I asked:  Do you know what type of farming the previous owners did or how the land was being used?

Barbara:  I understand that they sowed corn or soy.  When we took over, the land was rented out to a local farmer who planted corn or soy, rotating from year to year.  He continued to do this until we sold the back acreage, some 6 years later.


I asked:  Do you know why they wanted to sell the house?

Barbara:  All the family had moved far away, and we bought it from the daughter Mrs. Beatha Hansen and her two sons--grandsons of Tollefsrud who built the house. They had been renting it out for 15 years and it was becoming a burden to oversee from a distance.


I asked:  What attracted you to the piece of land?

Barbara:  It had a great barn which we wanted to convert into my studio, and the land had "potential" since both of us came from homes with lots of land around them.  Also it was priced reasonably, and we could afford it.


I asked:  Could you describe how it looked when you moved in?

Barbara:  As described above, the land was being cultivated by a local farmer, but the land close to the house was a wilderness, deep with ragweed thistles and weeds.   There were a few old apple trees on their last legs to the east of the house and the whole garden/land was in dire need of some tender loving care.  We removed old trees around the house, and cleaned up the others.   Put in new trees and shrubs at the front as a hedge, and gradually developed the "field".   To start with, we had  just over 5 acres.  In l978 we sold off 3 acres, leaving us  
with that long tract at the back. Over the next 25 years we  landscaped it.


I asked:  Did most of the houses nearby get built after you moved in or before?

Barbara:  There were houses on either side before we moved in, Tollefsruds having sold off some of the land on either side in the 30's. Apparently the houses opposite were built at tract houses in the early 60's.  There were no houses behind to the back east, on Highland, when we moved in.   But they appeared very shortly thereafter.


I asked:  I was wondering if you feel a strong connection or sense of place to your property, or if you do not have all that much attachment to the spot.  What factors do you think have contributed to your feelings about your home?

Barbara:  When we first moved into the house we used the downstairs of the barn as our garage, which meant a long, muddy driveway to the east of the house for some years, till we eventually built the double garage to the west of the house.  We built a staircase and put in skylight windows in the barn, and for some 16 years I had that as my studio.  Over these many years we have worked on the house, improving the upstairs, putting in a finished basement, adding the garage, porch, and then, finally, as you know, adding on to the front and finishing the attic.
Our sense of attachment is now quite deep.   We have invested such a lot of time, energy and loving care to everything, house and garden.  We love the quiet and space that it affords.  We love to have things of beauty around us, inside and out, so that means creating an environment that reflects this desire.   We have tried to do this at 520 Greenvale, given the constraints of place, energy and cost.   We have transformed what was a   very conventional midwestern house on a nice piece of land into a really comfortable and efficient dwelling surrounded by the beauty of managed nature.