Should We Build This Log House? 

Be secure in knowing that if the Townsends start a question with "Should we build....." the answer from me will *always* be *YES*.

"Should we build this log house?" Yes. Yes is definitely the answer.

The original cabin series is one of my favorite things on RU-vid, id absolutely love to see you guys build one of these!

My grandmother gathered her garden and shelled beans and peas on the porch. Less mess in the house. Also sewing, my grandmother hand quilted bedspreads and quilts for winter, this was done during summer after spring planting. There are every day reasons for the design of houses. Her house had a breezeway, bedrooms on one side, a covered, opened ended hallway, kitchen and living room on the opposite side from the bedrooms

Something NO ONE talks about, placement of out houses..no indoor toilets. This was a very important thing! My grandfather taught me..an outhouse was always downhill from the well, in this era, water wells were hand dug. Always place an outhouse downhill from the water well, and a good distance from the house. There are reasons for all this

Certainly a huge undertaking, but I'd absolutely cherish another series like the first cabin that you guys made.

When I was in grade school, (mid 60's) I got to live on a farm that had a two-story log house that was in pretty sad shape. It was a large house with a staircase much like the one in your video. The windows had shutters on the outside. I was able to explore it quite a bit and found many treasures that had been left in the house when the new house was built. The property also had a smoke house from the same time frame. the smoke house had a small room - almost like a mud room - that lead into the main part of the smokehouse. There was also a side door that went into the main part of the smokehouse. It was big enough to hang several half beef and whole hogs. The smokehouse was also used to quarantine a family member that had Scarlett Feaver in the early 1800's, from what the landlord told me.

In Denmark we covered the outer wood work with tar, or other forms of oil or paint, to protect the houses' wood work from rot and weathering.

Yes! Build it!!

Oh absolutely! Would be amazing to see a “next-step” style house on the homestead, almost like a timeline of structures.

The overhanging roof line of the first house is very similar to the "eyebrow houses" here in Key West that were built post Civil War. We usually have windows tucked up under the "eyebrow" and, as with this house, the overhang provides for shade over a spacious porch.

I think the Townsends should trust their gut. They built this amazing youtube channel by doing that I trust them to make the right choice. That being said I'd love to see their homestead replica grow. It'd be great to see the cabin turned into a shed after this and get to observe how that process could have effected all kinds of things they would be also doing on the homestead.

I had something of a lightbulb moment when you mentioned the space-efficient turning staircase. Because they're a feature of some old Czech houses as well - it's done in stone and brick, but the turning staircase is there. I think it would be interesting to know where the settlers who built those houses came from and if it's a feature in that part of Europe, too. :-)

Everything you have built (even the fence for the chickens) are our family's favorite videos! ❤️

Bro I was just watching an episode of This Old House and they were restoring a house from the late 1600s. When they pulled out the power tools, I kinda scoffed to myself and remembered you guys with your awesome hand tool skills. Then this video pops up to bring it full circle. Love you folks and your videos

Definitely yes! Another thing I'd love to see is a series on "butchering-time". One of my favourite parts in books like the Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder is reading about how they preserved meat like venison and pork for the winter months. I know food preservation has been covered a fair bit on the channel before, but I'd love to watch videos on things like smoking meat and making lard and headcheese

Watching Townsends go step by step in a comfy setting making a new house? Heck yes!

I love the ingenuity of the house with the overhang. Reminds me of something my father would do who has always been a different and deep thinker. All throughout history there have been humans who are ingenious 💞

It's fantastic how woodworking has changed so little between centuries. We improve our tools, but the joints and cuts tend to stay the same.

Surprising how much more impressive the earlier buildings are. You should definitely build one in that style! I'll be there to watch every episode!

