Mantle Mysteries
Rhone House Mantle Mystery
In 1984, Dr. Richard Morgan purchased the Rhoneymeade farm and Rhone House. In the following year the house was remodeled/restored extensively. The East and West bedrooms on the second floor had partitions within them creating additional small bedrooms. By initial appearance one would suspect the partitions were not original 1855 construction and added at some later time as the family grew. These two partitions were removed as part of the restoration process and revealed some interesting conditions. As shown in the following slides, the removal of the East bedroom partition left the intact mantle/surround of the fireplace which was subsequently repainted. The removal of the West room partition revealed a mantle/surround that was modified to allow the position of the wall. Without more careful investigation at the time of the remodeling it was assumed that the West room mantle/surround had been chopped off to allow for construction of the partition. This appears not to be the case! The partition in the East bedroom was nailed to the floor with relatively uniform spacing which is indicative of more modern construction that utilizes a bottom plate in the framing. The partition in the West bedroom showed clusters of nail holes indicative of earlier style construction where studs were toe-nailed directly into the floor without use of a bottom plate. Thus we conclude that while the partition in the West bedroom may not have been a part of the original design, it likely was part of the original construction!