History of a Reed Road Farm House:

(Many thanks to Bonnie Maxton-Harvey for this submission.)

Although definitive records have yet to be discovered, this two-story frame home was most likely built between 1885-95 as part of a working farmstead. It contains no stained glass or architectural flourishes, aside from some interesting outside framing on its front windows. Yet it is well-built and solid—a sturdy reflection of its practical purpose.

Franklin County records show that, in 1920, the property consisting of the house and a large but undetermined number of acres to the east of house, was owned by the Hartsook family. At that time, Reed Road was a rural two-lane road.

The Hartsook family had a fruit orchard and sold produce to the public, but the extent and nature of their farming operations is currently unknown. At some point, the Hartsooks sold off much of their land to the east for residential development. All of the roads in this subdivision are named after Hartsook girls: Grace, Mary Sue, Ritamarie, Patricia. There’s even a Hartsook Lane.

In 1976, a checklist compiled by the State of Ohio as part of a Bicentennial historic homes survey documented that the home was in “poor” condition and was the residence of the last member of the Hartsook family, who subsequently died in the mid-1980s. In 1986, the property was transferred to a One Brick Short, Inc., which rebuilt parts of the foundation and refurbished the interior of the home to modernize it. In 1987, the remaining land, approximately one half-acre, was split, and the southerly lot, sold.  \Today, the home sits on .272 acres. One Brick Short, Inc., also constructed a two-car unattached cinder-block garage at the back of the lot, where a chicken coop once stood.

The two-story core of the house—containing a side parlor and a bedroom—was constructed first, along with a front parlor facing the road and a roofed front porch. The floor plan was typical of Midwestern residential stick construction at that time and was possibly sourced from a mail-order catalog. The rooms have nine-foot-high ceilings and horsehair-plaster walls. Separate entry doors opening from the front porch lead directly into the front parlor and the side parlor, respectively. 

A kitchen addition was later tacked onto the back of the house along with a small pantry plus a utility room whose floor contains the trap door into the cellar. The rustic dirt-floored cellar was dug directly under the core of the house and currently contains the furnace and water heater. The cellar walls were constructed using undressed river stone. 

A small attic above the kitchen was constructed with black walnut roof beams that have hardened to the consistency of iron bar, thanks to the heat of 120+ degree summers. An enormous black walnut tree—one of the oldest surviving trees in Upper Arlington—is the last relic of a grove that supplied the timber. 

The home’s exterior walls are of vertical wooden waffle-style construction with exterior horizontal painted wood siding. “Insulation” was originally provided by several inches of air space in-between vertical boards placed at 18-inch intervals, although blown-in insulation was added in the early 2000s.

Brick fireplaces with inside stacks originally provided heating in each downstairs room (front parlor, side parlor, and kitchen). Upstairs heating was provided by air-flow registers. The inside chimney stacks were removed around 2005 because the soft red bricks were spalling and disintegrating. Two of the home’s three brick chimney stacks, which had become unstable, were removed when the home was re-roofed in 2010. The front parlor’s original faux marble wooden fireplace has been retained, but because the chimney has not been lined with modern fireproofing materials, no fires are burned there. 

The home’s 13 original counterbalanced sash windows, which reach from near the ceiling to within two feet of the floor, were replaced with modern insulated windows in 2006 because the pulley ropes had broken and the single-pane windows lacked screens and were drafty. Insulated screen doors were added in 1998, but the home’s three original outside wooden doors have been retained. Louvered windows that had been installed in the utility room were replaced with insulated sash windows at the same time. Insulated shades that be both raised and lowered have been installed on most of the windows to provide privacy and increase heat retention.

A wellhead dug just outside the kitchen window (which is currently concealed by a deck) provided the home’s water source. By the 1930s, the Hartsooks had placed a window and pump handle just inside the kitchen, enabling them to boast of having running water inside the house. It is currently unknown where the family’s privy shed was located. However, the home appears to have been well-shaded: the decayed remains of an enormous tree stump, the circumference of three adults with arms outstretched, was uncovered when the south side of the current deck was landscaped. A neighbor told me that the tree had fallen in 1986, demolishing the chicken coop where the garage now stands.

The home has been remodeled many times over the years. It now includes a full downstairs bath with a walk-in shower, plus a small home office, where the downstairs bedroom once stood. The front parlor is used as a family room. The side parlor (nearest the kitchen) is used as a TV room. One of the three upstairs bedrooms has been converted to a full bath with tub and shower. Two bedrooms remain, one above the side parlor, the other above the front parlor. In a different era, the upstairs once slept six Hartsook childen.

The home is economical to run, as it retains heat in the winter and remains cool in the summers. Opening the windows provides a nice through-breeze. Whole house AC is called upon during hot and humid weather. Each room has its own interior door, which can be closed to maximize privacy or retain heat. A whole-house gas generator was installed along with a modern electrical panel in 2014.