I love everything you guys do! Though if you really used period equipment and started with round logs and processed them all yourselves, I'm a little worried you'd be spending six months on it, or getting burned out in the process... this looks like an intense project

Seeing the cabins in the shape they are in from 180 to 150 yrs ago are a testimony how they stood the test of time. My ancestral grandfather built the Morgan cabin (West Virginia) in the early 1700's and is still standing today. Thank you for sharing this video!

YES build one. Build a copy of the 2nd house, the one with "two doors". I concur, there was likely an interior room with external access, perhaps some sort of place of business, with public access ? OH before I forget, WHEN should I show up to help with the build ??? I need a date and location😉

Yes, I would love to see you build another log house like these. The first two look so similar (except for the overhang) to the back half of our family farm house, which is a log structure built in the early 19th century, probably a bit earlier than these two. It's been covered with siding since the later half of the 19th century, when the family built an addition in the style of the times on the front, but if you go up to the old loft (now attic) you can still see the bark clinging to the rafters. All built of local golden poplar too. So I would be extra excited to watch if you built one, just to get a better idea of what it was like for my great-great-great etc. grandparents!

YES! Build one of those log homes! I have always loved these dovetailed notch log homes!

Yes, yes, yes! I love how you explain your thought process and tips for various projects.

Yes please build it

I would love to see you guys build this! The original cabin project was an amazing build. I think it gave a great idea of what someone venturing out into the wilderness would have built. A house like this would be an awesome and interesting progression, almost like the smoke house, to your guy’s historical homestead project. It could be an entire new chapter to dive into.

How did poplar last so long? That’s amazing, my father only had expletives when describing the usefulness of poplar as a building material.

60 some years later, Norwegian immigrants were still building hewn log dovetail corner cabins out here in the PNW. It's a fascinating building tradition and you get my wholehearted DO IT!

Yes, build it! Imagine the homemade furniture projects with the new wood shop!

Yes! That would be an amazing project to see!

I'd love to see you and the others make another cabin/house. That would be awesome!

Yes, of course! My favourite is the first one. The brick chimney, the clever staircase, the windows, all very appealing and well made.

the overhang log is ingenious. I would love to see you build this cabin on the homestead with the tools you have made already

I am living in a very similar log home (but the exterior has been bricked over) built around 1850 in East TN. The second story is divided into 2 rooms. It also has a window on each side of the brick chimney. 2 doors on the ground floor and 3 windows. I would love to see the construction in real-time.

I think they divided up the house during winter time then took the wall down during summer. The reason being is heating. Old homes were built with lots of rooms & fireplaces because they didn't have central air. So what likely happened is that the room that was primarily occupied was the one with the fireplace, while the other door would be used for a room that you didn't necessarily need to keep really warm such as winter time storage such as a place to put firewood, and food & alcohol storage for the really bad winter storms.

My family gathered the logs and stones from several log cabins and their chimneys. Dad hired a couple of carpenters and built one nice log cabin. It had a downstairs bedroom, a bathroom, a kitchen and den, with a rock fireplace and chimney at one end of the house. The den went across the entire downstairs with the bed room and half bath loft over the other rooms. The logs were mostly poplar and oak, some of the poplar logs being greater than two feet wide. It was made of hewn logs, six inches thick and had ends that were lock linked. There were giant cherry trees and walnut trees outside. We initially covered it with cedar shakes, followed by metal two decades later.

Hello from Detroit Michigan brother thank you for sharing your knowledge and expertise and for taking us on your adventure through time I'm in romulus just 8 mi west of dearborn ville

I grew up (in the 70s and 80s) in an 1880 farmhouse in Bergen NY. No insulation at all, the water in our rooms would freeze at night in the winter. We had a Franklin stove in the basement (I was in charge of banking at night and starting in the morning) the heat rose from the first floor floor vents and would rise to heat the second floor through openings in the ceiling through the upstairs floor. We had a cistern, well, and septic tank. It was a true adventure!

Absolutely!

Could watch this channel all day. Thanks for all the work you guys put into these videos!

