Age of building?

[bergie]

Can anyone help with the age of a building. I'm going to post photos when I can get out there. It's raining right now so we can't detect this new site yet, but hopefully later or soon. Building is made of large stones and is a two story former hotel and bar, with additional basement level. I can't find any local info on it yet. It's easily back to mid-late 1800s, but I suspect it could be earlier. It has red bricks lining some of the window frame areas if that helps determine age. Also, would anyone know whether a building like this would have had a wood floor or would the basement floor have been dirt?

 

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[billinstuart]

Building methods varied depending the area of the country, depending on several factors including what materials were available locally. One item usually fairly widely used was interior doors/hardware/trim, and these can often be used to date a building. Most multi-floor rural buildings definitely used wood floor systems.

 

[Cladius]

Sould be able to find out at tax office ?

 

[billinstuart]

Don't count on it. Buildings that old often didn't have permits, no property taxes.

 

[river city]

hello bergie,can you see the wooden beams in the house?are they hand hewn?can you see where the beams are put together if they are in a mortise and tenon style with a peg holding the joint together,look at the hole where the peg goes in.on the outer edges of the hole where it was drilled if it is a perfect circle it was pobably built after 1810.if the holes have a kind of notch on the edge where the hole was started by the drill bit it was made somewhere before 1810 ,i think.the new style drill bit that drills a perfect circle when starting the hole was not invented until about 1810,i think the dates are close but im not sure.a little more reserch might help.hope this helps

 

[bergie]

Thanks very much. I'd have to go back and look closely about the beams now that I know what to look for. There's obvious fire damage on the parts of the beams still sticking out of the stones. We have pretty much set this site aside to search, given it hasn't produced anything. We think it was probably searched in decades past.