Our Olde House: December 2024

Miss Sherry received a State Historical Marker (the most recent of ten markers in Olde Towne) for The Landrum House which has been in the Landrum family for 100 years. The house was purchased from Clinton Alderman Dr. Lipsey in 1924 by Monroe Landrum who was the grandfather of her late husband Jeff Landrum, which some of you may remember as Clinton’s Fire Chief. Monroe’s wife’s maiden name was Nellie Hilderbrand; many of her descendants live up north in the Bentonia area.

We believe the original 1924 house consisted of the three front rooms and the front hall, in the characteristic L shape. A kitchen with gas and electric appliances was added at some point, making the house into a U shape. More recently a dining room and new kitchen were added behind the old kitchen, and a screened in porch was built connecting the central hall to the new kitchen; the central hall and back porch still have exterior siding on the inside walls.  This porch was eventually enclosed and the floor leveled for what we now call the sunroom.

We are not sure when utilities were added to this house, but electricity was probably the first modern convenience to be installed. Electricity was provided by Mississippi Power and Light Company shortly after its 1923 creation. Clinton’s Towne Spring provided water for early settlers; indoor plumbing and sanitary sewer probably came in 1925 after the completion of Clinton’s first electric powered well at Capitol and Main, half a block from this Olde House which probably was wired for electricity at the same time.

Originally, heat was provided by three coal burning fireplaces, and sometime later from a small natural gas ceramic heater in each room; the last surviving ceramic heater is in the master bathroom. All of the natural gas pipes for the ceramic heaters were disconnected when the original galvanized natural gas pipes, installation date unknown, began leaking in 2015; Atmos put a liner inside the gas line to the street, and all under the house gas pipes were replaced, connecting only the stove, water heater and furnace. In 2022 the Generac was also connected to the gas line.

Miss Sherry and Jeff Landrum were the second Landrum owners of this house. After Monroe passed, Nellie lived in the house until 1980 when she was moved into assisted living. The house was vacant until 1987 when Sherry and Jeff purchased it from Nellie. The house needed extensive repairs and improvements after being vacant, and Jeff, Sherry, and their sons Jason and Nathan spent two long years of DIY work to make the house inhabitable.

Jeff was the Fire Chief at the time, and Sherry says that when he found knob and tube electrical wiring from the 1920s in the attic, he was amazed that the house had not already burned down; needless to say, new wiring with circuit breakers was his first order of business. Miss Sherry’s next order of business was making an indoor laundry room and adding a third bathroom for good measure.

The house needed a new roof in order to stop all leaks and prevent any further damage to the interior ceiling, walls and floors. After the roof was replaced, the screened back porch was rebuilt with a new subfloor, a wall with windows and a new ceiling. The water heater was relocated outside of the house next to the kitchen, because the Fire Chief knew that water heaters were the source of too many house fires. Jeff also added the first combination gas heater and electric air conditioning unit, along with all of the ducting under the house and registers through the floors; there was even a heat vent in the bathrooms.

The kitchen was remodeled with grounded wiring, new cabinets, new countertops and new flooring. (All of these items in the kitchen were replaced again when the tree fell on the house in 2023.) Miss Sherry did have her beloved gas stove/oven which we still have, a refrigerator which we replaced with a counter depth one, a dishwasher which we kept and relocated next to the new sink, and we added a disposal.

Miss Sherry and I requested some improvements to the newest kitchen while it was being replaced last year. We added some modern updates including new windows and under cabinet lighting, and we also put back some historically accurate touches comprised of beaded pine ceilings in the kitchen and sunroom, and custom solid poplar cabinets and drawers.

This Olde House will never be ‘done’ because everything gets old and needs to be repaired or replaced, and it has had a lot of years to get where it is today. We are repairing and replacing things with quality items within our means, as the very few people who lived here before us have done. This house provides many extra things for us to be grateful for at Thanksgiving, and Christmas reminds us that the future is bright and full of God’s promise. We never see the light at the end of the tunnel as a train headed our way, instead we see the bright star light as guidance to keep looking forward, and to keep going, through whatever life’s bumps we encounter along the way; Merry Christmas to all.