dad and I picked out (for and all mortared in ..different ways. So that is something Kalamazoo house). that I would be attracted to. Brick I’m not attracted to in a fireplace. KATELYN: He said that.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home line of “I could live in a smaller space”, well…then MARY BETH: We didn’t start going there, but that’s exactly again…maybe I can’t. I can’t get rid of some of these where we ended up (with carpet choice). (laughs) “things”. My space has to be able to accommodate those Ok so what did I say….Cozy…Inviting… things I guess. Interesting….Colorful….so, I need one more. Light. Um, if I don’t have light, I need lots of natural light. So the KATELYN: Where would your ideal home be? Are you still openness that you get from high ceilings and large attached to Grand Rapids, would you stay in Grand windows…light coming in. That’s very important. I feel Rapids or have you seen a place you would like to go? very “crunched in” if I don’t have that. MARY BETH: My ideal home would be located so my KATELYN: Do you feel that because you had more of a family is close. Wherever that is… so it could be hand in the design of the studio, because that was added anywhere. I mean, I don’t think I’m attached to the town on and built…that that would be more representative of so much as the people. your idea of home than the house itself? KATELYN: But…there’s no one left in Grand Rapids. MARY BETH: Um …..hmmm…There are different parameters for that space than for the house. I think we MARY BETH: There isn’t really anyone left…well….I’ve utilized some of the things I find important. It’s open, made some friends. But I could probably live somewhere there is a lot of light, we’ve got the big windows. I have else. I don’t think I could ever live someplace that didn’t vaulted ceilings, which gave me that airy space feeling. I have 4 distinct seasons. So that limits some places. I don’t think of the studio as being cozy, that’s not cozy to would really, really, really…at some point in my life…like me. to live on water. I thoroughly enjoyed the space at the lake (Pine Lake), grandma’s place at the lake. But daddy KATELYN: It’s cozy because the floors are heated. and I would never have considered buying that house. We talked about it when grandma said that they were MARY BETH: Well, that’s different. Cozy isn’t necessarily going to sell it. But neither one of us could see ourselves temperature related. The little nook that’s between the living there. That house was not the space that we were bookcases (living room) with the chairs by the attached to, and daddy didn’t like that lake. window….that’s my idea of cozy. That space. I didn’t have that in mind with what I was doing in the studio KATELYN: I never liked that lake very much either…but it (design wise). That was working space. There’s a was a lake. difference between what I need to have to work. My experience in college where we were in the basement MARY BETH: Right. So if I were to move again, I would without any windows (the clay studio), made be considering finding someplace on water. That was not me…”absolutely not…never going there!” I want lots of a high priority when you were little, because that opens a windows, I want lots of light. I want to have whole different category of worry. space….that’s what I was looking for in a studio. I don’t think you need to have huge rooms to be KATELYN: Well it has nothing to do with past home place, comfortable. There is a certain amount of what your dad I mean it’s what you want to do with your life now. and I have as far as furniture and “things”, that we don’t NEED. That we could change how we live. But there are MARY BETH: Yeah. It would be nice to be able to reduce certain pieces of furniture that there is absolutely no way the amount of “stuff” that we have so that we could exist that I’m going to let go. So to be able to have those in a smaller space. But I look at what we use, where we things, I have to have space to put them. So I walk this live, in the house that we have now. We don’t USE the  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home basement at all. All we do is store “STUFF” in it. We don’t ever go down there! Dad and I are never in the MARY BETH: Oh yeah. They made some definite mistakes basement….unless we go down there to get something with materials and how they did some things…I agree. that is being STORED down there. Or to put something away that needs to be STORED. So….do you need a KATELYN: Idiot Grand Rapids builders. basement? Yes WE need a basement because we have too much stuff. (chuckle) And some of the things that MARY BETH: One of the features of the house that you daddy does (electronics and hobbies) he says he won’t do remember as being your favorite house, was the plaster in a basement. That’s why he’s never had a workbench. ceilings. They were absolutely gorgeous. That house was The workbench that we set up in the basement he has well made, well built. It really was. The kitchen cabinets NEVER used, because he doesn’t want to be in a were built for that space. They were built-in, not just basement. He would do it in the studio, so the studio stapled to the wall. And I agree with you…I probably space could be that space. had more attachment to that house than I do to the The two bedrooms that are upstairs, that are yours and house we’re in now. You’re right, I agree with you on that. Michael’s….I wouldn’t NOT have those, because I want And had there been…had the people that built that house, you to be able to come home. I want where I live to be dug down and put basement below the family room….we comfortable for my family to come to. So I would still wouldn’t have moved. I can tell you right now that we have that. wouldn’t have moved. Because that would have been enough growing space for us. We could have figured out KATELYN: But they wouldn’t be OUR rooms. a way to add a bathroom. Your dad and I would have found a way to do it. And that would have been growing MARY BETH: If we ever move, it wouldn’t be YOUR room. space, it would have been fine. It would have been I think (now) they are still your rooms to a degree. I mean difficult for me to increase my business, but…to be honest I use them for other things, but don’t you still find there isn’t anything that I do in the studio that I now have ownership when you come to that room? that I couldn’t have done in that studio.

KATELYN: No, not really. That’s why I paint every time I KATELYN: But that’s hindsight. come home. Me trying to grasp on to it.. My attachment is more to the house that we lived in until I was 12. I’ve MARY BETH: Right. And to a certain degree you price always missed that house, and that’s my idea of home as a yourself out of the neighborhood if you continue to childhood home. I don’t have any particular attachment improve and add on to a house. We would never have to the place you live now. So I don’t have a “home base” gotten a return on our investment. So you have to look at anymore. I mean, I have an attachment because you guys that as well. Is this house worth doing that to? are there, but… KATELYN: But if it’s the house you’re staying in for the rest MARY BETH: Well yeah…I think you look at “home” as of your life it doesn’t matter. people when you get to that point. (age…before you establish your OWN home) MARY BETH: Right. I really like where my house is. I like where I am. I may not like it in a year or two if they build KATELYN: The disappointments of that house to me, are those 8 houses that they’re talking about. far greater than the advantages of that house. But you guys like that house…it’s got nothing to do with me, anymore. KATELYN: Then what will you do? But I want you to have something that’s not falling down around you.  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home MARY BETH: I don’t know. And it’s going to make a difference where you and Michael land.

KATELYN: Well I don’t know where I’m going to land….

MARY BETH: I know that… and it’s going to make a difference where dad’s job takes him. If things change in 2009 when television goes away (analog) Local broadcast television….. we just are not sure what the changes will mean. And I’m not going to work forever….dad’s not going to work forever.

KATELYN: Where would you like to retire?

MARY BETH: I don’t know….I haven’t seen enough of the country to tell you that. I like Michigan, I just don’t like what Michigan’s doing (politically). I like the climate, I like the change of season, I like the way it looks, I like the way it smells,… I don’t necessarily like the politics.

KATELYN: Well that’s the community of people, when that’s screwed up it doesn’t help your idea of home. It’s nothing that architecture can affect.

MARY BETH: I think Grand Rapids has been a comfortable city to live in, but I liked Kalamazoo better.

KATELYN: Would you move back to Kalamazoo?

MARY BETH: I might. Because it had all the good things of a bigger city, but it was smaller. And it was really…..the culture that was there, I really liked. It was the kinds of things that interest me. The things that were available interest me more.

Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home Interview Five the street walking around and staying up just a little bit Subject: Michael Cooper after dark playing when I was a kid. I remember having Interviewer: Katelyn Cooper on November 27, 2007 friends come over into our family room with the TV and playing games there. KATELYN: Tell me about your earliest memory of home. KATELYN: Do you remember any colors, or sights and MICHAEL: Well, let’s see, the earliest memory of home smells or tactile feelings of the house? that I can think of is just kind of three memories of my first home. I remember laying down behind the couch, so MICHAEL: Not really, it’s kind of strange. I remember all I could stay up later than I needed to, I remember having of these things as visual memories, and they’re my own room, and I remember the place under the disconnected. I mean, I can remember that the living basement, where all the computers were, and I room in our house was this really weird shade of remember the open bathroom. purplish, pinkish orange something or other. And I think the carpet in the family room was brown but I’m not KATELYN: Open bathroom? absolutely certain of that. And I remember that pattern in my room was some kitten wallpaper that despite that I MICHAEL: The bathroom without a door. There was a really liked. I don’t know why. I can’t remember it in bathroom that was missing a door and I remember that detail I just remember that it had kittens or cats on it and bathroom. I liked it very much. And I don’t know why I liked it very much. I can remember that I had this short, probably 3 KATELYN: Do you remember anything else about that foot by 3 foot table that my very first computer was set house? Could you try and describe that house? Well and on in that room, slightly before we moved out of it. I where, where was it? remember my dad showing me a computer for the first time, it was a let’s see, he had brought it down into the MICHAEL: Well, let’s see, first house, it was at two- living room, and then it went into the basement, and thousand, sixty hundred and sixty-six Wabash Lane, it was then I think it went into my room when we got more a two story house, with a basement. I remember my computers. I remember tooling around on that. I vaguely bedroom being on the second floor, adjoining a hallway. I remember lying on my bed. That’s almost everything I remember the woods and the hill outside that I would go can remember about my first home. sledding on in the winter, let’s see, I remember running all the way from my bedroom on the second floor, down KATELYN: Do you remember any changes that Mom and the hall, down the stairs, through the first floor, down the Dad made to that house? stairs, and into the bathroom without a door; all in one shot, back when I was younger. What else do I remember MICHAEL: I remember when we moved out. about that house? I remember sledding down the hill, because our house was at the beginning of an KATELYN: What was your favorite place in that home. And intersection. I remember sliding down the hill, across the why is that place special to you? street and down the other cul-de-sac that joined our street, it was called something like Daniel, and going halfway MICHAEL: It would probably have to be my room. down that before stopping. I remember the days when we Because it was, mine. All of those other places I was would have freezing rain and the entire street would be thinking about were also mine in that I had claimed them frozen up and I wouldn’t have anywhere to go and I and no one else either cared or wanted them. remember playing out on the snow. I remember out on

Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: Okay. Are there any bad memories attached to MICHAEL: Once we had bought a house, and selected it, I the house? really got into the business of admiring it. I liked, we had that five-and-a-half to six foot in diameter clock that MICHAEL: Nothing very bad. I remember when I ran, hung in the foyer. As much as a headache as that was for when I ran all the way from the top floor of the house to everyone else I thought that was the coolest thing in the the bottom floor of the house I’d run away from something world. I really liked that we had this huge entryway to but I don’t remember what. our house with that, I don’t know if it was vaulted or not, but that high foyer with the stairway in the front. Let’s KATELYN: You were sick and you hallucinated that your see the only other rooms in the house that really puppet was chasing you… Okay. So then we moved, do appealed to me were the basement and the, uh, my you remember how old you were when we moved? room. I liked my room. I don’t think it came to me as a loft bed, but I think it was soon made into a loft bed for MICHAEL: Something like twelve? me. Like the first thing that we got for a bed for me was some sort of black double bed or bed up in the air and I KATELYN: Younger than twelve, I was twelve. started sleeping in the air. I like that, because it gave me more space in my room, and, let’s see, I started needing MICHAEL: Okay, I was ten. the space because I would steal books from my parent’s library and I would leave them in my room and KATELYN: So do you remember the house hunt at all? Like eventually I needed bookcases for them and then I looking at houses, what do you remember about that? needed another bookcase and then I needed a bookcase after that – and I sort of filled my room with books. Let’s MICHAEL: Looking at houses? I remember being in the see, what else can I remember about that house that I car. I remember going out to the house and seeing really liked? I liked the way that my room was put features like stone fireplaces and things like that and together. I liked the way that the ceiling was slanted, and being impressed by them. But I wasn’t thinking of the that my bed would eventually be right up into that slant. I entire house as a space yet. I was looking at the individual never actually liked the way that our parents never features. actually finished the basement. But I did like it as a space that I could have, and that I could go to. I mean, there was KATELYN: Well do you remember any things about the a couch laid out, and the large television, and stuff to the houses that we looked at that you really liked, even if we side. Sometime we convinced our parents to get an air didn’t buy the house? hockey table and that was actually kind of enjoyable, but the main thing that we’d do in my house I’d get my friends MICHAEL: Not at the time yet. I hadn’t really put it into in there and we’d set up a table there and we’d play Risk place that I could have my own home, so I wasn’t all night and into the next morning. remembering anything like things that I wanted. My parents would come to me for input and I really didn’t KATELYN: Do you remember any changes that were made have anything to give. to that house, while you were living in it? Any changes that you made to your room, too? KATELYN: Okay, so when we picked the house that we’re in. That our parents live in now. What do you remember MICHAEL: Well, we did go from buying a standing loft about that house when we first moved in or they decided bed to some custom-built loft bed that was much better. It that was the house they were going to buy? was probably your old loft bed. And I liked that a lot more than I liked my first loft bed. I remember when we put in the studio. And I did like that, because it was another
Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home warm space. And it was off to the side. Although I didn’t KATELYN: So, when you were old enough to leave for go there very often while mom was working in it; later, college … Do you remember anything about Grand near the end of high school, it was a perfect space to use Rapids, living in Grand Rapids, growing up, like what we for the robotics team, when we could not have a space of did outside of the house? Were you attached to any spaces our own anymore. I don’t remember any major changes outside of the house? being made to the house other than the studio. I remember some of the things that we got or we didn’t get, MICHAEL: Growing up in Grand Rapids, was I attached and those were helpful or not helpful depending on what I to any places … Only places I was eating in while I was was doing at the time; like, I thought it was ridiculous eating in them. later, when I had left high school and gone off to college that my parents bought a drill-press; but Dad can be like KATELYN: So what places were those? that. Shit, the only other thing that I remember doing that was a major change to the house was that clock, because MICHAEL: It would depend on where I was eating. A Taco it was not a very sturdy clock and it was not working Bell could be a cool place for a little while, while you still anymore but I still miss the fact that we had that clock. had your food in front of you, or you could go to one of And I did like that in that vaulted foyer we could get the those really nice restaurants, and that was an experience largest Christmas tree, and I could brag to my friends, in and of itself. “What are you doing with this piddly little Christmas tree?” “What do you mean, it’s like twelve foot.” “Well, KATELYN: Like San Chez? why not seventeen!?” *laughs* MICHAEL: Not even San Chez. I’m thinking more of – in KATELYN: What was your favorite place in that house? high school prom, we went to some extremely high-class restaurant that I had never been to before, and the most MICHAEL: Let’s see. Probably the basement. hilarious thing was that everyone forgot to say separate checks for the bill. So amongst thirty people we had to KATELYN: Before it was invaded with stuff? kind of raise the amount of money, in cash, ourselves. And it was one of the most hilarious experiences of my life MICHAEL: Yes. Well it wasn’t invaded with stuff until the because, I just remember, vividly, being in that room all by grandparents moved out. Um, Let’s see, I liked it because ourselves, we just found a room that was there, and it was kind of built into the ground, but it was still open twenty or so guys just filed into it; and laying all their to the outside through the door, and because, well, money out on the table and counting it repeatedly and apparently no one else wanted. I mean, I was the trying to figure out how in the world we were going to pay primary user of that space for a long time, and it was this bill. It was like we had a debt to the mafia or mine. something.

KATELYN: Are there any bad memories – did you dislike KATELYN: Okay, so describe the places you lived after you any part of the house? moved out of the house – our parent’s house. Do you remember when you were looking for colleges, if you MICHAEL: I never really like the living room. It was looked at the place including the college or did you like generally filled with stuff, we rarely used the fireplace in the place, the college? it, and it was more or less completely claimed by my father and my mother. MICHAEL: When I was looking for colleges, the only thing that I was picking them on was not necessarily the space of my room, but the space of the entire college. And if it  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home felt like a place that I would like to go to, I liked it. If it didn’t it didn’t. KATELYN: So, because the dorm room wasn’t very nice, where did you go, was there someplace on campus you KATELYN: So of the colleges you looked at which ones did went that you could consider your own space? you like other than the one you ended up at? MICHAEL: Anytime the library was open, but not very MICHAEL: I liked… um, let’s see. I’m trying to remember busy, like between the hours of 1am and 4am, I could the colleges I visited. I liked a college called … it was in find a space in there and there are spaces to sit and lie New York; shoot, it was one of those ivy-league colleges down and everything, but the only thing that I didn’t like and I can’t remember it is name – Cornell. I really liked about that time of day was that they wouldn’t open the the campus at Cornell. And, it was a shame that I didn’t upper stories of the library and the books and honestly get into it because I think I would have liked that school, they were my favorite places in the library and the lobby but; who knows. Honestly, Case Western was, in terms of and the magazines and the newspapers that were my opinion of it, Case Western being the college that I available from 1 to 3 were not. But I still liked the space ended up going to, kind of in-between. It was an easy of the library, I liked the design; I liked the way it was put college to like and an easy college to hate. The business together. building, which was by that architect his name was Gehr, is it? KATELYN: So what’d you like about the space?

KATELYN: Gehry. MICHAEL: It was open, really. The way the library was put together, it had a wide window right in front, and MICHAEL: It was interesting to look at, and actually not you’d come in, and it had a large spiral staircase, difficult to live in, but all of the other architecture on something in the ten-foot diameter range that was open campus would vary so widely from being intelligently to the space as it spiraled up between the three stories. designed to being kind of thrown together to being badly And it had a basement, a floor below the floor level, and designed; that it sort of varied as you went through it had I think two levels above it. And you’d enter the campus and you went to different classes whether or not staircase and you’d go up, and always in the classics you were really able to enjoy the space that you were in. section, which is my favorite section of any library there The dorms, the first year they were tolerable, and the would be a carrel or a table and a sofa and you could sit second year they were unbearable. And there was a down and you could read and I liked that very much. reason for that. In the very first year, instead of stacking What else is there about that? Well, after my second year the beds together, my roommate and I had enough space of college I went to other spaces, are they in this segment that we had separate areas of the room, and his side was or after this? his space and my side was my space and never the twain did meet. Honestly, it was alright. In the second year… KATELYN: After, after your second year of college, when you dropped out, or what? In Cleveland, I’m talking about KATELYN: You were living in the same building. Cleveland.

MICHAEL: I was living in the same building, I was living MICHAEL: Okay. You’re talking about Cleveland right in almost in the same room, but having the beds stacked now. Another space that I liked was really the together and having a slob for a roommate drove me boathouse. Because I was on the crew team. The crew batty. I was literally irritated and annoyed by his members are insane in that we row on a freight river, presence in my space. And needless to say we never which was the Cuyahoga. Which means we have to be really got along. active when they’re not active. Which means that we have  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home to be active at extremely odd hours of the day. To row in aware. I passed a couple condemned stores, a couple crew you need to be able to get up at 4:15 exactly, be out more condemned houses, and when I found the store it by what’s called the “Ugly Statue” on location, it’s a statue was actually a drive-through liquor store. that has very, very, very little artistic merit, it’s a jumble of steel and lack of emotion, you’d gather under the Ugly KATELYN: Wait you were on your bike? Statue, you’d get picked up, you’d drive all the way through Cleveland to the center of town and there in the MICHAEL: No, I was on foot. So off I troddled into this very center of town nothing would be happening; and store and I did the customer things and I walked through you’d go into this boathouse and you’d be the very first the drive-through and I said, “I want a carton of eggs, and people in it; you’d open it up and start using it. And this a gallon of milk” I got a very strange look, and I got my would happen every day. And it was kind of interesting to carton of eggs, and my gallon of milk and I took it to the have, you know, a river that was, really never very still be counter and I paid for it and the cashier, with a look of occupied by a bunch of guys that well, wanted to go out concern on her face said, “You probably need to get out there and to row on it, and then as you row down river, of here.” And off I went. Walked back past the you go past the other things that are still open like the condemned stores and the condemned houses once again great steel and iron forges of Cleveland; and that was just and got back to my campus, but it occurred to me at the something to remember. Rowing along in the absolute time that was something very wrong with this area. And dark, with the putt of a motor boat and your coach on the that kind of describes the whole city of Cleveland when I radio ahead of you to make sure there was nothing that was living in it; it was not doing well as a city. I think you could be running into, and turning your head over to when I was living in it, it was either number one or the side of the boat to see this continuous fire coming out number two, in the “competition” if you can call it that, of the building, and the train cars with fire poking out the for poorest city in America. It had more people living front of them as they carried molten iron or steel to this below the poverty line than anywhere else. That kind of forge is something I will never really forget. affects the mood of the entire city when you go out into it, and needless to say that mood wasn’t always very KATELYN: What did you dislike about Cleveland as a good. place in whole, other than just your dorm? What else did you dislike? KATELYN: Did you ever feel attached to Cleveland while you were living there or did you still consider your MICHAEL: Well, the way that my university was built into parent’s house home? Cleveland, was that it was originally a very wealthy district. Our school, when that area of Cleveland started MICHAEL: The latter. I considered my spaces, in to run down, bought up those building and built its Cleveland, to be places I that I could also consider home, campus around them. While it held those individual but I was recognizing their lack of permanence. building from collapse, the rest of the neighborhood did. My very first experience in Cleveland I wanted to buy a KATELYN: So after you decided to stop going to college, carton of eggs and a gallon of milk at a very late hour, I what happened after that? What happened after think I was up, and decided that I needed to do this at a Cleveland? little bit before twelve. So I looked at a map and I used Google to search for convenience stores and things like MICHAEL: After I decided to stop going to college, the that and I found one, and off I went through a couple of very first thing that I did was to return to my parent’s blocks in the neighborhood. In the middle of the night. I house. Shortly after I did so, I was convinced or talked did not know yet that this was not necessarily the best into that I needed a change of locale. First of all because idea. After I passed the third condemned house I was the Michigan job market is not necessarily the best,  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home although I did have a job waiting for me when I left although you are a part of the drilling crew; you do college. everything that needs to be done, whenever it needs to be done. And that was really a lifestyle change, for a little KATELYN: Really? Where? while. Going down there the very first thing that happens is that you live out a hotel room for a week as you are MICHAEL: *snort* Working temp at the factory. They trained in the art of roughneckin’. After going through actually called me near the end of the school year to see if what is called well, “Rig floor training” or “Rig floor Team I would work for them again. Which was strange, but I Member Training” or whatever new age, politically correct was not interested in doing that specifically again; I term you want to use, you can get a job on an actual oil wanted some adventure after flunking out of college in my rig. My case was special in that it took me almost two mind. So I went with you out to Missoula (Montana), and weeks to get a job as opposed to right out of the class I lived in an apartment there for a while. And it was not because I had gotten in with very little prior notice. I think really anything like my space, in that it was a lot like a I was lucky; I got into it with so little wait I hadn’t even vacation in between; but there was a space in the living gotten put into their registering system. room that was mine and there was nothing you could do about it. KATELYN: So what do you remember about Wyoming when you first got there? KATELYN: What do you remember about Missoula as a place, or that apartment? Was there any thing in the MICHAEL: “Oh my God this place is empty.” The apartment that you particularly liked? countryside of Wyoming is flat, with a few hills, mountains in the background, predominantly sagebrush. MICHAEL: I liked the location. I liked being close to the Fields and fields of sagebrush. It’s actually more center of the city. I liked being close to that ridiculous depressing than corn, because corn is actually a crop, diner Del’s. I developed a taste for the small, privately and sagebrush is not. It’s what grows when nothing else owned diner, as opposed to fast food or something else can, in my opinion. I went down to Wyoming and like that; from eating at Del’s. I did like the way the worked at one of the drilling rigs during the summer, and apartment was put together, it was very open, and had it the next thing that was interesting for me was I been furnished in a different way it could have been a discovered the existence of what’s called a Man camp, very attractive space. But two people were living in a which is where you live while you are working on a rig. single bedroom apartment and there wasn’t really And it is a trailer, in a trailer park, down in one of the enough room or identity for there to be a space. After I small towns made bigger by this number of rig workers think maybe two and a half to four, or three months; we that work out of that location. And it is a temporary moved out of it, and I had to find my own place. place, you move in for a week, and at the end of the week you move out; you are expected to clean it out and KATELYN: What happened during that summer? Did you leave it as nice as it can possibly be when you leave. And get a job? you share this space with as many as six or seven or even eight other people. So it doesn’t have a lot going for it, it MICHAEL: Well, what happened was I looked for and has an open room, and every room that is not a found a job opportunity down south of Missoula. bathroom are bedrooms. They fill them with as many beds as possible. Simply because that’s the only way they KATELYN: In Wyoming. could get everybody in.

