Archeological Dig

Curiosity got the best of me on Easter so decided to do a little archeological dig to see what was under my vinyl siding. I picked a spot on the back porch so it wouldn't be visible from the street (if I ruined things) and a place that was a little shielded from the weather.

I pulled back the siding just over a window by my back door and then the aluminum trim around the window. I was told by some of my neighbors that the house was shingled before the vinyl went up and that it was in rather good shape.

Here's a little segment of the window trim that looks like it's in pretty good shape.

I pulled off another row of vinyl and here are those shingles. It looked to me like the shingles were sitting at a plane higher than that of the window trim which seemed curious. There must be something under the shingles.

So I cut away at the top row of shingles and this is what I found. The original clapboards! It's pretty dirty and there are quite a few nail holes but it's in relatively good shape.

As you can see in the lower left of the photo, the shingles were placed so that they slightly overlapped onto the original window casing, and then the decorative piece was added to hide that overlap and to finish the edges.

I'm unsure whether or not this is good news. I don't know whether or not any of this original surface will be able usable. But what's exciting is the possibility that once everything is peeled back, that we'll get the opportunity to see the original details.

I can't wait for that day to come.