Garage Job Is a Smash Success

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
September 6, 1964


   IT HAPPENED in early summer but has been too sore a subject to discuss.  Now, however, the end of the garage, though the new wood lacks paint, is free of holes and has no bulge.
   I had one of my momentary lapses that fateful evening.  I had returned momentarily to boyhood and was driving Dad's Model-T.  Anyone old enough to remember the car that put America on wheels recalls that the brake was about where the accelerator is today.

   I was easing the car into it's berth and, in my Model-T seizure, stepped on the gas to stop.  A dramatic rending of timbers resulted.  My alarmed wife and son came running.
   As we surveyed the damage I avoided their gaze, being almost as embarrassed as I had been years before when I backed over a brother-in-law's suitcase.  "Well," my wife said, "this is a great way to fight the war on poverty.  This should shoot another hundred or so."
   I thought her estimate conservative.  Four studs were splintered and the damaged wall had a hole big enough to allow entry of a St. Bernard.
   But next day the damage appeared less extensive-- something I might repair myself.  "Sure you can," said my wife's brother, who is ignorant of my limitations.  "Just saw off those two-by-fours above the break and push the wall back into position.  Put in some new timber to replace the bad studding and then all you have to do is install new siding."

Garage simulation

   He made it sound simple.  Licking the bulge was.  The siding was something else.  I ordered a jag of the stuff, acting as if I knew how much I wanted and hoping delivery would be slow.  It was out next day.  It sat on the garage floor for a month, a mute and mocking challenge.

'57 Dodge rammer

   AT LAST CAME the time of decision, the time to roll up the sleeves, spit on the hands and get at it.  The obvious first step was to remove the shattered siding and, armed with a wrecking bar bought in a surge of prescience, I went at it.
   But removing this particular type of siding cannot be done like beating a rug.  Each board is interlocked with its neighbor and, in removing one, you risk ruining the one immediately above or below.
   Also, none of the siding was damaged its entire length.  To save time, money and energy, it seemed wise to leave the sound sections undisturbed.  But how to saw off a spoiled section in the middle of a stud so that new siding could be nailed on to replace it?  I thought in terms of a circular saw and consulted my book, "How to Use Hand and Power Tools."  It provided no answers.
   In such a situation I go for help to the hardware store.  I acquainted Max and Floyd with my problem.  They told me what to do and Max, knowing the instructions had to be rudimentary, drew a picture and sold me a keyhole saw.

   AFTER THAT I was in command, though my garbage-can sawhorses barely sufficed.  Progress was further slowed by difficulty with measurements.  If a six-foot board is called for I add a fraction just to be safe, knowing that a piece too long has more potential than one too short.  This results in a good deal of extra sawing.
   The job was finished before dark and my lumber order was right on the nose.  Only a two-foot piece of siding was left.  I rate this as an even greater triumph than my bookshelves.


Copyright 2013 StarTribune.  Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune.  No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.

Thomas K.'s note of truth:  it was my mother who ran the car through the garage.  I was there, standing by as she burned rubber and rammed it.  (Dad protected her in his writing regularly).