MICHAEL: Yes, in Wyoming. And it was roughnecking. KATELYN: So is it … homey? Would you call that a good Which is basically general labor on a drilling rig, place to be?  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: What do you remember about that first MICHAEL: It works. Honestly it’s almost a convenient apartment? Likes, Dislikes? Were you very attached to it or place to live when you are working on a rig, because you not? are working and living with the same people at the same place at the same time. It is not anything that I think MICHAEL: I wasn’t extremely attached, but I liked it, I anyone could do for any length of time. Some things really liked it. I don’t know where, but my roommates had about what the trailer lacks become more important than excellent furnishings in that apartment. Like, I remember other things. I don’t think I could stand my crew for more that instead of a bed, I was sleeping on some $2000 than fourteen days at a time. Living together with them executive couch that they had picked up from a law office and working with them at the same time; it would just that was closing down for like… a hundred bucks. And drive people crazy. that seemed to go with the furniture in the rest of the house in that it was relatively nice furniture. They had KATELYN: So when you weren’t living at Man Camp that couches going along the entirety of their living room, first couple of months, where did you live? where they had this huge TV, floor tower speakers, and a media center piece of furniture for it all to go in. And it MICHAEL: As I recall, the very first week I went on was, really, a well-developed space. That and the fact that vacation, where I visited with my parents went up to my roommates were never actually home made it kind of Glacier National Park and did things like that. My second nice, because to live in this excessive space in Jackson week, I was determined to find an apartment. And within Hole, the house rented for something like $2400 a month, a couple of days I had gotten lucky, I moved in with which is high by any standard and Jackson Hole has a somebody I was working with on the rig, he was some ridiculous baseline for rent anyhow. The fact that they contractor, someone called a solids control technician. were never actually living in it they were working so much turned towards my benefit so that, when I was KATELYN: In other words, a mud engineer? actually home I had the whole apartment to myself.

MICHAEL: No, not quite a mud engineer. Solids control is, KATELYN: So then what happened? people who rent solids control equipment, stuff like shakers, centrifuges that clean the mud as it comes out of MICHAEL: After about a year of living there, their lease the hole. Anyhow, I moved into a three bedroom was up and there was no way I was going to pay the rent apartment that he was renting, into a small bedroom, at on that apartment alone, so I left. And for the summer, I the amazing low price of four hundred dollars a month. sort of, “went where the wind took me” is the way the And that was in Jackson Hole, which is a city that I like story goes but in reality I lived out of my car. very much. I like the feel of it, I like the shops and the stores, and the places to eat. For a Wyoming town it has KATELYN: What was that experience like, not having a a staggering population of nearly eight thousand people. home base at all? Other than man camp, I mean. For comparison, the town I work out of has only five hundred and thirty-seven. It’s not even the smallest town MICHAEL: As it sounds like, it was fun at some times, and in the area. It doesn’t feel empty like the rest of Wyoming it was miserable at other times. It can be kind of fun to does. for a moment, “I don’t know where I’m going this week. I can go anywhere I like. Well, let’s go north.” KATELYN: Jackson doesn’t? KATELYN: So what places did you see while you were MICHAEL: Jackson does not feel empty, no. living out of your truck?

 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home MICHAEL: I went up to the lower part of Montana, into a town called Nye which is small mining town in the KATELYN: Yeah, so when you were looking for an middle of nowhere and I went up and down the river apartment what were you looking for? Like, you could live there, just because. I think for some reason I was anywhere, right as long as you could still get back to the interested in the platinum that was in the river, but it was rig? mostly that I was camping out for seven days, in a place where very few other people were. Another time, I went MICHAEL: Yeah, so part of it was I was looking for the up into Edmonton, because, I went up into Edmonton. location of Jackson Hole, and I was looking for what I And I saw the sights and I went to the gigantic mall in would consider a favorable location in Jackson Hole – Edmonton which is a monster of a thing; it has its own water park, inside. It has a gigantic lake, in addition to the KATELYN: Well what decided you on Jackson Hole? water park, also inside the mall. I was there for an entire day, and I think that I only saw half of it. It was ridiculous. MICHAEL: Well of all the places that I could live; it’s the I did some other fun things while I was up in Edmonton in closest to the rigs that I can stand. All of the other places Canada. I went further west, although not as far as I would within an hour, or two hours of the rig are not places I have liked, and I stayed in a place called Star Valley. want to live. I mean, it’s the closest to a big town that I can get to that isn’t ridiculous like Green River, which is KATELYN: Idaho? a Walmart town. It has relatively well-designed houses and buildings and installations and things like that. It has MICHAEL: It’s … I think some of it’s in Idaho but most of a little bit of a trailer park sprawl syndrome, but trailer it’s in Wyoming? What it is; is it’s right there on the border parks in Jackson Hole are relatively higher class than between Idaho and Wyoming, there’s another valley cut trailer parks in other parts of the world simply because, out, and that place is called Star Valley. That was when I even a trailer park trailer is worth um… $390,000. got miserably lost in my car, which makes it convenient that you’re living out of it, you can stop and sleep; but I KATELYN: A trailer park trailer? was absolute miserable to discover that there was no hotels or anything else that was open for reservations or MICHAEL: A trailer house. It’s ridiculous. But that’s kind of anything that had any open rooms, and after being in the the way the property prices are in Jackson Hole. So I was car for so long, I had to sleep in it (all week). When I willing to go with just about any space I could make my didn’t have to sleep in the car, what I would do like when own that was available in Jackson Hole, although I did I was up in Nye or someplace else like that I would set up have another option. I was looking for a place for the this hammock that I had; right up until I set it up right in summer. And there is a place south of Jackson called the middle of a Wyoming windstorm. I mean, the wind is Hoback Junction, and I was looking for a place there, as howling above you and you are sitting there in this tiny well. But after chasing down the elusive, open, un-rented little hammock and it starts to drizzle, because it doesn’t apartment, unsought after apartment in Jackson Hole, I actually rain in Wyoming. And you can’t set up your rain think I was looking for two and a half weeks straight every cover because the rain cover just keeps blowing away. day; I found one. Simply because they were willing to And it was a choice between getting slightly damp in show it to me, it was the perfect place. your sleeping bag, or listening to your rain cover beat itself to death outside of the hammock. I chose the KATELYN: Okay, so what do you like about that former, and I was somewhat unhappy with the choice. apartment? Yeah, that’s largely what I remember of that. It was when I decided that I needed to get an apartment before it MICHAEL: There are some things about it the way that really got cold. it’s designed that I really like. I like how it has at least the  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home potential to be a loft bed. I noticed that the very moment the oven door, I can’t open any of the lower cabinets. So I walked into it, although my landlord looked at me with it’s possible to work in there, but it’s inconvenient. The a raised eyebrow, “You mean storage, right?” They saw a bathroom is cramped in that if I open the bathroom door, place to store junk where I saw a loft bed and the I can’t open the dryer door. It’s a top load washer and a designed living room. I like that it has potential, although side load dryer. That and the appliance of the dryer is I haven’t really gotten it out yet. And I like the view. broken. Because while having your own washer and dryer is convenient, having an intermittently working KATELYN: What’s the view like? dryer is a pain.

MICHAEL: I have a French door, whatever you want to KATELYN: So do you feel attached to that apartment? Do call it that’s somewhat large, like maybe 10 foot, with a you consider that apartment home? shade, and it’s facing the mountain, Snow King Mountain right on the side of Jackson Hole. And I can open my MICHAEL: Very much so. blinds; there is the town of Jackson and the mountain in the background. And it’s so large compared to the valley KATELYN: And the greater area of Jackson? of Jackson that it takes up almost all of the visual space, just leaving just a little bit of the sky. And I think that’s MICHAEL: I consider that part my home too. I’m not really cool. Let’s see, what else is there. The apartment willing to mark it like a dog does but the sense is there. came furnished, which is nice, because I don’t have a lot of furnishings of my own nor do I really care to have a lot KATELYN: Um, are there any other places in Jackson that of furnishings of my own yet, because I don’t have any you really like to go; spaces that interest you? space to me that is absolutely permanent. I don’t know, my apartment leaves a little room for desires that I have MICHAEL: Well yeah, but it’s hard to describe, because to make it my space more than anyone else space. the very first thing that’s a space in Jackson are the streets in Jackson, and that’s a very attractive space, just to stroll KATELYN: What would you change about the apartment? through. Once you go out into Jackson, I have the same liking for any place that I’m eating while I am eating MICHAEL: Paint. Absolutely paint. The other thing that I’d there that I had in Grand Rapids. So just about anyplace I change about the apartment is I’d make some more of the can buy food and sit down, I like, although some of the furniture match each other; because currently every spaces are greater than others. There are places I haven’t room matches itself which is alright, but it doesn’t really gone yet, and I will have to go to. I like the way that create a theme for the apartment. It’s like the furnishings some of the buildings are put together, I like the fact that and the rooms themselves are disconnected. I want to do you have while your walking, these little shops and these something about that, but I am not an interior designer, alleys that you can duck away into. I find it hilarious that nor do I have a lot of talent or resources or skill and there is a walk-in bar, just on the street. experience in that sort of thing. But it is something I want to do with the apartment. KATELYN: What do you mean a walk-in bar?

