Morse - Addition to Sophia Fahs 2007

Morse addition, designed and built by Devin Hollands. - spring 2007

 Interior drywall and insulation -  camp staff, electrical Carncross brothers. 

 Assisted on construction by Andrew Lewin.  Roof by Randi MacDonald.

old memories of Sophia project

Email with Devin and Aimee the following Summer (2008) about the Sophia Fas (Morse Room) addition.  The staff was used to insulate, drywall, siding, paint and redo the floors.  This caused friction from the crew to Aimee and then down to the building committee volunteers.

Devin Hollands <devinhollands@gmail.com>Aug 7, 2008, 8:24 PM

to Aimee

Just wanted to mention some items I just recalled tonight about the Sophia fahs project.  New Director - good time to restore the directors cabin, why go half way, let's do it all and add the wing that has been planned for several years.

Dan likes the idea and we work with B/G folks on the entire list for the spring....  Stove, Windows, Floor, Sophia  these were capital improvements and should not effect any $$ for general messes..

Dan and I pushed in Fall to Start Demo.. meeting up in the Leining loft work weekend...  workers start at it with knowledge addition will be done....  ie ceiling comes out of living room...

Spring we push for full funding including furniture for lodge at the Utica meeting.

Randy Jennings is one of the two key builders I bring him in to help but this is critical to all timing issues - Butch Dan or whomever pulled Randy almost the entire time - PLUG FOR the new stove  that was a project. Wiring in Lodge for Phil Lewin window project took BOTH my Carncross guys off the Sophia job.

All important tasks... BUT they cause Butch and I to do a wall we needed Randy to do  etc etc...  I remember at the time thinking if anyone complains about the timing - my workers that committed to help were Pulled off the job.

Last key was idea that Butch would come in and start drywalling in April-May  of coarse that did not happen and I kept asking Dan to get him to ORDER the drywall.. Start the Drywall....  But it just dragged out until beyond when Dan was to arrive....

And then you guys wanted the insulation - fine but just more time that was not planned.

I just don't want to go down as a one man band here that screwed the summer up....  takes more than one monkey to run the shop.

Once that project was done the crew told me point blank they feel useless as there was nothing to do to accomplish.... So the concept that the staff and crew were ruined by the experience I never saw.  I know the male crew guy was not thrilled to be doing Contractor like work... but again... plan was for Butch to do it...  If we were going to pay the big $$ let's use him at what he is best at.... even though Butch hates it.... I figured Dan would fire him for drinking so I wanted to get that drywall done while he was there - as you can't beat his work.

  Lauren can look at that building the rest of time and know she built the frickn thing....   not many can say they did that at 16 years old.

by the way how did you guys get the floors sanded and are they sealed?  did you do the living areas or just great room...  looked so nice... did you have Beth do!

The Carncross boys may be fowl but that wiring came out really really nice!

take care,  Devin

Aimee Spong, Director, Camp Unirondack <director@unirondack.org>Aug 7, 2008, 9:32 PM

to Devin

Yes, it's a beautiful room,truly.  We haven't gotten the floors finished yet, but I hope to by family camp so I can be in there.

 Crew last summer didn't do work when SF was done because they were too consumed by bitching about how ill-used they were.  Ben and Lauren used that ill-use idea as an excuse to sneak off and canoodle all day.  We had, as ever, huge lists I generated for them.  They always came up with some excuse, "oh, did we get that lattice"  "oh, I was waiting for someone better with colors to pick the stain" "oh, I wasn't sure how Butch wanted that done."  And so on.  they were surly little snots because they felt much maligned.  Damn they pissed me off.  Ben told me many times how much he'd get paid just to paint, how he wouldn't have taken the camp job if he'd know it was other than the job description....... Sure, I bet they see the selling points in retrospect, but damn they were snots about it, Butch too. 

Water under the bridge.  It's a beautiful space.  I'll be glad to get to use it when we finish painting and the floors.  The sanding went well last fall.  Was very hard as the machine's I rented were crap.  Quimby said they are very smooth.

==========================Aimee Spong, Director