What a beautiful mess

What a beautiful mess! I know this is a huge undertaking and I know how disciplined I will need to stay in order to accomplish what needs to be done. Or at least I think I do… 

So far, I have moved all the beds, chairs, dressers, lamps & old tv sets out of the first wing… The first wing is now empty of furniture! The previous era has come to an end and the new is beginning. I have discovered that no mask can truly combat Carpet soaked in cat pee, ohh how I despise cat pee.

This week I have been working on emptying all the rooms and getting things ready for paint, disconnecting the old boilers so I can pressure test the radiators. Good news, they held pressure for two days straight. Now I can start planning the new heating plant, prepping rooms for paint, floor repairs and cleaning, cleaning, cleaning…  I have some trim to replace and floors to seal, holes to patch and cracks to cure. I may move them old cast iron radiators into the hall to get the rooms ready for painting and flooring, shouldn’t be too bad as each one has unions. 

We are on the hunt for an economical vinyl plank (or something) to just cover the floor. If the floors last 5 years? Fantastic! If not? We will address that in the future, today is all about “price”. I have always been a “value shopper” and never have I been a “price hunter” … it’s oddly strange and goes against my natural desire. The best value is my normal… never just the bottom line. Being a small business owner, I understand value. Every so often I get a customer that is a “price hunter”. When price is all that matters, it’s hard to sell value.

I thought a short history lesson may be fun. I sat down this morning and studied the abstract, just to get a decent feel for what has gone on in the past. 

This is a story of a piece of land in Northern Itasca County… In the beginning the land was filled with rich large PINE timber

In the year 1906 the land was deeded from the United States to Ed Shultis, in 1908 it became the third addition to the village of Bigfork. Around 1912 an easement was established by Minneapolis and Rainy railroad; this is now the foot bridge crossing the river near the north end of town, don’t get it mistaken with the old railroad trestle. 

In 1938-41 The cornerstone was set for a rural Hospital. The first doctor was hired, his name was Dr Bender (I’m not sure if he practiced Chiropractics or not). North Itasca Hospital Association opened what is possibly the first rural hospital in Minnesota; we are still trying to “verify” this.

In 1957 an addition was made off the east side of the building, adding 4 beds, a Dr office, a Dentist office & a kitchen.

In 1965 the new hospital opened, and this hospital was closed. The building was then sold to Leisure Hills Inc. For many years the building was operated as a retirement facility which is extremely surprising as there is no elevator, chair lift or ramp to get into the lower level for dinner.  

From 1981-2024 the building had at least three new owners and was named “Riverside Residence”. The old building sat there year after year waiting for someone to come along and love it back to health, the electrical just kept getting older, the roofing just leaked more, and the carpet just absorbed more cat pee. Windows would give into the constant nagging winters and lack of paint would allow the water to take away the only barrier between the Minnesota cold and the warmth of the cast iron radiators that were working overtime. 

Some call it fate, I call it “divine appointment” 

On March 6, 2024, at approximately 2pm, I walked into the building for the first time and met the owner. I noticed a few guys, one I knew as “Coffee Cup Ron” his room was just to the left of the front door, he looked tired and weak as he made his way into his small room and sat down on the bed, I saw him later on my way out again in a “near collapsed state” on one of the nearby chairs. As the owner brought me downstairs to the boiler room, I had observed a few areas of the building that were “interesting”. I stepped past the makeshift double doors into the boiler room, and I gasped at what I saw. There, in the middle of a crowded room sat four boilers, three oil and one propane (the propane boiler isn’t connected to anything) The three boilers that were connected were in an extremely distressed condition, anything but a safe condition and I feared for the residents that had no options but to continue living directly above a virtual time bomb. 

A closer inspection revealed one boiler had an attempted repair using epoxy on a cracked section of the cast iron boiler… epoxy? The owner commented she had a handyman make an attempt at repairing this… I shuddered a bit at that thought. I have seen the destructive power of boilers that were operated improperly, I have seen it and I have the utmost respect for this scenario. I tried to not show fear on my face, but that was hard. In my veins I felt a slight chill as I recounted my qualifications as a chief boiler operator and the responsibility that title holds. 

 The building was dotted with small electric heaters, doors to bathrooms were locked but I could see the sewage leaking out from under the door. The floors were wet more than dry and later I would discover it is in part a sewer back up and in part leaking water lines that had been patched over the years and never actually repaired.

As I revealed the truth about her boilers, the owner broke down into tears.  As I explained, the only way to fix this is a full replacement of the system, she slumped down in despair. It was at that very moment I was completely overwhelmed with the one thought: I knew I needed to go home and talk to Jess; I knew we needed to figure out a way to buy this building, I knew we needed to fix it up, I knew we needed to provide a better home for the guys living there.

I won’t reveal more of that day and the emotions that led to the horrible situation.  I was starting to better understand. It must have been so hard to struggle to keep going every day, thinking about the difficulties she had to deal with, to just to manage this monster of a building, to see how much she cared for the guys living there. This was truly heartwarming. Covid was harder than some may think, covid was a back breaker and she was crushed. 

As time went on, Jess and I both understood it was our mission to lead this building back into a usable condition and so we took God’s lead and jumped in. Jumping into a beautiful mess. But that cat pee is a killer.