This Victorian home in sale pending in Mist Oregon has much history which has been compiled by its current owners/sellers.

 In Part 1, I talked about the Magnussen family who homesteaded and originally built this beautiful structure in 1870. Part II goes on with the history as told by Louise Green, current owner/seller:

Their daughter, Anna was the first school bus driver in Mist. The bus consisted of two horses and a wagon with canvas over the top. (Photo courtesy of Mist-Birkenfeld Historical Society calendar  2000, Louise Green supplied the photo)

We know of only three families who have lived here before us; the Magnussens, Garlocks and Ruby and Cap Serby.

When we moved into the house, we already had ideas of what we would do to make a lovely home from this sagging, rotting big bundle of potential.  The first winter here was wicked.  We had raised the house immediately to build a new foundation and an early snow gave us harsh reality (about 20” deep and long-lasting).  We had black plastic all around the bottom of the building and it was mighty chilly. The water pipes froze and broke. Orin [Louise’s husband] spent many hours under the house cussing and soldering pipes just to have it freeze up behind him. I used much of my days crawling under with him to bring “that wrench, you know what one”, as well as packing buckets of water from the frozen-over creek.

Part of the time the electricity was off so I cooked on an oil stove in the living room. Got rid of that sad old stove before we did much else.

We could tell as we took old linoleum off some floors that there had been brown and orange carpet on the living room floor, seven, yes seven layers of various types of floor covering in the bathroom downstairs. (We had indeed found us a neat old home).

Most all of the walls and ceilings were layered with old newspapers and vintage wallpaper.  Good reading if one is Norwegian!  We did save and use some of the newspaper that when decoupage was just what we wanted to use as background for the Magnussen family pictures.

Lars Magnussen (bottom left) with a Western Red Cedar cut on his property in Mist, OR circa 1890

(Photo courtesy of Mist-Birkenfeld Historical Society calendar 2000, photo supplied by Louise and Orin Green)

As described on the back of the calendar: “Magnussen hand-sawed and hand-planed lumber from [this] tree which he used in additions to his house.  Some lumber may have been used when he and others built the Mist Church in 1892 [which also still stands]. Origin of photograph unknown as well as the others in the photo [two men inside the tree, one on top of the horse].”

Louise goes on to explain:

We have renovated the home with the goal to honor the hand sawn lumber in the house, its handmade front door and the old windows with bubble in them.  All in all we have tried to re-dress this grand old farmhouse using as much that was useable and adding only items that enhances her age, giving her more years and more history.

Foyer:

Window leading upstairs, a personal touch:

Guest bedroom:

Upstairs bath with original window:

Some outside beauties, a pond, arbor, flower garden:

Gardening areas abound:

On 3.92 acres, there is much room to play, garden, have a horse, whatever suits you!

There’s also a big garage and shop.

Speaking of history: in the base of the column closest to the side door is a  time capsule.

The black walnut tree, magnificent oak tree, two maples at the driveway, the lilac bush and snowball bush are original to the grounds.

At $325,000 this home and acreage are a real find and a part of history that could be yours!