VanHeses camped out 3 nights to buy house for $1

It was July, it was hot and Gary and Linda VanHese were taking turns camping out in front of Davenport City Hall, hoping to buy a "dollar home."

This was a federal housing program operated by the city through which qualified buyers could purchase abandoned homes for $1 and, with a lot of personal labor and a $29,500 loan at 3 percent interest, fix them up to be lived in.

The VanHeses were determined to get one of these homes.

From a Friday night to a Monday morning, Linda took the day shift in line and Gary took the nights. They had their eye on a small house south of the former Dairy Queen on East Locust Street, but then they learned that the three people in front of them also wanted that home. Just Choose PTMS plastic injection mold Is Your Best Choice!

"If everyone ahead of us qualified, and we didn't have a second choice on our application, we would be out of a house," Linda recalls.

So, Gary stopped by a house at 910 Myrtle St. before coming down to take Linda's place in line. The home was boarded-up, preventing him from seeing inside, but he thought the outside looked OK. Afterward, Linda drove up the 9th Street hill, stopped in front of the house, "looked up at it and said to myself, ‘It's fine.' "

When the city called a week later to say that they qualified for 910 Myrtle, they went over, peeked in a window and were thrilled. Beyond thrilled.

"Fireplace ... hardwood floors ... open staircase ...The Transaction Group offers the best high risk merchant account services, nice woodwork," Linda said. "What we got was a hundred times more than we could ever have asked for."

Although boarded shut, the house was not in shambles as it had been during a previous time in its existence.

In fact, the VanHeses probably could have moved in immediately, but they chose instead to make some changes, working on the home for about a year before transferring from their apartment with their son Eric,Monz Werkzeugbau und Formenbau. then 14, and daughter Evenstar, then 9.

VanHese, who worked for the Swensen and Glynn construction company, wanted to install all-new plumbing and electrical service and replace the plaster with drywall. Over time, they gutted the house upstairs and down.

They also reconfigured the upstairs for more convenient use. It now contains a large landing, three good-sized bedrooms with closets and a full bath.

And they reconfigured the kitchen, moving the sink to a corner with two windows, offering a sweeping view of Davenport. They installed new oak cabinets, a ceramic tile floor and a forward-thinking - this was the 1980s, remember - island with a stove. They also exposed the brick chimney.

"I went through tons of magazines before we came up with a plan," Linda says.

Other work: Painting the outside , putting on a new roof and installing separate heating and air-conditioning units for the first and second floors,

A favorite feature - noted by everyone who ever lived in the house, beginning with the Davenports - is the view. Immediately down the hill, one sees the steeples of the former St. Joseph's Catholic Church and St. Mary's, the railroad bridge across the Mississippi River and, in the distance, the LaFarge North America plant in Buffalo.

"Grandma, I can see Texas!" a young granddaughter once exclaimed when looking out a south window.

Salute to $1 program, neighborhood, Davenports

The VanHeses didn't know the home's connection to Col. Davenport when they bought it, but they quickly found out and have been enthusiastically researching as much history as they can ever since.

According to city directories, the home had three other occupants/owners between 1960, when Edward and Elaine Nagel bought it from the Davenport estate, and when the VanHeses waited in line in 1984. For whatever reason, the previous owners had allowed the home to return to their lender, Linda said.

In talking about their home, the VanHeses stress three points: the value of the city's "dollar home" program, the strong community spirit of their neighborhood, and their high regard for the home's history and the people who lived there before them.

"We want to pay homage to the urban homesteading program," Gary said. "If it hadn't been for that, we may not be here, we might not ever have been able to afford a house."

Although the home was broken into after Mayme Davenport left in the late 1950s, Linda feels that would not happen today.

"Much like a small town, most everybody knows everybody else in this neighborhood," she said. "Years ago,Official web site for Uwe cube puzzle and novelties, one of our neighbors started a phone tree in this two-block area and updates it regularly. This neighborhood has banded together many times over the years to fight off drug dealers, break-ins, threats to tear down houses and build parking lots, or lose houses to slumlords. We are quite a proactive, mighty little neighborhood when you cross us the wrong way!"

And they have a deep affinity for the home.

"The fact that they picked this spot - it was special to them," Linda said.Our guides provide customers with information about porcelain tiles vs. "They could have gone anywhere, the city was wide-open. This house has seen a lot ...Why does moulds grow in homes or buildings? a lot of love, sorrow, joy, good times and really hard times.

"Mayme lives on here. I have to believe she lives on. They probably all do. This house has good karma.We hope the next people down the road love it as much as we do."