We have a phone line to the house from our cabin down in our dingle (pictured in my avatar). The Panasonic system phone I installed in there didn't fit with the cabin decor, so a couple of months ago, I started looking for an old wooden wall phone for it, or a newer replica wooden phone. Nothing I found met my desires, so, ultimately, I decided to build my own. I had some antique oak salvaged from a poorly restored dresser that fell apart (top and drawer fronts). The rest went to firewood and kindling. It took a lot of looking on the Internet, and some thinking and figuring to get the design and all the functionality I wanted, AND be able to make it all out of the limited wood at hand. I bought all the antique and reproduction works and trim on-line from PHONECO Antique phone, collectible telephone, old telephone. Here is the final project, before I installed it yesterday. Before anyone asks, yes, it works. The bells ring, and if I wish to place a call, I just lift the receiver and then lift the writing shelf to reveal the concealed TouchTone pad. And, if I need more access to our home phone system, I just open the door... And there is the system phone. I even wired it so that cranking the magneto rings the bells. Doing this, I learned how to make box joints (made a lot of kindling on practice pine pieces...), and plunge-rout the "picture frame" around the transmitter mount.
I love it! When were were kids we actually had a working phone system here using the old phones. The phone line went from my Grandmother's House to my parents house, then up to my Uncles Home. The Phone system worked until well into the 1980's, but by then the 6 volt, dry cell batteries were hard to find. Today with the internet it probably would not be an issue to find though. My house is decorated in 1930 decor, partly because we got a lot of antiques from my Grandmother's house, and because Katie just loves the 1930's. We now have my Grandmother's phone in our home, but sadly it does not work...just an old phone not hooked to anything!
"We now have my Grandmother's phone in our home, but sadly it does not work." Heck, we can make it work. We have the technology. Assuming the elements are still in the handset, all you need is a 425 style network block, and maybe a 0.47 or 1 uF cap to help the bells ring on ring cycle from the phone company. BTW, what's the name on the nameplate?
I have no idea what that stuff is my friend. It has all the "guts" and is working as far as I know. Every wire is still attached to stuff. My father's used 6 volt dry cell batteries, but this one has a crank and lots of parts inside. It is a Western Electric, but no model number...
I noticed you lived in CA which is too bad...only because there are many of these types of phones at the Fairfield Antique Mall in Fairfield, Maine. It is a vast place where antiquers set up areas and consign stuff. Because a couple of hundred antiquers are competing against themselves, prices are held to reasonable levels. As an example I have seen kitchen cook stoves as low as $500 when they are $1200 elsewhere, and old phonographs with those Edison Like speakers go for $300. I stick with 1930 stuff, but go with less priced items like the fan ($35) and the 1930 radio in this photo for $30. I did almost grab a REAL icebox for $450 though, but chose not too in the end. I feel those are decent prices for antiques, but your mileage on that may vary. BTW: is there any hope for that radio atop of that dinnerware chest? It works, but I could not get it to pick up any AM stations. My wife's grandfather gave me a rebuild kit for the record player part of it. (The lid lifts up to reveal that part of it, but we typically keep it closed due to dust). I love antiques and would love to see it cast music of some sort again!
First of all, don't plug the radio in or try to play it again until it's restored. The capacitors in it are probably dried out and might pop. Sure, it can be restored. Tubes are still available on-line. After a good cleanup and inspection, you can do one of 2 types of restoration. A functional one removed the old capacitors, which are no longer available, and replaces them with new. An appearance restoration leaves the capacitor cans in place. They are either disconnected and new caps are hidden under the chassis, or for an even more original appearance, the old cans are gutted and new caps hidden inside. Then, anything else is replaced or repaired, and an alignment is performed. Google antique radio restoration, or look for an interested amateur radio operator aka ham in your area that might be interested.
BTW, I know the restoration can be done. Here are my grandparents 1948 RCA Victor TV and my Dad's WWI vintage Philco radio. Both were restored 15-20 years ago. Both work (but there's nothing on the air to see on the TV unless I hook it to my home cable system). Nothing like the aroma of an old tube receiver warming up...
Nice restoration! We have kids so our TV gets a lot of work (though no cable TV here, just air TV and DVD's so we can limit what the kids see for filth and fake news). So we do have a modern flat screen TV which is actually in this photo. It is inside the cabinet hanging off the wall behind my wife and can see if you look close enough. We just hated how it looked before; a house full of 1930 stuff and then...a modern flat screen TV! Yuck! So we cover it up instead. We have the same issue though in our kitchen, but with our refrigerator. It needs to be rounded with the compressor on top, and while they do make them, they cost $3000 and I am not paying that, Well at least right now.
I really like that potbellied stove. I might have put one in the cabin if I'd found one at the time. Instead, Dad cut and laid a real stone Rumford style fireplace. (Gotta keep some firewood theme here ). As far as the fridge is concerned, you could skin it to look like an icebox. That's the next cabin project, skinning the bar fridge. You can see the door a little to the left side of the picture. Here's a better picture. Or, find a squatty one, and fabricate a faux condenser coil for the top.
