The Building

Making the Front Door Unit

The pegged front door is a master piece of construction. When the paint was stripped from it during the restoration of the full size house, we discovered that the builder of the door unit had signed the door before it was painted. He wrote "This was made and finished by Rufus N Brown of Anson." The door has its original wooden pegs still in place and the pride of the quality of the work done is obvious and well appreciated. To make sure that Mr. Brown's work would be properly credited to him, we stained the door's interior surface instead of repainting it so that we could preserve the message so proudly written there in 1838.

Click on photograph to enlarge

A cross section of the front door unit with its two side lights is shown on the right. The vertical posts have a slot milled to accept the window pane and bottom panel. The front door is much thicker than the other interior doors and therefore was not made with tongue and groove construction but rather from a panel cut to the full size of the door. The door frame strips and door moldings were then glued to the panel with the hinge as shown in the sketch.
The front door unit, including the side windows, was constructed in a jig that just fit the door cutout. The vertical strips and the top strip were cut from 3/8 " maple. This strip was then slotted so that the side windows could be slid into place as well as the bottom panels. Extra strips were placed on the inside of the door frame to create the door jamb. The photograph on the right shows the painted frame in place with the windows and bottom panel in their slots ready for the mullions to be added. This frame was assembled with 5 minute epoxy. In the right hand window is the template for the placement of the mullions.
This photograph shows the painted mullions in place. The inside mullions are stained a dark red/brown and the outside mullions are painted white. The mullions were glued to the plastic windows using "Goop".
Here you see the completed door unit frame. The door itself is not yet in place. The threshold was glued with 5 minute epoxy and clamped in place as shown, waiting for the epoxy to set.
This photograph shows the door being attached to the door frame unit and clamped in place while the epoxy sets.
The completed front door unit is then glued in place with "Goop". The outside door molding has been attached to the unit. However the complete Greek Revival woodwork will wait until the exterior siding is in place. Note that the front door has the knocker, door knob and brass kick plate in place.
While the outside door unit and door are painted, the inside is stained a dark brown. Also shown is the large rim lock which has a key.

Web site designed by Eve and Olof Anderson (Catnip Graphics).

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