Around June of 2010, my wife and I started looking for our first new home. We decided to do a hard target search around central Phoenix, particularly in neighborhoods that were close to the Metro Light-rail and major access roads. Sure enough, we found the house of our dreams in a cute little neighborhood, from 1955.
(My wife has done a fantastic job documenting the renovation of our house, and you can see those posts on her blog starting with this entry: http://flyingdivincenzos.blogspot.com/2010/07/this-house-is-just-right-rustilocks.html).
Seriously, if Mayberry could be transported into the future, this little area would be it. Most of the houses are to their original design specifications from when they were built. One of our neighbors, Mary, has been the original owner of her house since her husband helped build them. It is rumored that the Doyle’s (my wife’s family) may have even helped with some of the plumbing for the houses in this neighborhood. All of our neighbors know each other and keep a watchful eye on the street.
So, when my wife and I saw the “Cavalier Freeway No. 1” sign lying on its face on the freeway entrance side of our little community, we resolved to save it, starting with chasing down a guy trying to take it for scrap at 11:30 at night.
Yes folks, that’s right, we are weird.
Cavalier Freeway No. 1 is the designation for this neighborhood when it was built in the 1950’s, and part of that design for the planned community was a massive wrought iron sign with the name of the development. Well, for many years, it stood in this one particular corner lot yard until about a week ago, when it fell over. We don’t know what happened; whether it was a storm, or a drunk driver, or just some random act of God. The elderly lady who owns the house who had no means of fixing the sign gave it up to the scrap heap, which brings us to 4 days ago, and the brief late night chase.
As I was bringing my wife home from the train station, we noticed a pick-up truck heading toward us with the sign strapped to the bed. We immediately turned around, pulled them over, and had the driver return it to the yard from whence it came. The next day, Allie and I tried to rescue the sign, only to see that it was way too big to fit into our Honda Element. We also noticed that the sign had a note attached to it reading “free”. We decided it was time to talk to the owner of the property. After a lovely chat with Barbara, and learning that she really couldn’t do anything with it, we said we would take it for safe keeping, as we felt that we just couldn’t let a piece of neighborhood history die in the smelter of a scrap yard. She lent us some flatbed dollies that she had, and my wife and I wheeled it down the street to our house, passing every neighbor we have on the way, explaining ourselves multiple times to our befuddled fellow homeowners.
As we speak, the sign is sitting pretty in our backyard, for now.
We are not sure what to do with it; I think we are going to attempt to restore it with a fresh coat of paint. However, after that, we have to see if the city has any interest in saving it; otherwise, it may just become a part of the history that is our home, Mulberry Park.
2 comments:
wow first I didn't even think about that the Doyle family may have done the pluming for your house. It may not be but the possibility is still cool. I think saving the sign is cool.
We are weird, but I'm glad we saved that sign. It looks pretty cool in the backyard, too!
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