Mystery House cont.

Continue from last post... So I waited a bit more, and I could see someone looking through the window by the door. Moments later, an elderly gentleman with white hair, in a white button-down white shirt, opened the door with a crack. I was terribly embarrassed. "Hi, I am terribly sorry for being intrusive. We both work at HMS, and I pass this house often on my way to work. I am always curious about the history of this house... Was it really built in 1793?" I pointed to the number on the door frame under the eagle relief. Noticing the number was a big relief- it gave me the opportunity to ask a concrete question. He looked at us, then started the following tale in a deliberate manner. "No, it was built 1591 in Holland following a Dutch town hall..." (Imagine the eyes of both A and me became saucer wide and "Wow"s coming out of us) "It was taken apart and moved to Chicago in 1893 for the World Expo. Afterwards, it was taken apart and moved here." Needless to say I was awe struck. He also explained where the "1793" came from, but on that part, both A's and my memories are a bit blurry- I think we were both in shock at that moment. Here is the summary of what we can put together somewhat coherently. Somehow it seemed a Dutch cocoa company acquired the house around 1793, and sponsored its transport to and display at the Chicago Expo- all parts of their advertisement campaign for their cocoa. "That was the time before coffee became popular, you know". He told us.

After telling us the history of the house, he opened the door a bit more and said "Would you like to come in to take a look of the inside?" OMG! It is a miracle! He must be reading my mind! At this point I was ABSOLUTELY dying to see the interior of the house, but it is not something you could ask, could you? I nodded my head as fast as I could (quoting a Chinese analogy, like a chicken picking up grains "如鸡哆米”) and thanked him profusely. We stepped inside. He explained that he had his office downstairs and his wife has an art studio upstairs. There is a beautiful wooden staircase to the left, a coat closet, and an antique pendulum clock on the wall. We were told the clock was also from about the same time the house was built. They found it in some antique shop and spent lots of time having it fixed.

Next we turned right into the living room. I must admit my senses were overwhelmed. It was like a Dutch decorative art museum, but it was better than a museum, because it has the more intimate, lively feeling only associated with a human occupied living space. I didn't know where to look first! It is not like I was in a real museum that I can take all of my time and wander to anywhere I like. I can only offer a laundry list of things I remember here that cannot do its justice. But oh well.

There were beautiful porcelains, majority of them blue-white china-plates, vases, on the wall, window sills, display cabinets. The picture with this post shows what a typical Dutch blue plate looks like, not actually from the house. There is a Tang three-color horse too =). Some sculptures, oil portrait paintings, a harpsichord. There are several magnificent cast iron chandeliers, which I was told to be Victorian. The wallpaper, actually I don't know exactly the material of it, is in a rich Burgundy color with raised golden Baroque? Victorian? flora, medallion, Neptune? face patterns. The wood work in this house is absolutely gorgeous! The ceiling panels are painted with decorative motifs. There are a pair of golden Renaissance dolphins, and a very pretty dutch girl statue in one fireplace. Now the fireplaces. He showed us the fireplaces-they are decorated with blue-white tiles from the 1890's. These tiles picture scenes from the Biblical stories, while all the characters are in Dutch style clothes-like Joseph wearing pantaloons. He specifically pointed out one appeared several times of a man carrying some wood panels. He told us that he couldn't figure out what this picture was about until one day he read from cover to cover and finally realized that it was Samson carrying the gate of Gaza. He then led us to a plate he collected with the exactly same design on it! The kitchen of the house has been renovated by his architect son. The kitchen is updated with modern appliances. They really did a fantastic job maintaining the house in good forms. I asked if it is a lot of work to keep it up. He said actually no. The house was extremely well built. Each wooden beam has red paint marks on it. He also told this story: they tried to put in an extra bathroom -there was only one originally. To put the the pipes in they had to open the wall, and there was some grass in the wall. So he was like "My god there are small animals living in there!" But an old carpenter told him that this grass was "eel grass". Apparently the grass soaks up the salt and minerals from the sea and thus becomes somewhat fire proof. So it used as insulation for the house! You learn something new everyday! While we were there one clock struck 5 o'clock. I was very much distracted by the charming sound. A said he noticed at least 5 different clocks ticking away, since they are not perfectly in sync. I also noticed a small beautifully decorated porcelain bowl which I took as a barber's basin since it has the shape of Don Quixote's helmet =).

He told us that with his wife they travelled to Holland to visit the original town hall, which was still in use. The Dutch original's bell tower houses 102 bells that play a hymn every 10 minutes! The bell tower of his house was damaged in a hurricane a long time ago (could it be the one in1938?). The Dutch original still performs civil services like weddings.

I was filled with more questions, but we've been inside the house for at least 30 minutes. He showed us to the door. We thanked him again and again. I hope he could tell how grateful I was. It was so kind of him to let us in. I understand he was taking some risk in doing so. It must be many many years of effort to put together such a collection, the exquisite furniture, decorations. I felt very fortunate to be inside of the house and hear about its extraordinary story.

An after note: the house is in high renaissance style.