Just curious

[holmer]

I know that there is a lot going on in this picture but the subject in question is the chimney on the right.

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The next two photos are taken of the chimney viewed from the attic. The home was built around 1870 or so. Current owner has no idea when the modification was made. All the fireplaces below have been removed as well as the partition walls to make bigger rooms on both the first and second floor.

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Do any of you folks out there see this kind of thing very often?

[David C. Argabright]

I saw a one room school that was built around 1840 with a suspended chimney in the center. The difference is that it was made for a free standing stove to attach to and provide heat in the building. It had a simple beam system on each side to hold the weight of the masonry. Metal bars and under-carriage transferred the weight onto the beams above the ceiling. It was still a very solid structure after all these years. Sorry I can't locate the photos.

What you have pictured appears to serve no purpose other than to hold the top of a now useless chimney. Are the tops of the chimneys open and allow water entry? Did they plan on building a new firebox and using the old chimneys? Do they have clay flue liners or exposed brick?

If I saw them I'd recommend they be removed. Then they could do a little something with the upper area.

[Steven Hockstein]

Is it possible that the home is in an historic district and changing the exterior is not permitted? Or maybe the owner felt that the exterior balance of the two chimneys was an important element that needed to be maintained.

[Bill Kibbel]

Do any of you folks out there see this kind of thing very often?

Eric,

I come across it pretty regularly. It's usually an interior renovation that takes out most of the chimney. They usually don't want to remove the exterior portion as it would break the symmetry, or they're waiting for the next re-roof. The "temporary" structures added to support them are rarely adequate.

[Chad Fabry]

My house had three chimneys supported the way Bill's pic shows. My wife had a tantrum when I told her they were the reason the dining room floor was three inches out of level. I used the bricks to build a nice garden wall, but she still wasn't happy.

I have to admit, the house looked better with them, but they were death to the structure.

[Jim Baird]

Have seen similar "support" "systems" from time to time, though usually not as stout.

Time was when kitchens had these little masonry flue columns that served a "Franklin" woodstove. My grandmother had one in her kitchen. She didn't cook on it, but she loved to stoke it up just for the cheer and warmth. When it got hot she might put a black skillet on it to fry up little corn meal "Johnny cakes".

Have seen several "remodeled" kitchens where the column was removed below the ceiling and the upper column "supported" by angle iron screwed to the ceiling joists. Usually the sag in the ceiling is quite noticeable. The remodeler was thereby relieved of the rest of the chimbley removal and consequent roof repair.

[hausdok]

Chimbley?!

Heck Jim, I haven't heard that colloquialism for at least 30 years. It's what the locals in the farming town of Amenia, NY, (population 1100 give or take) where I grew up, used to call 'em.

I sure hope you aren't calling them that in your reports - unless your wearing oversized bib coveralls and a straw hat, that is. []

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

[Scottpat]

The Chimbley Sweep!

I am a chimbley, a chimbley sweep

No bed to lie, no shoes to hold my feet

On a rooftop in dead of night

You’ll hear me cry I’ll shake you from your sleep

To hear me weep. Your day will come indeed.

For I am a poor and a wretched boy,

A chimbley, chimbley sweep.

I am an orphan, an orphan boy

I’ve known no love; I’ve seen no mother’s joy

A dirty doorstep, my cradle lay

My fortunes made I’ll shake you from your sleep

To hear me weep. Your day will come indeed.

For I am a poor and a wretched boy,

A chimbley, chimbley sweep.

"Oh, lonely urchin," the widow cries

"I’ve not been swept since the day my husband died."

Her cheeks are blushing, her legs lay bare

And shipwrecked there I’ll shake you from your sleep

To hear me weep

Your day will come indeed

For I am a poor and a wretched boy,

A chimbley, chimbley sweep.

For I am a poor and a wretched boy,

A chimbley, chimbley sweep.

From Bath England, Author is unknown.

[Les]

Finally some gud poetry!!

[Jim Baird]

I was born in Dixie in a boomer's shack,

Just a little shanty by the railroad track.

Freight train whistle taught me how to cry,

Mama made the driver sing a lullaby.

from Freight Train Blues, by Bob Dylan

[Erby]

Poor unswept widow!

[BADAIR]

Robert Frost wanted to add his take on the chimneys in the photos

The Kitchen Chimney

Poem lyrics of The Kitchen Chimney by Robert Frost.

Builder, in building the little house,

In every way you may please yourself;

But please please me in the kitchen chimney:

Don't build me a chimney upon a shelf.

However far you must go for bricks,

Whatever they cost a-piece or a pound,

But me enough for a full-length chimney,

And build the chimney clear from the ground.

It's not that I'm greatly afraid of fire,

But I never heard of a house that throve

(And I know of one that didn't thrive)

Where the chimney started above the stove.

And I dread the ominous stain of tar

That there always is on the papered walls,

And the smell of fire drowned in rain

That there always is when the chimney's false.

A shelf's for a clock or vase or picture,

But I don't see why it should have to bear

A chimney that only would serve to remind me

Of castles I used to build in air.