KATELYN: Okay, what’s your least favorite feature of the MICHAEL: Well there’s a door, cut out, and a tiny little apartment? room with a bar. And you walk in, buy your drink, and leave. MICHAEL: It’s a toss-up between the kitchen and the bathroom, because, while functional, both are still very, KATELYN: So it’s not a sit and drink your drink in the bar? very cramped. The kitchen is so cramped that if I open  Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home MICHAEL: No. But just the fact that it’s out there on the side of the street, is just amusing. Something I had never KATELYN: Dick Cheney has a house in Jackson? seen before. MICHAEL: Dick Cheney is from Jackson. As far as I can KATELYN: Well what else about Jackson do you like? Or tell, I don’t know exactly where he is, but the other people dislike? that live in Jackson are, I think, Harrison Ford, has his primary house in Jackson. But these people that can afford MICHAEL: I’m amused, in that I’m not yet a citizen of primary houses, secondary houses, and tertiary houses in Jackson, not someone who participates in the elections different parts of the country, they have a house in Jackson and that sort of a thing. too. The people that want to sell to them, and the people that want to sell to people that work for the city, and the KATELYN: Do you think you want to become rooted in people that drive the sweeper trucks, and people that Jackson? work for the park are at very divided interests. Because they both want to develop the land, but how, and why, MICHAEL: Possibly. Not necessarily. I don’t have the and for what purpose they stringently disagree on. And I’m attitude toward Jackson that appears to be the sitting on the sidelines. Because while I would like one of predominant one. I’m not trying to keep people out. those huge expensive house when I had lots of money, for the time being, I’d really like one of those cheap ones. KATELYN: The predominant attitude - they are trying to Let’s see, what else is there about the town of Jackson that keep people out of Jackson? feels unique to me? That it also has this cross purpose between being a ski-resort town and being a tourist town. MICHAEL: Well, it’s kind of a fight between the people Because it has two tourist seasons. It has a summer tourists who want to keep Jackson as it is, and the people that season, and a winter tourist season. And the summer want to make a lot of money in Jackson. tourist season are the people that are going up into Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Teton National KATELYN: Well, it’s kind of a vacation town, right? Park, and decide to make Jackson Hole their home base. And there is an incredible amount of them. I remember MICHAEL: Sort of, it’s becoming more and more able to reading in one newspaper article that said the population support itself, in terms of city to city commerce, but the of Jackson at that time soars to 132,000 people. And I thing is that’s always on peoples mind is whether there is could easily believe it. The hotels fill up, all of the stores enough housing available for people who don’t have and shops open, and there are crowds of people, not enough income to live in Jackson. Because there are necessarily Hong Kong throngs, but there are groups of people who work for the parks, people that work for the people all along the walkways of the town. In the winter, city, there are people who work for the town, in that there’s a different tourist season, because then people sense, that work in the town of Jackson for the town of come to Jackson to ski. And there are people who live in Jackson that really can’t afford to live there because the Jackson, to ski. They work at the convenience stores, prices are so high. And then you have developers that are they’re called ski bums. And uh, they bring a very different in this business to make money, buying up and leasing tone to the nature of the city. You’ll see them when they fly federal land and things like that around the town of in with their skis in the airport, and you’ll see them when Jackson and areas by the town of Jackson and developing they walk to one of the shops for something to eat or it, so they can make a lot of money by selling these breakfast or dinner or something like that, and you’ll see expensive homes to people that want to live there. Or take their car up into the resorts, but other than that, you people that fly in. People that have more money than don’t see them. They don’t frequent the shops, they don’t they know what to do with. People like Dick Cheney. stop at the bison.

Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home stories or more underground in the middle of a city, and KATELYN: Oh? that’s probably a ridiculous idea. The other thing that I would like to have would be, I would like some of the MICHAEL: There’s a stuffed buffalo. And if you live in space of the house to be above ground. It’s something Jackson for any more than two weeks, I think, you grow along the lines of I want a very modest house, with a lot to dislike the people that have to stop at the bison as of sunlight and a lot of open areas, and then underground they’re walking, and get their picture taken. I mean, we I want space. Does that follow? understand that it’s a bison, we understand that this may be the first time you have seen a buffalo. But please stop KATELYN: So like, vaguely. I think so, so you have a lot of petting the bison and having your picture taken. It space underground and then the space you live in is happens once every two minutes. above ground?

KATELYN: What are the regulars of Jackson? There’s the MICHAEL: Well yeah, because I have interests like the tourist people, but isn’t there a constant? making of wine and things like that where I need a massive amount of space to use it. And the thing I want MICHAEL: Yeah, there is that sense that there are regular to do is to dig that space out of the ground. people. I have a problem in that I keep very strange hours. Because I switch from a night shift to a day shift, and I KATELYN: So you want hobby space. But it doesn’t have to don’t believe in the concept of a day to begin with. Day be underground You don’t want to live underground. begins when you wake up and ends when you go to sleep. I can be out at like three o’ clock or one o’ clock twelve o’ MICHAEL: Not entirely, no; I don’t think I could really clock or anything like that. I have seen regulars, just not stand it. I’d like to have a large portion of my house be regularly. The regulars of Jackson as I understand it, they underground. I may even have living space next to the go to the athletic clubs, and they go to the ski hills, and hobby space. But it won’t be permanent living space, it they go to the nicer but cheaper restaurants, and they just wouldn’t be the only living space. kind of continue the business of living in Jackson Hole without having to be at, this store, or this store, or this KATELYN: What features would you like to have in this store. The people who consider going to K-Mart more house? exceptional than going to the gift shop. MICHAEL: I’d like to have a number of rooms, in terms of KATELYN: When you start to put roots down, I don’t know bedrooms and bathrooms and things like that. If I was if you want to start a family or not, but where would you living with people, like I was married or something like like that to be, what would be your ideal home place? At that, I believe in space. Sort of like the easiest way in my this point in your life, and possibly in the future of your mind that I could live with another person is that one life, what would you like to have in a house, or an bedroom that is ours, one bedroom that is hers, and one apartment? bedroom that is mine.

MICHAEL: I would like a house that probably I would KATELYN: Well does it have to be a bedroom? have to build. Because there are a lot of differences in the way that I do things, and the way that other people MICHAEL: Well a room that I can sleep in, in my mind. would build a house, and do things. Like, I really like the She might have a room that is just a room, but I want idea of a house that goes underground, because so much something that is nicer than the couch. of that space, in my mind is unclaimed. It may not be, because one of my favorite things to have would be two

Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home KATELYN: That interesting. Give me five words that mean MICHAEL: I like the idea of spaces with multiple uses, home to you? but those spaces have to be truly flexible, and not just jumbled together. I like spaces that can do one thing and MICHAEL: Mine. can do another thing, but by using the same things to do so. Yeah. KATELYN: That’s one. It’s mine. KATELYN: One more MICHAEL: Let’s see… five words that mean home. The Latin root idio-. It means “private citizen,” it’s the root of MICHAEL: Elegant. both idiot and idiom. It is. KATELYN: Good word. Do you see yourself living in a KATELYN: So why does that make it “home” town like Jackson, big town, small town? Do you miss anything that isn’t in Jackson? MICHAEL: That it really is only for yourself, that you’re breaking away from the idea of a society. MICHAEL: I could. There are some things that I miss that aren’t in Jackson. It’s largely from the place I grew up. KATELYN: So once again “mine.” Compared to Wyoming I grew up in a far bigger town. Than the State of Wyoming. Literally. MICHAEL: Once again mine. Yes. KATELYN: So do you miss having more people around? KATELYN: Just another way of stating that. Breaking away from society? MICHAEL: I don’t necessarily miss having more people around as I have more the services for people around. If I MICHAEL: Doing something really unusual. were to buy land in Wyoming, and build a house, I’d have to give serious thought to things that I wouldn’t have to KATELYN: So “unique.” give serious thought to in Michigan, or Florida, or anyplace where there is a certain density of people. I MICHAEL: I was trying to think of a word like that. could have to be the very first person to run water lines to that location. I could be the very first person to run KATELYN: So that’s two, maybe three. What else? power lines to that location. I would have to deal with the problems we pay and expect a city to provide on my MICHAEL: Um… “spacious.” own. Even if I were building in a city, I would be looking at with a whole different set of regulations building in KATELYN: Spacious? Jackson Hole as opposed to say Grand Rapids, or a suburb of Grand Rapids. If I was building in a more dense area, it MICHAEL: Spacious. Both in its use of space and it’s would probably be easier for me to say, “Okay, fine. I’ll amount of space. I like form tied to function. I like to walk find a different location that suits my needs.” In Jackson into a room and feel like that room was designed to do Hole, if I were to build there, and they had regulations what it’s doing. against what I wanted to build, I can’t build it, and I’d be out the land. So I don’t know about that yet. It’s something KATELYN: Okay, so you don’t like spaces with multiple that I kind of have to, as I get a little bit older, decide what uses. kind of town I want to live in. But for density I like Jackson Hole, because it has enough services to serve 132 thousand people, but that population goes back down to 

Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home about 8. It can make something like, getting a hotel room in the summer; impossible, and it does. But it ensures that some things that I’m not sure I can live without, are still available.