There is a bit of backstory behind that 1893 pot bellied stove. Our old one crapped out, so we wet looking for a used one in the want ads and found this stove online. We arranged to meet the guy and paid him the $100 he wanted for it. As we talked, we found out he knew a lot of the people that he knew. In fact, being a Christian, he led his co-worker to the Lord, who that man in turn, years later was the one that led me to the Lord! So he handed back the $100 bill and loaded my trailer with a lot of odds and ends like motors, steel, hydraulic cylinders, etc...so ultimately I got this stove for free, but wait...there is more! So we are friends now, and when he found out I had Cancer, sent us $500 in a get well card. Then sent another $100 for Christmas presents for our daughters. In the meantime, the stove he gave us needed some parts, but there is an old stove shop and museum nearby, so Katie and I headed there to get some stove legs. We walk into a tractor trailer box full of thousands of old stove legs and are just overwhelmed. But in 3 minutes time Katie finds the two wee need! The owner was shocked saying people spend hours in there trying to find them, and we found them in 3 minutes time for a 125 year old stove! Then Katie sees it...like a light shining from above...a 1917 Crawford Gas stove. Well it is a small world and my Grandfather worked for the owner as a machinist for many years, and it seems they are getting out of gas stoves and going to only old wood stoves. The daughter who runs the place now makes an off-handed comment that she would sell every gas stove for half off, so me seizing an economic opportunity, and one to always carry cash, tell her I would buy it for half off, $700 cash on the barrel head. So in the end this kitchen cook stove followed us home. (Sorry, not a very flattering photo of Katie, but it shows the stove better).
That is a great idea about cladding the refrigerator and turning it into an "electric ice box". I do have some woodworking skills long stashed away as ever since getting into sheep farming, I just have not had time to do much of it. But I am sure I could make something decent, so thanks for the idea.
For the ice box, I made a frame and rabbeted the inside of the back to hold the 1/4" front slats in place with glue. It slips over the door and is held on with screws through the sides. I still need to make a frame for the fridge box to mount the door and latch on. You can find reproduction ice box hinges, latches, and nameplates on-line. I got mine from historichouseparts.com. Hey, I don't see any period push button wall switches in your pics. I got one for the cabin from the site above. The phone now hangs next to it. Maybe you shouldn't let your wife see that. Sooner or later, I'm going to paint that Wiremold aged copper to match the box and wall plate.
It is actually the opposite here, I would like to make the house as 1930's as possible, but she really is not into it. For instance I would like to replace the couches and recliners with more 1930 looking ones, but she likes the recliners in them, ease of cleaning, etc. It is the same thing with electrical boxes and switches. I am 100% with you on swapping that stuff out, but she is okay with a 1930's look and not 100% authenticity (if that kind of makes sense to you). I might be able to convince her otherwise if we chose to move into my Grandmother's home. We are considering downsizing houses and moving into another house we own (my late Grandmother's) and that is a 1900 Sears Four Square. Because of its much smaller size, and actual age, we could do a lot because it does not mean replacing outlets, that house was built before electricity came here in 1930 so the one outlet it has is not going to cut it in 2018! It was modified some from t=what we think is the original plan simply because houses in 1900 here did not have bathrooms; they had an outhouse, no electricity and heated the house with wood. In New England that REQUIRED a chimney in the center of the house. It has a brand new chimney (along with new kitchen and bathroom), but we are thinking about knocking down the chimney because it makes the upstairs room really awkward! You can read more about that downsizing decision here: Rent or Sell
Funny story on electricity here: Back in the 1930's they were putting electricity to rural farms in Maine, but they targeted dairy farms due to the need to refrigerate milk to reduce spoilage. Well a dairy farm was several miles away so as close as the power came was 1 mile from here. So as teenagers, my Grandfather and his chum brother, cut, peeled, dug holes and set powerline poles hoping that if most of the work was done for them, the power company would just run power to their potato farm; not considered a priority. It did not work. In fact they had to wait several years before power came, but when it did, they used their poles still adding insult to injury.
I love stuff from the '40's and '50's. Here's a '57 telephone some friends gave me. I have bought a few Chambers stoves also. Chambers stoves were the Cadillac of stoves in the '40's and '50's. Due to the large amount of rock wool insulation in these, their motto, put on all their stoves, was "Cooks With the Gas Turned Off". Typically you fire the oven for a certain amount of time and then shut it off and your food will continue to cook due to the great insulation around the oven. The downside to this is their weight. Typically 350 pounds or so. The blue one is the one I'm putting into the house I'm building. They yellow one I will eventually restore and sell. And I also picked up a Chambers In-A-Wall oven. This one is the copper model, from '57, and came with the original literature.
That is one of the reasons why we got the Crawford Stove for such a low price. It has NO insulation at all in it. The woman said tucked inside a cabinet recess like a modern stove and it could catch on fire, but I seriously doubt that. I say that because the oven only gets to 500 degrees and there is 6 inches of space around the oven because the grill top is bigger than its oven base. At best it is right at the threshold of burning wood temperature wise, and still 6 inches put back from that...very doubtful on burning. Even then a person could clad the counters with non-burnable substances like Durarock. But Katie just uses the grill part of it anyway, and the oven for storage. I disabled the oven burners. She has a modern wall oven for her oven making needs, but sadly she wants a big one for our big family, and gas wall ovens only come in small. Not sure why, but that is how it works, so we have electric for the wall oven. :-(
