last day of summer

the clinton nature preserve, which is in way western douglas county, was nice today---dog enjoyed immensely sniffing at 15 different kinds of animal dung or whatever---

the best thing about the place is this c. 1830 log house stuck way off down in the woods----it hasn't been occupied since the 1950s, but miraculously has survived in great shape---it's on the national register of historic places and one of the best-preserved log houses that i've ever seen---the larger pen was built first and a short time later the smaller pen, which was the kitchen, and the connecting dog-trot were built---it has a very rare purlin roof that extends several feet beyond the ends in order to protect what were probably original mud-mortared chimneys---the only sawn lumber was for the flooring---in the late 1890s or early 1900s, the walls, floor, and ceiling in the large pen were covered with tongue-and-groove boards, and a nice stone chimney replaced the original mud chimney at the north end of the main pen---in the 20th century, a small wood-framed room with no interior finishes was built at the rear of the kitchen and the wood-shingled roofing was replaced with corrugated metal---except for a plain porcelain light sockets in both pens after world war ii, there were no other improvements---the kitchen never had a ceiling or even chinking between the logs----