2.4 Analysis of Current Homes of Subjects

The Home of Nan and Bob Cooper: Nan and Bob Cooper live in Plymouth, Michigan in a somewhat larger subdivision on the edge of the subdivision off of Sheldon Rd at 44665 Governor Bradford Rd. They have lived in this house for over 30 years (they moved to it after their children went off to college). From their house, they can walk to downtown Plymouth (though currently they drive the short distance more often than not), which is a thriving small town with a “new urbanist” feel without the clichéd detailing. There is a coffee shop (or two), small shops, a corner store, a movie theater, a bookstore, and a very good public library. All of which are frequented by Nan and Bob. There is also an exceptional network of activities for retired couples, such as Elder-wise, and the Detroit Art Institute. The house itself is a single level ranch tract house with a full basement. It has 3 bedrooms (one master figure 2.4.1 main and basement floor plans bedroom, one guest room, and one office), 2.5 bathrooms, a kitchen, a breakfast nook, a living room, a dining room, a family room (which they refer to as the “clubhouse”), a laundry room, and a 2-car garage. They have a back patio and a brick walk leading to the front porch and entry (see figure 2.4.1). However, the things that really make this house a home are not inherent to the house itself. They have put down roots and altered the house to fit their need for 30 years, and this is what makes this house such an obvious home place. The house is permeated with their own personal identities. In large part, Nan has control over the aesthetic of the spaces and layout of the furniture. Bob has his workshop in the basement where he can retreat as his own private space. Nan and bob share the majority of the house (even the office is a shared office). Some of the house is only used when there are guests (like the guest figure 2.4.2 living room room). Nan and Bob’s favorite place to be during the day 
 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home is in the living room in their “window seats” (two swiveling arm chairs placed by a large picture window The Home of Tom and Mary Beth Cooper: Tom and Mary that looks out on the back yard) (see figure 2.4.2). In the Beth Cooper live in Grand Rapids, Michigan in “Plainfield same room as the chairs there is a large built-in bookcase Township” off of 4 mile Rd on a small private drive with 3 that covers one whole wall. This bookcase is filled with other houses on it at 823 4 mile Rd. They have lived in books and artifacts of the home (Nan collects miniature this house for approximately 11 years and currently both chairs and pears, as well as pottery and other artful knick- of their children have moved away for college. They are knacks). The place they enjoy at night is the clubhouse not yet retired, and therefor still work. Tom is a television engineer and works at Fox 17 which is about 2 miles from their house, but he also does free-lance repairs which he works on in a corner of the living room at home. Mary Beth is a potter (clay artist) and has a studio at home, but she also throws pots for Heather Lane Pottery in Ada (about a 30 minute drive from the house). When they aren’t working they spend most of their time at home either together, or doing their separate hobbies. The house itself has 3 bedrooms (2 are still semi- owned by the children), 2.5 bathrooms, a large living room/family room, a kitchen, a dinning room, a laundry room, a full basement with a walk-out, a 3 car garage, and an attached studio. There is a wrap around front porch which is partly screened, and a fenced in back yard that

figure 2.4.3 bookcase wall

(family room), which is where the hearth is (and also the tv). Most of the time spent in the house is spent either in the office (on the computer), or sitting reading in the living room. Both Nan and Bob are very active in the community through volunteer work, their church, and activities, so they do get out of the house quite often. I think the elements in this house that really stand out as important to Nan and Bob’s individual concepts of home are: the sunny place to sit (the chairs in the “window seat”), the artifact wall/bookshelf (a self programmable, easily changeable element), and the hearth (which becomes the gathering place at night). There is also a strong privacy gradient in the house. Even though it is all on one level, the transition from more figure 2.4.4 main, basement, and 2nd floor plans public spaces to more private spaces is easily understood. 
 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home has been cat-escape proofed. The front porch and the living room are their The house was built by a builder (who cut a lot of favorite places to be in this house. The living room is corners) as a spec house and thus has some detail really the only gathering space in the house, so everything problems, which really bother Tom and Mary Beth. This gets done in the living room. There is a computer desk/ issue detracts from their sense of home because the house office space in the living room, Tom has a work desk for doesn’t live up to their standards and expectations. What they originally liked and still do like about the house is that it has a large stone fireplace in the living room, an open staircase in a 2 story foyer, and it has a ton of storage space. Much of the 3 car garage is used for storage and project space rather than for parking cars. Also the entire basement is full to the ceiling with stuff.

figure 2.4.6 living room

electronics in the corner, Mary Beth has a “window seat” (two swivel chairs by a window), there is a tv and a couch, and there is the fireplace. Which is a lot of activities to jam in one room. Tom and Mary Beth’s concepts of home would probably benefit from a house figure 2.4.5 basement with a bit more separation, or delineation of space, or just more space for all those activities to happen at once in. Part of what is so difficult in this house is they don’t really There is little privacy gradient in this house and it makes it have the opportunity to display what is really important to all seem like one big jumble. them, so they hang onto everything in storage, in hopes that someday they will have a place for it. The Home of Michael Cooper: Michael Cooper lives in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, essentially in the downtown area 
 Achieving a Specific/Individual Definition of Home in an apartment only a few blocks from the town square. large (for an apartment) kitchen, a dinning nook, a living He has only lived in Jackson for the past year while he has room with a loft “bed”, and a balcony. His apartment is been working on a natural gas drilling rig as a Roughneck on the second floor of a complex and there is an exterior (hired hand). His job entails living “on-rig” for the week stair that leads to his and one other apartment’s door. that he works (at a “man camp” or trailer park for the employees of the rig). On the week that he is not working (he works one week on rig, then he gets one week off) he returns to his apartment in Jackson and has a whole week to just kick around downtown and enjoy the “local color”. Jackson itself is an interesting environment because it is a ski/tourist town that supports a much larger population in the summer and winter than it does in the off-season. As probably the largest city (if you can call it a city, with a population of less than 10,000) in Wyoming it has the most infrastructure and businesses. Michael has said that there is no way he could stand to live anywhere with less people than Jackson. In the off-season many of the shops and restaurants are closed, but during tourist and ski season the town is practically teeming with life. It figure 2.4.8 apartment floor plan has the energy of a much larger place (like Chicago, or New York) but it still has the “small-town” feel. Also in tourist season there is a greater majority of tourists than Because he is just starting out he does not have very much furniture that is his, but the apartment came partly people who work, so there is a leisurely feel to the activity in the town. furnished. Therefore he doesn’t have much influence on how the apartment is decorated. He is still very proud of it because it is the first place he has lived on his own. He also has plans to paint a few walls and buy some new furniture, but they are not the first things on his list. If he were to paint he would at least be taking some ownership in the place itself, which he feels is necessary in really becoming attached to a residence.

figure 2.4.7 downtown jackson

When he is off-rig and at home Michael frequents the shops and restaurants in Jackson. His apartment is small so he gets out more often than if he were living in a house. The apartment itself has a one bedroom, a bathroom with a stacked washer and dryer in it, a semi- 
 Section 3: The Concept of Home and Design

To push the understanding of the concept of (locations with unique qualities that inspire strong home even further, it is important to study precedents in attachment), and many of the patterns have a higher social design. For home place, this could be most anything that agenda than to just create “nice” places. “A Pattern relates to residential architecture. However, the Language” is really about improving society though the precedents I chose to examine all show some exemplary built environment, but many of the patterns still ring true aspect of home place, or they are striving to create better to the concept of home. Some of the most relevant home places. patterns to home are: Degrees of Publicness (pattern number 36), House Clusters (37), Network of Paths and 3.1 The “Pattern Language” Cars (52), Quiet Backs (59), Accessible Green (60), Christopher Alexander’s “A Pattern Language” is a Common Land (67), Public Outdoor Room (69), Street book of design guidelines for planning everything from Café (88), Corner Grocery (89), Positive Outdoor Space cities to the detailing and construction of buildings. (106), Half-Hidden Garden (111), Entrance Transition Alexander refers to his method as “A Pattern Language” (112), Intimacy Gradient (127), Common Areas at the because, he says, there are many pattern languages and Heart (129), and Entrance Room (130) (Alexander, pp. his is just one method of designing exceptional cities, 193-626). These patterns are the most relevant because towns, neighborhoods, and buildings. He provides 253 they deal with a main concept of creating public and patterns to guide design on many different scales. The private spaces, but also creating a gradient between the patterns are broken into three sections for, towns, two. There are more detailed patterns that also speak to buildings, and construction. Each of these sets a scale that the concept of a gradient and layers of separation between the patterns in that section apply to. The patterns have public and private space, but I will not include those here. been derived from years of research and observation of In it’s essence the “Pattern Language” describes a perfect “successful” towns, buildings, and detailing. What home place. But the problem with the “Pattern Language” Alexander is trying to describe, but never really comes out is that it is a language, and as with any language, if you and says is that these patterns, applied correctly, make don’t know it you can not understand it, and if you do places people can become attached to, like home. know it, you can still make grammatical errors. The The “Pattern Language” is probably the first problem is that there is no clear defined way of applying complete attempt to develop a methodology for designing it. As any language it can be finessed any way the places, but if it is used in a certain way it could also help designer pleases to create his or her own poetry, not to say to make home. It is a staple for the design of places 
 The Concept of Home and Design that all poetry is bad, but that it has the potential of being Evanston, a suburb of Chicago) for a short while, then Eliel very bad. was invited to teach as a visiting professor at the In an ideal world the “Pattern Language” works, University of Michigan by Emil Lorch in November of but unfortunately we do no live in an ideal world. It is, 1923. The family then moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan. It nonetheless, very relevant for the concepts of planning it was there that Eliel eventually met George Booth and his describes and these concepts should be considered when wife Ellen Scripps Booth who were at the time developing devising a methodology for creating home place. Cranbrook, their home and estate. Booth had envisioned that Cranbrook would become a place where artists could 3.2 Saarinen’s House at Cranbrook live, work, and learn. Booth enlisted Saarinen to help Eliel Saarinen was 50 years old when he decided make his dream come true. And so, Saarinen was given to move to America from Finland with his wife, Loja, and the opportunity to design a place as a whole that would his son and daughter, Pipsan and Eero, after his entry for become his (and his family’s) home. the Chicago Tribune Tower won second place in 1922. What is interesting about Cranbrook as a place is Once in America the family lived in Chicago (and that it grows with the needs of the school. Saarinen’s first

figure 3.2.1 cranbrook site 
 The Concept of Home and Design finished project for the compound was the Cranbrook house (see Figure 3.2.2, red axes). These axes set up all School for boys (1927-1929). The Arts and Crafts other axes on the campus, except for one. Saarinen liked Buildings (1928-1929), the Saarinen House (1928-1930), to experiment with and shift axes in his architecture and the Kingswood School for girls (1929-1931) were because he thought it made the observer more aware of soon to follow. Later Saarinen designed the Academy of the architecture. By shifting an axis slightly it forces the Art (1930-1938), the Cranbrook Institute of Science viewer to notice that something is different, and thus look (1935-38), and the Cranbrook Academy of Art Museum closer at his or her surroundings. The axes and cross axes and Library (1938-1942) (Wittkopp, pp. 26) (see figure of Saarinen’s site plan for Cranbrook are always shifting, 3.2.1). Because Saarinen had so much involvement in the but almost every axis (that Saarinen planned) is parallel or design of the campus and buildings on it, Cranbrook is perpendicular to that original axis of the Booth house very fascinating to look at as a precedent for home place. gardens. The one axis that is different is the axis of When laying out the site plan for Cranbrook, “Academy Way” (see figure 3.2.2, purple axis). Why this Saarinen used the existing cross axes that run the length of is not parallel or perpendicular is not immediately the West terrace and the reflecting pool of the Booth apparent, nor is it disclosed in any information about the

figure 3.2.2 cranbrook site axes 
 The Concept of Home and Design Cranbrook plan that I could find. This axis is what the was making for himself. The result achieved by this is Saarinen house is aligned too and we can speculate that something that feels like an extremely large pleasure Saarinen wished to distinguish this part of the plan from garden, with winding paths, delightful follies, and a few the rest of the site. It is also the axis that the Arts and well places buildings, that everyone who lives, learns, and Craft’s buildings are aligned too, though some of them works there has the opportunity to experience everyday. align to both the canted axis and the garden axes. Maybe he meant it to be a metaphor for the point where the teachers and the students meet. It may simply have been to take advantage of the view to Lake Jonah (though the lake is man made and was made after the axis was established). Regardless of the reason, it is obviously still intriguing. The most famous view of Cranbrook is the view from the Nichols Gate toward the Museum and Art Gallery. This view really illustrates Saarinen’s use of axis

figure 3.2.4 saarinen house entry

When it comes to Saarinen’s house at Cranbrook, figure 3.2.3 nichols gate Eliel’s effort to make a home for him and his family is highly evident. It is clear that each aspect of the house to create a pull on the viewer. The architecture and the was carefully considered and designed. The house landscape pull you in. He also uses forced perspective to communicates the personality of both Eliel and Loja very make an axis seem longer than it is, to give it more clearly, with a little bit of Pipsan and Eero in the mix (if weight. Another example of this is the entry to his house you look for it). But before we talk about the specific at Cranbrook (see figure 3.2.4). Overall I think it is details of the house it is important to understand Eliel’s important to consider the whole site of Cranbrook when mastery of the plan and layout of the spaces in the house. considering how an architect with control over the The Saarinen house is located on “Academy majority of his home environment creates a place that is Way”, which is where they Arts and Crafts buildings for pleasing for him and his family to live in. Obviously not the school were located and also where the Cranbrook all choices that Saarinen made in the planning of Architectural Office was located. It is evident that Cranbrook were motivated entirely by his desire to create Saarinen thought it was important to be accessible to the a home place for himself, but I think, on some level, he students, even when he was in his home environment. was always considering the quality of the place that he The manner in which “Academy Way” is laid out it allows 
The Concept of Home and Design it to become the “main-street” of Cranbrook. It has the feel of a toned down thoroughfare. In this environment is where Saarinen chose locate his home at Cranbrook, very different from Hvittrask, the family’s country villa in Finland. In the plan of the Saarinen house, what is immediately evident is Saarinen’s fascination with creating and manipulating axes and cross axes (see figure 3.2.5).

