Hester Bradford's House

I continued to collect antique dollhouse furniture all of my working life.  I traveled a lot driving Geo Metro's, saving the travel and gas per diem for spending at antique stores.  I started to buy on ebay, and discovered that the person I bought from the most lived one town over from me-Ann Meehan.  Man, that got expensive!  But we pal'd around some, and she got to know what I liked, and I got to know lots of dealers.  

 Sometime later Ann and Sue Singer split a house worth of furniture and asked if I wanted the house.  By then I had about 10 old houses, and had just gotten a Hacker.  This new house was going to be big and I wasn't sure.  My husband, bless his heart said 'We can always find room for another house'... so off I went to see the large glass fronted house.  Imagine my surprise when Sue handed me a little pile of papers and a letter:


The Bradford House!!!
Ok, so, meant to be!  My first thought was 'I can have a Bradford house of my own!  Yes, yes, yes!!!' Of course, I would need to strip it down and decide what rooms I would recreate.  The attic and first floor would be pretty easy to decide, but not so the second floor.

 There were also photos with the house, showing how it looked in 1905 when it was new.  The more I poured over those photos, the sadder I felt.  Indeed, one photo was of a late middle aged woman with a note that said, 'So Sarah will know what I looked like when she gets the house.'   Okay.... since the photos showed the inside in 1905, it was relatively easy to fill it back up with what it had in the beginning.



The house in 1977

 Where it sits now makes it hard to photograph, here's a shot of the Parlor, as close to the photograph as I could get.  


I can't afford ormolu chandeliers, so the house got antique beaded ones instead.

So I came away with a Bradford house, just not The Bradford House- but the seed was planted..
ETA:  Here is a photo of my daughter and grandson at the Bradford house today, taking photos and videos for me-  Is it huge or what?

Comments

  1. TroyMay 29, 2019 at 8:55 AM

    Great photo and a great project!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Donna ROctober 4, 2019 at 10:56 AM

    Oh my gosh, envy is not an emotion I feel often, if ever, but to have an antique house with pix of how it originally looked, with a story by the original owner was beyond anything I could EVER hope to find (or afford if I did find it!). That is incredible! Thanks so much for sharing!!!!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thanks for taking the time to tell me what you are thinking about The House- I read all the posts, and need lots of helpful encouragement from all!

Popular posts from this blog

Finally!

Image
Woo Hoo!  I am euphoric!  I bought a new laptop, and it only took me 4 weeks to find and remember the log-in for The Bradford House Blog.  Yay me!!!  It only took me 2 weeks to download the camera apps and figure them out, lol.  I still can't crop... Here are some photo updates: Night Nursery:  I took this photo a while ago, I now have the exact wardrobe in there.  The cradle is good enough for now (I did the gold paint), but I really need a baby walker instead of a play pen. I didn't seem to take a better photo of the library- and the ceiling light pieces are sitting here ready to be glued together.   Here's a shot of the house from standing back a little- Yes, I did put orange lights around it.  What can I say?  I got distracted by Halloween. My friend Patty sent me some perfect (or exact) accessories: A ship in a bottle The doll chair in Alice's room A Strombecker table for the Day...
Read more

How Time Flies

Image
I can't blame my tardiness with posting entirely on the holidays, it just seems like it is getting much easier for time to get away from me.  Sheesh! There have been some wonderful changes since the last time I showed you photos- There are a number of things in the house that I have worried I will never be able to find- or afford- including the Dining Room set, the 'Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep' sampler in Alice's room, and how am I going to get a Butler's Pantry built-in? Well, well, well, look what the builder showed up with this weekend!  Ok, so don't look too closely at the temporary 'pulls', I'm just trialing things.  I bought some Chrysnbon dishes but they are too small and 'flat'.  I guess I am going to have to slowly build a stock of various table settings.   And my oh my, the  Dining Room table showed up!  Lol, TheToyBox on etsy has had a fair amount of things for the house.  One of my favorite shops! Bliss. And...
Read more

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas!

Image
Last time I showed you how Faith Bradford decorated her house at Christmas- Tree with presents, circle of greens with candles on the mantle, and one lonely candy cane on the piano bench.  What an odd little pitcher on the TynieToy round table. I've made headway in mine: The entire right section of my room is empty.  The TynieToy flip top table is on it's way from Ann Meehan, and what is the odd little pitcher on it made from?  I have no TynieToy chairs for this room, but that should be fairly easy, albeit expensive.  There are 4 matching chairs in just this room. Today I did string white lights all round the house, and hung some wreaths on it like I imagine Faith did.  Artistic license, lol. The Parlor maid needs to be dressed, or in this case over-dressed.  I am pretty sure I can get a black dress with apron on over the green without altering what looks to be an old outfit.  She has a new feather duster in her hand, but I found an ol...
Read more