Should you build a hewn log home? Well of course you should! The evolution of your homestead, also means you'll have to come up with a clever idea for the existing cabin. I look forward to this like a child looks forward to Christmas!

Yes. this looks like a fantastic group project and would fit really well as a more permanent housing for the homestead.

Now, in thinking heating and cooling. The added larger windows were for ventilation, no a.c. no fans, a house was cooled by the temperature change. Open doors and windows all day, the porches were for working during the day, cooking inside made a house hot, so people would sit outside on the porch, go in periodically to check the cooking, usually a wood cook stove. My grandmother cooked on a wood cook stove when I was a toddler.

For the house discussed at 8:25 mark, a clay render all around would have easily preserved the wood beneath and been easy to re-apply. It would also have sealed the cracks and kept out the worst of the winter winds. A clay render like that would have probably been white washed with lime to provide a bit more protection. And as with the chinking, that kind of finish would have been easy to install and maintain over time.

Love the attention to detail, I am a woodworker and its so nice when people making these kinds of videos give good footage of the woodwork. Thank you!

Are you nuts? 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂 What a huge undertaking. I'm looking forward to it. I'll be watching you all the way to see how you pull it off. Knowing full well you will do it with the humour and smiles that you put into all of your hard work. The same spirit our ancestors had.

My ancestors settled in north central Indiana in 1851. It is really interesting to see similar houses that they would have built and/or lived in.

Thanks for taking us with you, that is so cool to see! Great video!

I am very stingy with subs and don't hesitate to unsub if I stop watching a channel for any reason. You guys are my favorite channel because you live and breathe nostalgia, even if it is from another continent. I'm an amateur woodworker myself but I dream of one day being able to build a house like this 100% with my own hands and cook in it like you guys do :). Especially the peace and calm you guys exude when telling a story does it for me. Keep it up!

Whatever you do, make sure the windows are covered by shadow in the summer and let in light in the winter.

Yes you should build one. Could be a great summer video series.

Yes, thanks for sharing

Yes please build something like this. should be a good place for future cooking videos and diary reading.

Sturdy, lovely homes. Enjoyed the tour.

Amazing video. More of these. Learning and understanding forgotten old techniques make us better today.

My home was built in 1810 and has 5 bedrooms and has been well kept over the past 200 years. And in the 13 years I’ve owned it I’ve taken great of it. And everything about is original ( except the electricity and the plumbing that was put in obviously lol ). My favorite 3 story curved staircase in the huge hallway. This is a cool video of an average home back then

Yes. Build it! Thanks for the tour of the homes. There is one in our pioneer village in London, ON, that was a tavern and is much like what you have shown.

What beautiful homes. I wonder what the temps inside were during the winters with a fire going and some lanterns or candles also. New construction today would be very unlikely to hold us so well after 180 years!

That original builder was a master of his craft that home was amazing the fact it was the only home deemed safe enough to see the second floor and needed no covering for weather because of his genius elongated roof. I am curious if much is known about him besides the structures he built.

Yes, please make one of these homes. As amazing as it is to see the finished product, watching the process is more engaging!

I've seen very old, small, stone farmhouses in France with the same second floor: shoulder-height walls and only a few windows. There, it was used as a granary during the winter with wheat, corn, etc., stored up there. The house also had the staircase that was closed off. Everyone slept on the ground floor and the crops stored upstairs served as insulation. The absence an exposed chimney in the loft room suggests the space wasn't used for sleeping in winter.

Excellent choice for most overlooked. Fantastic plot, and great synopsis from you! There is good detail and the research team did excellent work with the aviation elements too.

Thanks loved the log cabin, series x brilliant

These houses were an amazing contrast to a late Victorian brick farmhouse we were considering buying. It was made only 28 years later than the oldest log cabin. It had fine, fancy woodwork, stained glass windows and doors, parlor stoves, not fireplaces as well as beautiful bronze lights. Less than three decades. What a difference.

