After only a year and a half in this new old house, I finally got around to disconnecting our gutter downspouts from the sewer system.  It wasn’t difficult at all, once I remembered the Rule #1 of KC home improvement: When in doubt, always go to Strasser Hardware on Southwest Boulevard.  That’s the only place that had the proper plugs to top kill the old standpipes.

Apparently it used to be the fashion to direct your rainwater into the storm sewers instead of onto the grass where it can be soaked up and re-used by mother nature.  This is a bit of problem here in the older park of KC where we our storm sewers are still combined with our poo sewers – when it rains a lot all at once the whole thing overflows poo into local streams.  Here in Westport our poo overflows in to Flush Brush Creek, on the banks of which sit the Country Club Plaza.

Now the Feds are finally requiring the City to fix these problems.  In addition paying much higher water bills to raise the billion dollars needed to build new sewers, regular folks can do lots of little things like disconnecting downspouts and putting the newly popular rain gardens and rain barrels.

Here’s some local info on disconnecting downspouts and some more info from Portland, where they know a thing or two about rain.

So, we are now doing our part to keep our poo out of the Plaza.

These photos are kept at City Hall, and they will provide you with a digital copy that you can get printed. The KC Public Library has many more resources for researching the history of your house.

This is the house in 2008. It is largely intact.  The biggest change is the addition of asbestos cement shingles over the original wood clapboard siding. At some point the porch railing got froo-froo spindles and the front and rear windows sprouted aluminum shutters.  Also, the old Sanborn fire insurance maps show that the garage has replaced some chicken houses at the back of the property.

Hiring movers was the best decision ever.  We had them move the big stuff, but really wish we had just let them move everything.

The dog has taken to the new place really well, but is still working on sniffing every nook and cranny at least seven times.

The new place is a classic Kansas City Shirtwaist, a local variation of the traditional American Foursquare.  It is excellent condition for being 98 years old, but there is still a lengthy list of projects to be done before its hundredth birthday.