A Sense of History, Part 2

We've been especially blessed when it comes to home furnishings.  Not only did we get to buy several nice pieces of our household furnishings in Korea from Lockheed upon our departure for a significantly reduced price, but we've also been gifted with several "heirloom" pieces from various family members.

The chest of drawers in the master bedroom is an elegant, refinished piece from my Memaw Kerr.  Our dining room table is an elegant, but somewhat dirtied (by us) piece from my Grandma and Grandpa Beerwinkle.  The dusty rose chaise lounge in the master bedroom is a well-kept piece from my great-aunt Zelma and I've loved it since I was a little girl.  And Gideon's bedstead and chest of drawers are simple, sturdy pieces that were once in the home of my great-grandparents Beerwinkle.

The last piece to take a place in our home is the icebox my grandparents Beerwinkle acquired (most likely) secondhand when they married in 1936.  My dad, born in 1942, remembers ice blocks being delivered for the icebox by the ice man, so it was used well into the 40s.

Then electricity reached Moffat, Texas, and the icebox was relegated to various barns, workshops and sheds (including ours) for the better part of 50 years or more.  And during those years, it became home to numerous families of various types of rodents, who pissed, crapped and birthed their young all over it, leaving it with a foul odor that filled the whole of our 2-car garage here in Maryland.

Before

But thanks to locally-owned, family-operated Schoenbauer's Furniture Service - who sanded it, placed in a special ozone chamber to reduce odor, hand-made replacement tongue-and-groove slats for the top left of the piece, and finished and coated it - this neglected undesirable can now be welcomed into the house and take its place among the other treasured pieces we count ourselves lucky to have - pieces that help give us a sense of history.

After