How absolutely wonderful to see all this 🥰

fascinating, absolutely fascinating! thanks so much for showing these homes. i liked the first one with the door and stairway. and yes, it would be great to see the building of that home.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and those of the people that built them. Its a treasure to still be able to look at the skills of people 100+ years ago.

Yes!!

Really like your building projects! 🌞

Love those cantilever porches. Clever way to make some shade. Plus it's a neat way to see the thought that went into the design with the big log continuing through holding up the roof extension.

My dad was born in 1957 and grew up in a story-and-a-half farmhouse very similar to this. The original house was built in 1890. Like this house, there was a large front overhang. The ground floor was split in half: the north half was the kitchen and the south half was divided into a living room and a master bedroom. The turning staircase was built along the wall dividing the living room from the kitchen. The upstairs room was used for kids sleeping areas. The floors are hand-planed hardwood. The walls were uninsulated plaster and lath. A plumbed bathroom and "north room" were added in 1936, as well as kitchen plumbing and a cooking range. Also, at that time the chimney and fireplace were removed and replaced with a propane heating stove which was the only heat in the house until it was renovated 2004. The porch was also enclosed at this time and a cellar dug underneath the porch floor. In the late 70's, Grandpa and my uncles "finished" the upstairs by splitting it into three small bedrooms, and added styrofoam pellet insulation and airsealing for the old windows. The insulation would be considered laughably inadequate by today's standards, but it was enough to cut their propane usage by two-thirds. They also carpeted over the hardwood floors. My uncle still lives in the renovated house.

Yes, my favorite era of cabin. It would be really neat long term to have the round log cabin, a hewed cabin and then a brick or stone house all in a row. Showing the progression of time in housing on a homestead.

Super interesting. Thanks for content!

OOOOH I love it! That first one reminded me of the one I got to sit and tat in during a festival in our small towns local museum. Wonderful feeling to sit next to a fire in a fireplace at a table like the original home owners owned while my wee baby slept in a cradle dressed in period clothing. Makes you feel like you could almost expect the real owners to come walking through the door and demand to know what you are doing in their home. :) Can't wait to see the house you build!

Loved this, Jon! Can't wait to see what you guys decide to incorporate to the homestead.

It would be fantastic to see you build every part from this. A two story building with a kitchen, dinning room etc. especially if you are using period correct tools etc. This would be my dream to help with something like this. I love history and the way you all build and make everything from the tools to the well, to the farm area and even a canoe. Please keep doing what you are doing

Most of the original log homes still in our area had either a small front porch or small roofed covering just over the door. Pegs in the wall were very common to hang tools,traps,bags of roots,etc on. The only room partitions most would of had would've been a hung curtain or blanket on a line or wire. Most stove works foundries were formed after the civil war so many out lying areas probably stuck with fireplace and stone or brick chimneys for some time. My sisters 1860 farmhouse had an open fireplace in the common area and hookup in the kitchen for a wood burning cook stove. My mothers home was stick built in 1890 and had small stoves all throughout the house. Each bedroom had a stove,as did the living room and the kitchen had a wood burning cook stove. Almost all the cabins here in Appalachia are either oak or tulip poplar

My wife's grandparents built a very similar house in South Eastern KY in the 1930s, although theirs had an internal chimney and front porch. The house is still standing and functional although the internal (and much more modern) batons and wall board are falling apart. Testament to the rough hewn timber design and how efficient the layout was to begin with.

You'll have an absolute blast cutting those dovetails! I've always admired that style of corner.

I remember the old house on my dad's farm. It was made of logs. Similar to this, because there was a kitchen downstairs, and one room next to that. There was one room upstairs. It had a wood burning stove in it. This was before the new house was built. Thanks for sharing this. It was awesome. Cheers!

A great video and tour thank you for sharing .