figure 3.2.5 plan axes diagram figure 3.2.6 studio

The main axes in the interior of the house are the entry axis, the axis the runs the length of the living room and dinning room, and the axis in Eliel’s studio. These axes all cross and shift to a point where you are almost always award of them. It is interesting to me that the more private or intimate spaces do not have such a strong axial feeling to them. I think this is because when you are in a space with a long axis you are drawn to move through the space and do not wish to linger. Now, if the space were filled with people (say in a party environment) this would not be so apparent. What is interesting is that the “living room” was originally labeled the “reception room” (Wittkopp, pp. 31), thus it was never really meant for “living” but was always meant to be a pass-through or transitional space to the more intimate spaces of the home, such as the dinning room or the studio alcove. (figure 3.2.6) Another important and very interesting thing about the Saarinen house is the variety and gradient of public and private spaces. In the plan (see figure 3.2.7) figure 3.2.7 privacy gradient diagram this is very apparent. On the first floor there is a gradient from each entry, as you move into the home from each 
The Concept of Home and Design entry the spaces become more private/intimate. Upstairs there is a gradient that runs from the front of the house (the street side) to the back of the house. Eliel used the hallway and the thick closet wall as a buffer/barrier to the bedrooms. In the master bedroom the buffer to the front of the house is the sitting area/vanity, (see figure 3.2.8)

figure 3.2.9 master bath

3.2.4). The wall lets you see the house, but it also delineates that the yard is private. On the side of the house that faces the reflecting pool in front of the Art Academy Library and Museum there are several barriers to create a more gradual gradient. First there is a high wall

figure 3.2.8 master bedroom and as you move back in the bedroom you come to the most private space, the master bath (see figure 3.2.9). The master bath is special and unusual because it was not common during the period of history in which the Saarinen house was designed to have such a large and luxurious bathroom. In section the techniques Saarinen utilized to create the privacy gradient between his house and the surrounding school are more apparent (see figure 3.2.7). On the side of the house that faces “Academy Way” he uses a low wall at the sidewalk, and landscaping between the wall and the house to create a green buffer (see figure figure 3.2.10 back garden 
The Concept of Home and Design at the campus side, which the house has a view over, but people at the pool level cannot see over. Beyond that wall there is a buffer green space and then the landscape slopes up with a set of stairs to the courtyard in the back of the house (see figure 3.2.10). There are also trees and bushes to create a visual screen without making a solid border. On the side of the house (see figure 3.2.11)

figure 3.2.12 ownership diagram

figure 3.2.11 side of house where the walkway runs to the side entrance that enters into Eliel’s studio and office space there is a covered passage that crosses the path creating a “gateway”. This is the privacy cue at the side entrance that not everyone belongs, that you are entering a semi-private space. Another interesting thing about the house that figure 3.2.13 library nook relates to privacy is the “ownership” of spaces. By ownership I mean the perceived ownership or belonging What is not shown though is that Eliel and Loja each had to a space (not literal, or legal ownership). In the house ownership or control of different spaces in the house. there are four groups of people that have ownership: the Loja definitely had control of the master bedroom and one Saarinen family, the guests to the house, the students on of the guest rooms was claimed as her sewing room the campus, and the service staff/maids. The relationship (Wittkopp, pp. 46). She also used the library nook on the and ownership gradients are shown in Figure 3.2.12. first floor as a place to work (figure 3.2.13). Eliel obviously had control over the studio and his office  The Concept of Home and Design (figure 3.2.6). I believe the rest of the spaces in the house chosen for its adjacency to New York City, its particularly were generally neutral ground, each person having some interesting topography, unique landscape features, and its share in the control. secluded forest setting. Wright’s plan for the 50 proposed The detailing and furnishings of the Saarinen home sites gives each home a circular site of roughly one house are very unique and very custom. It is obvious that acre (see figure 3.3.1). The roads of the developments are Saarinen considered all things in his house worthy of narrow and they wind around the circular sites grouping consideration. When a visitor walks into the house it is them together in small pods, giving the affect of frog eggs clear who it belonged to and the personality and identity clustered together. The space left between the circles of the Saarinen family is still evident even today after its becomes a “buffer of green”, a sort of no-mans-land to blur restoration. borders and cushion the social fabric of the community.

3.3 Usonia Usonia Homes Incorporated is a community of homes in Westchester County, near Pleasantville, New York. This community began as a cooperative of several young families living in New York City in the 1940’s. These families pooled their resources to realize their dream of moving out of the crowed city and into single-family homes in the country, later to be known as suburbia. This group of people stumbled across Frank Lloyd Wright’s idea for the city of the future (Usonia or Broadacre City) at a MOMA exhibit in 1940. Immediately they decided to enlist Wright to help them design their community of houses in the country. While Wright personally designed figure 3.3.1 site plan only three of the 47 homes built in the community between 1947 and 1963, he designed the original site plan Wright also planned public space for a community center for the community. The majority of the homes designed by and play field. The community center was not built other architects were approved by Wright, and his design because of budget issues but the site for it was utilized as a ideals were pervasive in the by-laws of the cooperative. swimming hole and later the community built an in- The result is a neighborhood of homes that nurtures the ground swimming pool. There are also several small parks tight-knit community of people that created it. Usonia (as it that are created by a ring of home sites with the space in is named by it inhabitants) is a rare example of a suburban the middle left for everyone to use. The effect this plan has development that is successful in creating and supporting a on the built houses is to separate public and private space healthy social web, while also generating a strong without fences or hedges. Each home has its designated connection between its inhabitants and nature. By place within a sea of public space. Instead of being examining the architecture created by this group of people jammed together with hard lines separating whose land is to suit the needs of their community, I hope to be able to who’s, the circular sites float gently next to one another. work backwards to understand if architecture can create The borders are not visually obvious so the land becomes a community. shared, give and take, element. This is very important to Frank Lloyd Wright’s site plan is the backbone of the social fabric of the neighborhood. It also sets up the the Usonia development; without it the homes built there language of the architecture to be built on the sites. would not achieve the connectedness to nature and The homes themselves are built on Wright’s community feeling that they do. The site of Usonia was principles for Usonian (his word for American) architecture.  The Concept of Home and Design These principles are: low profile roofs, no garages (carports room and the master bedroom. Its triangular shape faces only), no basements or attics (slab on grade with imbedded three sides, the public (living room), the private (bedroom), radiant heat), no interior trim, no light fixtures or radiators and nature (the exterior face). This poetic, three-sided (indirect light is provided by bouncing it off walls and approach to architecture informs the design of not just this ceilings), built in furniture and art, no paint (only lightly house, but also the whole community. The kitchen opens oiled wood on the walls and waxed concrete floors), no onto the living room thus connecting all social functions of plaster, and no gutters or downspouts. Even though these the house. There are two prominent materials in the house, rules are not strictly followed in every design, due to the wood and natural stone. These materials give the house the varying styles of the different architects that designed homes in Usonia, they all share the same language so they feel like they belong together. One of the homes designed by Wright, the Reisley House, is a shining example of Usonian architecture.

