I will be scratch building a number of structures from historical photos. The structures were built late 1800’s and early 1900’s. What would have been the measurements between floors (and floors to ceilings). Does anyone have a sense of what they varied during this time period?
The same thing for doors. What would have been their heights during this time period?
Tom Makofski
NorthEastern Wisconsin Free-mo
Total Membership of 2 and Growing!
The trick is to find something in the pic that is either a known measurement, like say a car in the pic that you can look up the wheelbase, or something that you can estimate, like say a chair or bench out front that you know would have a seat height of around 16" to 18". Then you can make a simple scale ruler and measure anything you need.
Your question asks about structures that were constructed before the availability of electrical fans and air conditioning. I have a co-worker whose mother-in-law’s house was constructed in Pittsburgh, Pa during the late 1800’s. The first floor of this house has fifteen foot ceilings. The top floor (fourth floor) has ten-foot ceilings. The intermediate floors were about 12 to 13 feet.
The added height was necessary to promote natural air circulation and ventilation. Heating fuel was cheap and plentiful, making energy conservation a non-issue back then. Old downtown homes appear to be very narrow. They are, in fact, quite wide. However, this is an optical illusion since the homes have very high (15 foot ceilings).
I wouldn’t go so far as to say heating fuels were ‘cheap and plentiful’, I would bet the average family of today pays a lower percentage of their income on heating than did a family 100 years ago. I think the high ceilings allowing better summer ventilation were a trade-off for the increased need for coal or oil in the winter.
Thanks everyone for your help. Here’s the structure that I am working with. I just recently found this photo of the John Strange Paper Company at the Menasha Public Library. This will be my first structure for my Menasha Canal Module. (See, I haven’t given up!) Here’s the link for
the photo: http://www.pbase.com/tmak2654952/image/73201275
I also have some updated photos for the Neenah Icehouse on my “work
bench” gallery.
Tom Makofski
NorthEastern Wisconsin Free-mo
Total Membership of 2 and Growing!
Tom, I had a similar problem in drawing the plans for the Old Saybrook (CT) station on the New Haven RR. None of the photos had anything to compare with to extrapolate the dimensions. It did have clapboard siding so I made an enlargement with my scanner and Photoshop and printed a large enough view to enable counting the boards. Using an estimate of 4 inches to the weather, I then used a divider to mark off the dimensions on the photo. I then cross checked them with window and door dimensions and the trim, etc. It may not be 100 percent, but it makes a nice model and scales well to the rolling stock.
In your case, there are the 40 foot box cars in the foreground. If you guestimate the windows in the right most building at 5 feet and the space between them at 8 feet you have a width of 47 feet. Since that building is farther back than the boxcars the width would actually be larger than 40 feet so I would keep interpolating from differant window widths until you get to somewhere between 45 and 50 feet. Then go from there.
When all else fails, you could probably find the exact dimensions on a Sanborn Map of the area.