[Source: B. Poole, Tucson Citizen] -- Decades of blood, sweat and tears are nearly over for the Pima County/Tucson Women's Commission, which is about to wrap up a key phase in the restoration of its 19th-century adobe home.
But work on the Royal Johnson House, 240 N. Court Ave., will likely never end, said Arthur Stables, an architect who helped add new windows, doors, floors, roofing, heating and cooling to the home built in the shadow of the Tucson Presidio. "Historical things don't just exist in one time. They keep evolving as people use them," Stables said during a presentation Thursday marking the close of $173,000 in work funded by the Arizona State Parks Heritage Fund. The building's origin is unknown, but by 1881 it was owned by local ice merchant Royal Johnson, who lived and maybe kept ice there for 12 years, said Annette Campbell, who is on the commission committee that guided the work. It sits just one-half block from the uncovered portion of the presidio wall that will become part of the city's Origins Heritage Park. "This building is one of the first buildings that grew out of the development of the fort," Campbell said.
State-funded renovations began in 2001 with the hiring of architects, adobe experts and craftsmen, but the love began pouring into the structure in the early 1980s, said commission Executive Director Sandy Davenport. In 1981, the fledgling group asked the city not to demolish the ramshackle house and to let it move in. Starting in 1983, the commission rented the city-owned property for $1 per year, and volunteers set to work with hammer and nail. Eventually the landlord came calling, Davenport said. "As it got better and better, at one point the city wanted to take it back," she said. The commission held its ground, and by 2000 the city had turned over the keys for the price of a month's rent. Some of the volunteers' work in the 1980s had to be undone to meet federal Department of Interior standards for historic restoration to be on the Register of Historic Places. You have to be very careful what you do and don't do," said Heritage Fund grant coordinator Vivian Strang. There were plenty of surprises as the home's walls and roof were pulled apart, Stables said. The roof - 18 inches of hard-packed mud on top of two layers of saguaro ribs - was basically supported by two-by-fours. There were cavities of several cubic feet inside the adobe walls caused by leaks in pipes and the roof. There was asbestos in window frames and under tile. Despite the transformation, there is plenty left to do. Flooring and lighting are next, and other interior work remains, Davenport said. "There is plenty of work to go around," she said. To make a tax-deductible donation to the restoration effort, call Sandy Davenport at 624-8318.
