Italy Spitaly

I've traveled to Italy, Spitaly, France and Spain
Over the hills and back again...or at least over to Rome (Pennsylvania that is).

Happy May Day and a word of warning! This is a looooooooong post with many photos. Go get yourself a cup of coffee and have a seat, you might be here for a while. (All of the photos in this post are mine except for those pre-auction pics of the inside of the house. I lifted those from the auction ad.)

We spent a summery May Day at a country auction poking through the remains of an old homestead in Rome, PA. The house and its contents were all on the auction block and for at least the last 100 years (and probably more) this sweet home housed several generations including the most recent inhabitant Reva. She, her late husband, their kids and his parents had at one time all lived in the house together.

The auction listing advertised the house and property as a
"country estate".

It has a former chicken coop and an old pig barn.

As the auctioneers tell it Reva was a real "corker". She zipped through town on a moped wearing a hot pink Artic Cat snowmobile helmet, was as cheap as the day was long and would let you know in no uncertain terms whether she liked you (or not). The auction house selling her property yesterday had been to this homestead back in 1974 when Reva's husband passed away. At that time they sold off the farm and the equipment and all but the two acres which housed the tarpaper-shingle-covered Greek Revival house. Evidently Reva hadn't lived in the house full time for some time, but she returned there regularly for a weekend or two and to stay there in the summers. It was clear she never parted with anything.

When they returned to clean out the house after Reva's death this past January the auctioneers said it looked exactly as it did 36 years ago. They even came upon the 1974 receipt from the previous auction. It was like time had stood still, only it didn't stop in 1974, it stopped sometime between 1935 and 1950! Reva's husband's clothes and all of his belongings were still in the house and his hat was still hanging up by the door. Such sweet souls.

The house has NO indoor toilets but it does have running water from a hand dug well near by. Now, I have to muse on this thought for a minute. It's one thing to have no indoor plumbing in 1935, but we're talking 1974 here and this woman was no spring chicken! That's what I call hardy.

The ladder is leaning against the outhouse.

Fortunately the auction company rented a porta-potty,

otherwise we would've been using this

Yep, it's a two-seater!

And there's plenty to read - although I don't know exactly

how you position yourself to take advantage of it

Note the potty next to the chair.

They sold many of these yesterday!

Inside the house they found a 1930's Maytag wringer washer, two International Harvester refrigerators and two antique coal/wood cook stoves. All had been in recent use! One stove even had two full buckets of coal next to it and was all ready to be fired up. They found an old lawn tractor which Reva evidently kept in her kitchen and if their story is correct, she marched the old thing down the kitchen steps and outside, mowed the two-acre lawn and then marched it right back inside.

With that kind of care I bet it still runs great!

There were room-sized linoleum rugs in every room and beautiful old screen printed paper on all of the walls. Every window had matching curtains and there were large prints and antique photographs in elaborate frames all over the walls. This house had obviously been well loved and tended to at one time.

As you'll see I was a little obsessed with the linoleum rugs! You never (and I mean never) see intact rugs of this size. Get ready - I have shots of almost every room!

Downstairs parlor

Downstairs bedroom

Upstairs bedroom no. 1

Upstairs bedroom no. 2

Upstairs bedroom no. 3

Back porch and kitchen no. 1 (yes, there were TWO kitchens)

Kitchen no. 2

They were able to rescue two small linoleum rugs and
guess who came home with both of them?
Me! I'm still looking for the perfect spot for the other one.


Here's the wallpaper series...

Kitchen no. 1

Pantry shelves

Kitchen no. 2


Downstairs bedroom
They just don't make stuff like this anymore...


A the start of the auction the auctioneer announced proudly
"Everything in this sale is OLD!"
I think I heard someone up front mumble "So is the help!"

I was quite taken with this guy.
He seemed to know everyone and was just having a grand old time!

At the end of the day our car was loaded

and I was very happy to have met Miss Reva.