figure 3.3.3 reisley living room

feeling that it grew out of the hill it is nestled into, like a peculiar rock formation. They lend a naturalness and warmness that could never be achieved with vinyl siding. All these things contribute to the sum of all the homes and tie the community together in aesthetic and in heart. Many of the members of Usonia were very involved in all phases of the project. They put together the figure 3.3.2 reisley house funds to buy the land. They cleared it themselves, built the roads, dug the wells, and laid the pipes. As each young As Wright’s later version of a Usonian Home it is family began construction on their own homes, they were unique from other homes he designed earlier in his affair right there with the builders, helping out. Most of this was with the idea of Usonian homes. The plan is based on a done to save money, but the result is that each family has triangular module, which sets up a trapezoidal geometry much more invested in their house and in the community that creates very pleasing spaces. The approach up the than just money. The Usonians put their sweat, tears, and driveway welcomes you with the warm wood-clad soffit of blood into building their community and the result is and the carport that reaches out and up, pulling you under and architecture that gives back as much, and more, than was into the entry vestibule. Once inside you are greeted with put into it. a view of the terrace and woods, beyond the cozy living room. The hearth is essential to creating the feeling of home and is a grounding node at the corner of the living  The Concept of Home and Design 3.4 Seaside “Mixed Use” (uses are tightly woven together and Seaside is a “New Urbanist” community on the buildings are zoned by size and physical type, not use), panhandle of Florida. It is the embodiment of the “New and “Special Sites for Special Buildings” (civic buildings, Urbanist” movement. Therefore to understand Seaside we such as schools and town halls, have special and central must first understand the defining principles and driving locations) (Duany, pp. 15-17). This model was applied to factors of “New Urbanism” (specifically defined by Duany the design of Seaside, Florida. & Plater-Zyberk). When we examine the planning of Seaside, we In Suburban Nation Duany & Plater-Zyberk find that there is merit in the logic behind the describe the problem of suburban sprawl and how it has methodology of the codes and layout, which makes this manifested in recent history and modern developments. project very relevant to the problem of home place By contrasting the characteristics of sprawl with the making. In detail, the layout of seaside is a U shape characteristics of traditional neighborhoods and small opened to the ocean with three major axes. One major towns, they indicate the direction that urban planning axis, route 30-A, runs through the “downtown” area and should take in the future. creates a buffer between the majority of the town and the According to Duany & Plater-Zyberk “suburban sprawl is ocean. The other two axes project at a 45-degree angle an idealized artificial system”, unlike the traditional neighborhood model, which “evolved organically in response to human needs” (Duany, pp. 4). There are five components of sprawl, each strictly segregated from the others. These components are: housing subdivisions, shopping centers, office parks/business parks, civic institutions (such as schools, churches, and town halls), and the highways and roads needed to connect all these functions (Duany, pp. 5-7). This system is not merely an accident; it has been chosen by town planners and is figure 3.4.1 seaside plan enforced by our zoning codes and town planning. It is not only unsustainable in that it uses massive resources to from the center of town. The rest of the streets are laid out install and maintain the infrastructure needed for society so that the north-south streets are wider and allow a view distributed so widely; it also destroys all sense of place corridor to the ocean, and the streets that run east and because it is so spread out and homogenous that one can west are narrower. The urban code of Seaside is set up to not distinguish one suburban development from the next create a pedestrian friendly environment. Lots are smaller (Duany, pp. 7-12). and streets are narrower with boulevards and sidewalks to Duany & Plater-Zyberk look to the past for what emphasize the pedestrian aspect. The urban and they call “the Neighborhood Plan”. There are six architectural code also sets up a language to further define fundamental rules to create a successful urban the pedestrian scale (Seaside, pp. 62-75). community. These are: “the Center” (each neighborhood The town’s layout is divided up into eight building has a center focused on activities of commerce, culture, types by lot. Types one through three are near the urban and governance), “the Five-Minute Walk” (things needed center. These types are meant to create a 3-5 storey for everyday life (living, working, and shopping) are within “downtown” feel with primarily retail on the bottom and a five minute walk of each other), “the Street Network” (a office/apartments and condos above. By zoning these “net” or grid of streets that creates multiple routes archetypes into the initial plan an urban center is built between two points), “Narrow, Versatile Streets” (because into the neighborhood. The scale in plan is set so that the of the repetition of routes, each street can be smaller), urban center is at most a 5-minute walk from any residence in town. The urban center is essential in the  The Concept of Home and Design creation of any community and the scale that Seaside place is concerned the method that Seaside demonstrates addresses this issue is successful. Types four and five are is effective in neighborhood building and place making, reserved for the larger and more prominent lots in Seaside. however, it is unclear if the intention of the codes was to Type four is mainly residential but it is meant to produce invoke in the residents a strong sense of home. The result large grand buildings that can either be private residences is a highly desirable community, and with high demand or bed and breakfast inns. Type five encompasses the lots comes high prices and thus limits the demographics of the on the ocean side of Route 30-A and the use is not town. This lack of diversity is detrimental to the process of necessarily specified. This type is unique in that it is locating one’s self in society which is essential to the rather liberal in it’s codes, but the building plans must be process of home making. This is not the fault of the codes approved my the municipal authority (town architect). and planning of Seaside but the fault of urban planning Types six through eight are the “suburban” single-family across the nation (or lack there of) that creates such a low residence lots. These types actually have specific supply of quality home places, thus a high demand for architectural style in mind, such as the “Charleston single localities with a strong sense of place. house”. They deal mainly with setbacks, front porches, New Urbanism, however, does not solve the and elements such as required unique white picket fences problem of creating home places. It creates places, but at the street line (Seaside, pp 100-103). The urban code is home is something that is defined by the user not the presented in a visual format and was tested on students to designer. Fortunately it demonstrates the fact that home ensure that nothing “undesirable” slipped through. The place can be encouraged by design if not created. urban code does not actually impart an architectural language because it deals mainly with heights, setbacks, 3.5 Martha’s Vineyard parking, and outbuildings. Also, Duany & Plater-Zyberk Martha’s Vineyard is a small island (only 25 miles purposely did not design any buildings for Seaside so that long and 7 miles across at its widest) off the coast of Cape there were no specific examples to copy. There is an Cod. It is said to have received its name from Captain architectural code that is stringent on specific things like Bartholomew Gosnold for his infant daughter and the wild building material and methods but it does not dictate grapes that grew on the island at the time (Railton, pp. 6). “architectural language” to the buildings. The code is very I have spent 6 months living on this little island observing important to Seaside’s makeup and is strictly enforced. the architecture, the people, and how the people view the One provision is that the “Seaside Architectural Review” nature of home place on the island. Martha’s Vineyard is must approve all buildings (Seaside, pp. 260-263). There a very interesting location to examine home place is also a limit on how many buildings a specific designer because so few of its residents actually live here year can design in Seaside. The purpose of this is so that there round. The Vineyard is essentially one big vacation is diversity in the architecture. It is arguable that the result community, but it still manages to instill a strong sense of of these codes would be different were Seaside to be home and belonging to its temporary inhabitants. located on a different site, or built in a different time There are two crowds on the vineyard, 100,000 to period. Thus the codes serve their purpose in creating an 150,000 people that visit and live on the island in the urban environment and cohesive neighborhoods, summer, and the 20,000 some odd people that live here regardless of the architectural style. year round simply to serve the people that visit in the Seaside, in fact, is an urban experiment. The summer. For the year round crowd, life isn’t easy. The outcome of the codes at the creation of Seaside was lowest price for a house on the island is around $400,000, unsure, but I feel that the implementation of well thought groceries here seem to cost twice as much as on the our codes is more effective than the “Pattern Language” by mainland (my average for the two bags of groceries I buy a Christopher Alexander in creating the desired outcome of week is $80). Average rent for a one bedroom apartment a “better” urban environment and strong sense of place. is about $1500 a month (that is if you can find an As far as the encouraging the concept of home and home  The Concept of Home and Design apartment), and the average rent for a room in someone’s Vineyard history (Railton, pp. 142-160) in that it made house is around $650 a month. For the summer crowd, living on the Vineyard possible and profitable in the the prices are the same but they aren’t here to make a 1800’s, the houses that remain there today demonstrate living, they are here to live. Many people come and this profit. After oil was discovered in 1859 and whales spend the whole summer whiling away the hours on their oil was no longer necessary to light lamps, the whaling porch in Oak Bluffs, or laid out on a private beach, or industry died out and the people of Edgartown had to look playing golf, or sipping Mohittos at Sharky’s, or shopping elsewhere for profit. Eventually Edgartown became a in downtown Vineyard Haven. For the vacationer there retreat for the wealthy from New York and Boston, which are a million things to do on the vineyard, but you have to it remains today. The downtown area of Edgartown is full have the money to do them. This sets up a social caste of small shops and restaurants that cater to the tourists in system that divides the people who work for their money in the summer, and the people who come to spend their money. There is always this duel between the year round residents and the people that only spend the summer. There is even a divide between the day-trippers and the people who stay for a few months. I can’t say that the sense of home on the Vineyard is a harmonious one, but it is an interesting one. There are many towns on the vineyard but the three largest (in order) are, Edgartown, Oak Bluffs, and Vineyard Haven. Each of these towns has a unique sense figure 3.5.2 downtown edgartown of home and a specific vernacular that governs this sense of place. Here I will discuss each of these towns, describing how each unique sense of place is expressed in the summer. The houses of Edgartown are grand, Greek Revival, whaling captains’ houses, with painted white ship the architecture and the atmosphere of each town. I will start with Edgartown, since that is where lap siding and black shutters. Edgartown exudes an air of wealth and family values. It is a bit haughty and abrasive; English settlement on the vineyard started. Thomas it does not have the laid-back feel of some of the other Mayhew Jr. founded the first settlement in 1643 (Railton, pp. 14), so the Vineyard has a very long history indeed. Vineyard towns. Edgartown is home to more year-round residents however, so more of its shops and restaurants The architectural influence that can be observed most in modern Edgartown though is the whaling Captain’s houses stay open in the off-season. Edgartown is a stones throw from the island of Chappaquiddick, which houses many of that line Water Street. Whaling was a huge part of the island’s famous visitors, such as Meg Ryan, and the Kennedys. This could be the reason why I get the feeling that I don’t belong there. Edgartown is homey to those with a bit more currency than me. The architecture contributes to this feeling of alienation for me. It proves that home place is not simply influenced by the architecture, but also by the attitudes of the people that live there. Oak Bluffs is another story. When Edgartown began to become more of a pleasure seeking community in the mid 1800’s, some Edgatonians banded together in figure 3.5.1 captains houses religious groups seeking salvation. These Methodists set  The Concept of Home and Design up camp for the summers in an oak grove on the are just there on a one-time vacation, everyone is Nantucket Sound side of the island. Eventually their not- accepted into the blanket of hominess that lies over Oak so-permanent tents were enclosed to become the Bluffs. People are neighborly, waving from their porches gingerbread cottages of the Camp Meeting in the Oak and greeting complete strangers. Somehow the Bluffs of today (Railton, pp. 241-276). Eventually people architecture of Oak Bluffs sets a canvas for this behavior, stopped coming to the Camp Meeting for retribution and or maybe it is just the relaxed air of the people visiting on started coming just for the pleasure of summer on the vacation. It is difficult to determine, but I believe there is Vineyard, thus Oak Bluffs became the pleasure center it is something in the fact that the architecture allows a great today. The most interesting thing about Oak Bluffs deal of individualism within a given style, not to say that I architecture is that there is a unifying style, but each house actually like all the frills, but there is definitely something is unique from each other. There is a similarity in the style there. The last town I will discuss is Vineyard Haven. Vineyard Haven is an interesting subject because it is where the ferry docks year round (because in the winter the Vineyard Haven harbor is the safest from rough sea and wind). Many of the residents of Vineyard Haven are

figure 3.5.3 camp cottages of the houses and if you don’t look closely you don’t see the differences, but it allows each house to have it’s own individuality thus better reflecting the personality of the owner. The frills, bright paint colors, and “carpenter figure 3.5.5 ferry dock gothic” details create an urban fabric that fades into the background allowing an overwhelming sense of home to penetrate the community. Even though half the residents only live there for the summer, and half of those residents

figure 3.5.6 vineyard haven house

year round residents because of this. Of the towns I have discussed it is also the only dry town so the downtown figure 3.5.4 harbor houses area is less developed than that of Edgartown and Oak  The Concept of Home and Design Bluffs. Of the three it also has the least defined greet passers by. In fact, most of the traffic around architectural style. There are houses that resemble those Vineyard Haven is vehicular rather than pedestrian. There in Edgartown, and houses that borrow some details from is one corner, referred to as five corners, which is absolute hell to try to get through if the ferry has just come in flooding the small streets with traffic. Pedestrians must always be watchful when crossing the street even though there is a $100 fine for anyone who does not stop for a pedestrian (though I haven’t seen this enforced). The vehicular traffic is a curiosity of its own since normal traffic laws seem to not apply here. Right of way is something decided by the drivers currently trying to turn. It does take some getting used to, but once you understand the convoluted made up traffic laws, it is another level of belonging, though I don’t see how the 3.5.7 vineyard haven house stress of it doesn’t drive the locals mad. Over all, Vineyard Haven is not really defined by its architecture, but more Oak Bluffs, but most of the houses can be described as defined by its traffic. Once you reach home, you don’t “Cape Cod Style” with cedar shake siding, white trim, and want to go out again into the madness, so the sense of a general cottage feel to them. The houses in Vineyard home is confined to ones house and does not encompass Haven are also more widely spaced and there are fewer a neighborhood, like it does in Oak Bluffs. I think this sidewalks and more roads with higher speed limits. The shows that traffic control is key in creating good downtown of Vineyard Haven is very pleasant with Main neighborhoods, and allowing for as much pedestrian Street being a one-way street with ample diagonal parking traffic as possible. for the shops that line both sides. There are almost always What makes the towns of the Vineyard Possible is the restriction of chain store development, and the dedication of the property owners on the Vineyard to preserve the quality, and home feeling of the place they love.

