Brubacher House was built in 1850 and is therefore prone to the normal issues of an old farmhouse. While living there, the hosts have encountered many memorable mishaps and different kinds of rodents.
A water-filled basement
and other weather mishaps
“Lots of basement flooding! Luckily, we never had to cancel any events or rentals, but we came close a few times. We bought a snow shovel that we used to push the water into the room with the brick floor.”
“...lots of basement flooding.”
Dorothy Bean had several entries in her daily diary about the water and weather problems at Brubacher House:
- December 6, 1982: Water in basement.
- December 21, 1982: I fell on my butt while getting mail.
- December 27, 1982: Vacuumed 15 pails of water from the basement floor.
- December 28, 1982: Picked up 13 pails of water in basement.
- March 7, 1983: Car snowed in so took the bus to church.
- November 28, 1983: Windy. Hydro off for 45 minutes.
- February 25, 1985: U.W. men came to clean up water in basement. Ida made a fire to dry out the brick floor.
- April 8, 1985: Telephone got fixed. It had been hit by lightning. U.W. men came and to mop up water.
- June 29, 1986: Fed geese and walked around golf course. Rain and hail storm came up and blew the door shut and all were locked out in the storm.
“There was a spring-time meeting of a historical group in the basement meeting room. As they left, one of the cars got stuck in the mud and most of the attendees ended up in my bedroom, which was where the phone was, to call a tow truck.”
Unexpected Guests
In 1984, Dorothy Bean wrote in her daily diary about Brubacher House garden mischief:
- June 15: Rabbit ate off my beans in garden.
- June 22: Rabbit ate off peas and beets.
“We had a groundhog die under the porch which smelled awful and needed to be removed. Other than that, LOTS of voles...”
“Squirrels took up residence in the attic. They chewed a huge hole in the northwest corner of the eaves and we often saw several coming in and out at the same time. They might even have had a litter up there before pest control showed up.”
“LOTS! Animal control was called frequently - though often we had to manage the nuisance ourselves (as U of W had the House low on their priority) - squirrels in the attic, raccoon under the front steps, bat in the house, several birds in the house, and MANY mice in the walls and basement. Mice was the constant issue - we always heard them in the walls and 4-5 basement traps were often full in the morning.”
“Over the years, various birds have also found their way into the house, and we’ve had to guide them back outside again. But last year, we were very startled when Josh discovered a bat flying around our apartment! It must have come down the chimney, as we discovered that we had left the floo open. Oran and I shut ourselves into the bedroom and luckily Joshua was able to quickly coax the bat downstairs and out the door (while wearing protective headgear).”
Bird on cedar shakes, 2007.
“The biggest pest mishap we had is quite dramatic. One cold February night, while we had a few friends over, we noticed a strong skunk smell filling the house. It got so strong so rapidly that we all agreed that it might be a gas leak - the air was thick and it became hard to breathe. After evacuating and waiting an hour for a UW caretaker to come by (it was about 1am on a Saturday), they let us know it wasn’t a gas leak so we could go back inside. With no where else to go, we slept in the house (a very strange sleeping experience), and in the morning, after some of the smell had dissipated out the windows, it was clear that somehow a skunk had sprayed close enough to the house that the smell started getting circulated by the forced air from the furnace. The skunk smell was strong enough to be slightly uncomfortable for about 5 weeks; but even until the day we left, you could still smell a hint of skunk in the basement if it was raining outside.”
“We were infested by ladybugs each spring that came in through the gaps in the windows! We had a chipmunk come in through the floor in the summer kitchen. It made its way all the way up to the apartment.”
“One day we were sitting in the living room watching tv and it came around the corner and we both stared at one another for what seemed like 30 seconds before it scurried off into the spare room. We had to close all the doors, and cover the bottoms with towels then "scare" it down the stairs where Chris was waiting with a broom at the front door to whisk him out onto the front lawn.”
“One time, we found a garter snake curled up along the edge of the basement! It must have come in looking for warmth. Good thing we had decided to do a double-check of the event space before opening it up for the rental group that had booked that night. It was wintertime, and the snake was in partial hibernation, so it didn’t move too much when we scooped it into a box. We named it “John E” and gave it to a friend who was an outdoor educator with the school board.”
“We relocated 25+ chipmunks from under back steps, helped starlings caught in the furnace, and used moth balls to help get rid of skunks from under the front porch. The house always had plenty of mice and the Abell Pest Control worker was a frequent visitor.”
Furnaces and Fires
“The furnace quit a few times on some very cold winter days.”
“There was a crack in the firebox of the furnace and we found out when the furnace turned on in September, ejecting soot throughout the entire house. EVERYTHING, including artifacts and our possessions, needed to be professionally cleaned.”
“Near the beginning of our time as hosts, there was an electrical issue, and we were unable to use the stove. Joshua cooked in a cast iron pot over the fire in the basement summer kitchen for two weeks while we waited for a replacement! It was a good introduction to the Brubacher lifestyle, although he was grateful to see the new stove when it came.”
“There was a fire in the museum’s dumpster in May 2009. We never found out the cause of the fire.”
“In Winter 2018, some electrical wires caught on fire underground and we experienced a power outage for 5.5 days. The university provided us with a generator while they completed repairs.”
Other interesting stories
“Our biggest "mishap" might have been the brief period of time when a group wanted to film a movie in the Brubacher House. This is quite a long story, but in summary the group ended up not being the right fit for Brubacher House (ie: it turned out to be a horror film and they wanted to use all the artifacts as props..... hmm) and we decided to let them know it wasn't going to work out on our end. That led to some very interesting interactions, though we are grateful that Paul Penner at Grebel helped us navigate that situation!”
Dorothy Bean wrote about breaking into the museum after getting locked out:
- July 23, 1983: Locked myself out of house. Came in the window.
Sunset, 1994.
“Once we looked up and there was a small child just standing in our apartment; apparently the door had not been locked on the main floor after our tour hours ended. It was a bit startling, and ended up being a very interesting tour with her family. They were from Sarasota, Florida, and had Brubacher Family connections (or… so they claimed!).”
“In one of our first weeks as hosts, we managed to lock the door to the upstairs while we were cleaning the basement. We didn't realize that the door would lock behind us! Outside, the snow had just barely melted, and we didn't have phones with us, or even shoes or coats. We must have seemed very strange when we walked into the nearby CIF building barefoot, asking to use the phone.”
“This did not work out, but we almost had an episode of 'Murdoch Mysteries' filmed at the house while we lived there.”
“For several years before they connected the house to the main sanitation line on North Campus (which didn’t exist when the house was re-built), we had continual issues with the septic system. It always seemed to fail when we had large events, like the Sledding Extravaganza with 200 attendees, or a kids’ March Break Camp. Inevitably, we ended up opening up our apartment washroom to guests when the basement one would fail. It was interesting to see their expressions when they saw the Host Apartment.”
“One time we went down to the basement, and the floor was missing bricks and there was a groundhog sized hole. We never caught the culprit.”
“One night some teenagers rang the doorbell repeatedly at about 1 a.m., not realizing anyone lived there. They got quite a fright when I appeared at the door!”
“Here is a view from our living room on a busy sports evening. Someone took up a whole parking spot with that little yellow truck. This was our first month living at BHouse in 2013.”