Very much looking forward to the build series. The cabin series and all the support videos for the tools and techniques was endlessly fascinating, and I used clips in my AP World History class. My students got to see the big picture, in real time, instead of looking at woodcuts and reading old articles. The authenticity is very much appreciated by this viewer. Keep up the wonderful work!

Beautiful old buildings! Thanks for taking us along. It would be a really big project but YES! Please build one!

When I was very young my dad had a cottage and the layout of this place gave flashbacks, especially that staircase in the corner.

Hi, it depends. Can you and the rest of the team afford to build it? I imagine there will be some cost to building this house. Would it be used for reenactments? I am sure we will all follow this series if the house is built. The first cottage series was very well done. I would definitely follow a build fir sure.

Beautiful country , Beautiful old houses , AND a Wonderful and knowledgeable host ! Cheers from California 😊

i love how they used dovetails to help hold the logs together. Ingenious! it makes me wonder here in Vermont when Waitsfield was first being settled how those early or first cabins looked like. i haven't been able to find any examples or even exactly where those plots where but, some of the later houses like The General Waits House still do exist. but they are late 1800s to early 1900s houses, so not terribly old by now. the Town Historical society does have a collection of photos, but i haven't seen any with the original buildings.

I would love to hear more about the foundation, too! Wonderful video!

This is a cool place. Thanks Jon. 👍🏻

Another excellent episode.

I enjoy your videos. Thank you for the entertainment and the education.

Such a simple design but Beautiful. Love them old log homes.

I grew up in Chicago & my Dad made me & my brothers & sister build a homestead every other year. Good times.

I love these simple research/information videos. For one, it's amazing to see relics survive from ~200 years ago; for another, the breadth of Jon's knowledge really comes through when he's analyzing the various techniques and materials in such an off-the-cuff manner.

This makes me cry a little. My granny and papa lived in a log cabin farmhouse my whole life, she passed away over 20 years ago. Their place was in Bartholomew County, outside of Columbus, IN. I believe it was built in the 1820s, maybe earlier. It was a combination of the first 2 houses. It had 2 front doors, a couple feet apart, a fireplace on the right wall and the staircase was along the back wall on the left. I would say, easily 24 feet by 12 feet. Ceiling was high, taller than modern houses but only by a few inches. There was definitely a wall between the two doors, both sides had a wood stove, The fireplace on the right was flanked by two large windows. Two big windows on either side of the doors. I don't know what was original because I think other windows were made into doors to the bedrooms and kitchen. They never used the second story for anything but storage. The door was absolutely heavy with Papa's coats and things. I was in my teens before I even realised there WAS an upstairs and that it was a log cabin! One day, she had to get something from the upstairs, it was storage, and I got to peek. I had NO idea that it was a log cabin until that moment! The logs were easily 2 ft diameter. The outside of the house had been clad in gray asphalt shingles, probably in the 30s. They also added a large front porch of concrete and brick around that time. The bedrooms, bathroom, and kitchen were all attached to the outside. My Papa used the outhouse, he didn't care for the indoor outhouse as he called it. There was a small smokehouse, a big canning kitchen over a huge cold store, a barn with chicken coop, and a large open barn/carport. It was a beautiful property. When Papa decided to sell, none of us kids wanted to live outside Columbus. My granny actually passed away of a massive heart attack in the small hallway by the door to the stairs. It was a devastating loss for the family. I have never been brave enough to see what the new owners have done to the place. Every family event was spent there. Holidays, birthdays, Sunday dinners, summer breaks...now we just don't seem to know what to do with ourselves. That place will always be home in our hearts. The house was cozy and warm, you felt both absurdly vulnerable out in the darkness of the countryside, and safe behind the doors of this solid fortress. It was truly a magical place.

If this style of log house will improve your production efficiency, I say YES! Very exciting structures.

Fascinating!

If you do it, do the fireplace too. Either homemade brick or start a little quarry for personal use. Either would be extremely interesting by themselves, but they could be logistically undoable.