3.5.8 downtown vineyard haven people walking on the sidewalk shopping, eating ice cream, and dining in the cafes. Downtown Vineyard Haven offers plenty of home place feel, but the houses of Vineyard Haven lack something. Maybe it is that they are less closely spaced than those in Oak Bluffs, or maybe it is that there is no defining architectural style. There certainly are fewer front porches and people don’t sit on them and  Section 4: Towards a Design

4.1 The house for Anybody Therefore the only outcome of this thesis is a After all the research, and all the analysis, the house that shows a process for creating a home that can conclusion is that the best way to design a home place for appeal to a few people. This process is detailed in the someone is to design a home place for anyone. This following section. means that when designing a house (to become a home) it is best to have no client. The reason for this is that the 4.2 Site Description and Analysis perfect home cannot be designed for a specific individual The site I chose for this project had to be special. (or individual group/family) because each individual’s idea It had to fit all the design imperatives coming from the of home is constantly changing and therefore his or her general definition of home and it also had to fit the design home must also change with that idea. The key for imperatives coming from the specific definitions and attachment to home place is the choice an individual, or histories given by my family. The most important things in group of individuals, makes to have a relationship with the site selection were diversity and versatility. Thus the that place. Some houses speak to us, some houses repel site I chose is in a diverse area. us, just like human relationships. It is located in a residential area that consists of In the design of home places we can understand rented houses, apartment buildings, and single-family generalities of the idea/definition of home, and these help dwellings. Just down the street from the site is a corner us to design a general framework in both houses and market where essentials (like milk and eggs) can be larger scale projects like neighborhoods and cities. We purchased. The site is about a block from the University can also understand specifics of individual ideas of home of Cincinnati campus, which accounts for much of the that lead us to the details of the home, but we should diversity. Half a mile away, down the hill on Clifton, is never really design for one person. The any-home means Ludlow, where there are many shops and restaurants. that anybody (not everybody) can come along and see There is also a theater, a grocery store, and a drug store. some aspect of home in that house. They may or may not The site is a 5-10 minute drive from Downtown Cincinnati think that this particular house could become a home for and Newport, Kentucky. them, but by making them think about it they are forced to This wide variety in setting and area allows for a examine their individual idea of home, and by doing this wide variety of people to see a possible attachment to this they can understand that the key to being attached to a place. It could be a house for a professor, or a bunch of home place is the choice to make a place a home. students, or anyone who works downtown, or a family, or

 Towards a Design a retired couple that wants amenities close by, or many other varied occupants. The site for the architectural part of my project is a run down old farmhouse that damages the unity and “home feeling” of the neighborhood it is located in. It was built in the late 1800’s but today it is owned by a landlord and has no occupants and thus has gone uncared for. The site is surrounded by a 6-9 foot wall and the house is up on a hill another 6-8 feet above that. It towers over the sidewalk and alienates people passing it on the street (see section title image). Because the site is on the corner of Riddle Rd. and Sandheger Place it has the potential to unify the entire neighborhood, which is what I hope to realize with my project. The neighborhood also becomes part of the site, because I am also intervening to improve the overall quality of the neighborhood. The neighborhood I am referring to consists of a dead end street called Sandheger Place, that has five houses and one apartment complex on it. Sandheger also has access to the back yards of three houses with fronts on Riddle Rd. The apartment complex is a three-story building built in the 60’s with about 20 apartments in it. It has a parking lot that surrounds it and from the parking lot there is a great view over a steep drop off to Probasco and also to the hills of Cincinnati in the distance. The diagrams on the next page are my analysis of the current conditions on the site pertaining to the general principles of home.


Towards a Design

figure 4.2.1 privacy gradient diagram figure 4.2.4 perceived ownership diagram

figure 4.2.2 externalization of identity figure 4.2.5 temporal order diagram

figure 4.2.3 spatial dialectic diagram figure 4.2.6 vehicular and pedestrian traffic  Section 5: Project Description and Design Outcomes

As stated earlier, the project for this thesis is The general design criteria for the site and house are: essentially a speculative house (a house with no client in - Emphasizing Public vs. Private gradient and dialectic mind), and interventions within an established - Emphasizing Ownership: group ownership, individual neighborhood. It is sited in an existing neighborhood, ownership, family ownership, group ownership with which allows for improvement on the neighborhood plan dominant individual owner, physical vs. visual ownership without the need to change (most of) the existing - Developing opportunities for Identity (self expression) architecture. The house itself is both a private house and a and “self programming” (versatility of space) gateway to the community/neighborhood that in the site’s - Creating Temporal Order/Connection through the current state is hidden and ignored. The house is not to be emphasis of daily rituals/cycles, holidays, and important a “club-house” but it is planned in such a way that it events could become the gathering place of the neighborhood. - Emphasis of the Spatial gradient/dialectic: Inside vs. Outside - Encouraging Pedestrian emphasis over Car emphasis, and creating Clear and Distinct Pathways

5.1 Design Methodology and Outcomes The deign methodology for the house and the neighborhood interventions stems from both the general design criteria (discussed in Section 1) and the specific design criteria (distilled from the individual interviews and my family’s current home places). figure 5.1.1 privacy gradient for house  Project Description and Design Outcomes

figure 5.1.2 privacy gradient for site figure 5.1.4 externalization of identity for house

figure 5.1.3 perceived ownership for house figure 5.1.5 externalization of identity for site

figure 5.1.4 perceived ownership for site figure 5.1.6 temporal order for house  Project Description and Design Outcomes

figure 5.1.7 temporal order for site figure 5.1.10 paths for house

figure 5.1.8 spatial dialectic for house figure 5.1.11 vehicular and pedestrian traffic for site

figure 5.1.9 spatial dialectic for site  Project Description and Design Outcomes The more detailed design criteria derived from the individual interviews (used in the detailing of the house itself) are:

- Sunny Place to sit - Bookshelf/Artifact Wall

- Hearth/Fireplace - Open Staircase

 Project Description and Design Outcomes

- Natural Materials - Work/Hobby Area

- Open Kitchen with Informal Dinning - Basement/Storage

 Project Description and Design Outcomes - Bedrooms Upstairs - Garden

- Private Spaces - Patio

 Project Description and Design Outcomes - Brick Walk 5.2 Program Neighborhood Program: - Off street parking (18-20 spaces) - Public park (with allotments, funded by parking fee) - Neighborhood Green-space (shared private and semi- private) - New pathways and sidewalks - Outdoor structures that allow for semi-enclosure of space to denote public and private - 4-car Covered Garage to replace garages being torn down for project (this garage is shared, not private to a specific property)

House Program (Total Square Footage: 4350): - 4 “Bedrooms” upstairs (flexible in size and in use) - 2.5 baths (2 full upstairs, one powder room on main floor) - Entry room - Reception room (Living room), with nook for - Welcoming Community/Neighborhood conversation/reading - “Family” room - Kitchen - Informal Dinning - 3rd floor flexible space (could be studio, could be library, could be second (more private) family room) - Front Porch -Back Patio and Garden - Balcony on Bedroom level - Full Basement

 Project Description and Design Outcomes 5.3 Reflection In retrospect I feel like my project came out pretty well. The design helped me to learn some things about home that I would not have learned without doing an actual project. By doing a “house for anybody” I think I have covered more things about the making of house than about the making of home (design wise), but I knew from the start of the architectural project that I is essentially impossible to design “home”. Because the specifics of the idea of home actually come from the resident, when there is no defined resident it is difficult to see how details play a part in the making of home. But my intent was to make a house that the viewers could look at and see how it could be made into a home for themselves. I never meant to design the perfect home. It was mentioned in my final crit that it might have been more useful to design a home for myself. This certainly would have given me enough material for specific design details, but I still think there is the problem of my concept of home constantly changing. Also there could never really be a critique of the design because it would be so personal that it would be hard to separate myself from the actual architecture. The real benefit of doing a home for myself may have been that by doing something that works for me, I may have set up a pattern that could work for anyone. But because this is not the direction I chose, it is hard to determine if this would be the result. All in all I feel that I have learned many useful things about home and the idea of home that I can apply to my work later in life. This project will always be an ongoing ordeal for me and I will never forget the lessons I learned here.

 Bibliography Alexander, Christopher, Sara Ishikawa, and Murray Israel, Toby. Silverstein. A Pattern Language :Towns, Buildings, Some Place Like Home :Using Design Psychology Construction. New York: Oxford University Press, to Create Ideal Places. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2003. 1977. Lawrence, Roderick J. Bloomer, Kent C., and Charles Willard Moore. “A More Humane History of Homes” in Home Body, Memory, and Architecture. New Haven: Environments, (Eds.) Irwin Altman and Carol Yale University Press, 1977. Werner, 1985. pp. 113-131.

Clark, Robert Judson, et al. Lawrence, Roderick J. Design in America :The Cranbrook Vision, “Deciphering Home: An Integrative Historical 1925-1950. New York: Abrams, in association Perspective” in The Home: Words, Interpretations, with the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Meanings and Environments. (Eds.) David Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1983. Benjamin and David Stea, Avebury: Aldershot, 1995. pp. 53-68. Cooper-Marcus, Clare. House as a Mirror of Self :Exploring the Deeper Railton, Arthur R. Meaning of Home. Berkeley, Calif.: Conari Press, The History of Martha's Vineyard. Beverly, 1995. Massachusetts: Commonwealth Editions, 2006.

Douglas, Mary. Reisley, Roland, Frank Lloyd Wright, and John Timpane. “The Idea of a Home: A Kind of Space” in Home: Usonia, New York: Building a Community with A Place in the World Social Research, special Frank Lloyd Wright. 1st ed. New York: Princeton issue, Vol. 58 No. 1, Spring 1991. Architectural Press, 2001.

Dovey, Kimberly. Saegert, Susan. “Home and Homelessness” in Home “The Role of Housing in the Experience of Environments, (Eds.) Irwin Altman and Carol Dwelling” in Home Environments, (Eds.) Irwin Werner, 1985. pp. 33-64. Altman and Carol Werner, 1985. pp. 287-307.

Duany, Andres, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck. Seaside: Making a Town in America. Ed. David Mohney Suburban Nation :The Rise of Sprawl and the and Keller Easterling. London: Princeton Decline of the American Dream. 1st ed. New Architectural Press, 1991. York: North Point Press, 2000. Werner, Carol, Irwin Altman, and Diana Oxley. Duncan, James. “Temporal Aspects of Home” in Home “The House as a Symbol of Social Structure” in Environments, (Eds.) Irwin Altman and Carol Home Environments, (Eds.) Irwin Altman and Werner, 1985. pp. 1-29. Carol Werner, 1985. pp. 133-149. Wittkopp, Gregory. Eckert, Kathryn Bishop, and Balthazar Korab. Saarinen House and Garden :A Total Work of Art. Cranbrook. New York: Princeton Architectural New York: H.N. Abrams, 1995. Press, 2001.