Thursday, February 15, 2007

The name is HOOVER

The Old Hoover House which went through many uses is an amazing structure. It had a small creek that ran under the western foundation, which allowed the family to have water year round. An elaborate hand pump in the basement was used to move water into the attic. Thus the house had running water from the water pressure coming from the tank at the highest point of the house.

One of the children who grew up in the house returned in the summer of 1992 and gave us some interesting history of the home.

Did you know that the exterior walls were 12 inches thick - poured concrete - and exactly 40 feet one half inch in length. The basement had a fireplace which was used for boiling sap to make maple syrup and there were many rooms in the basement which were used to dry and preserve fruit from the many fruit trees that grew on the property.

The house had, at one time, used natural gas for heating, directly from the floor of Lake Erie. Natural Gas bubbles up through the lake floor in several places, and the Hoovers taped into it.

The foundation of the original home the Hoovers lived in was directly north of the old house. When we arrived it was covered in refuse that had been dumped there, and was over grown. Using money from a Canada Works Program we cleaned up the site and discovered the old foundation.

You can read about the history of the Hoover family here.

But from the pages of Camp Selkirk history comes this picture from within the house! Thanks J9!

7 comments:

J9 said...

Yeah, that was from '93...not sure who's bra that is, I think it might have been Trish Convery's...

Anonymous said...

Hey Fred I also remember doing a thorough cleaning of the attic in Hoover, and we might have even done a little down in the basement too.

Anyone remember how easy it was to scale the back wall on the fire pit side?

I'm pretty sure we scared the life out of the girls one night doing this, it was summer '92.

Sue Matthews said...

Mark, I don't know about scaling the back wall, but I did almost get fired for jumping off one of the second floor balconies.

I thought Mrs. Lewis was off the campgrounds for the day. She drove back up the driveway as I was dangling from the balcony getting ready to drop. Her youngest son was with her in the car.

Something about me being a bad example...

J9 said...

I was so disappointed when we were kicked out of Hoover! The whole time I was growing up, that was where the girls staff lived. It just wasn't the same in the old hospital!

(for one thing, we didn't have to worry about "the ghost of Jacob Hoover" anymore!)

Fred and Wendy said...

Oh, didn't you hear? The ghost of Jacob Hoover moved into Cabin 10 in 1990.

J9 said...

Nah, that was Jacob Jr. The original Jacob was all ours.... ;)

Anonymous said...

HAHA! The ghost of Jacob Hoover in cabin 10 ... great memory! I'm sure he spent most of his time in the DYS cottage and visited cabin 10 on his rounds ...