Demolition Derby

Just before demolition

Photos.

In the introduction to a later edition of Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh explained that when he wrote the novel in late 1943 and early 1944, he anticipated the imminent demise of the English country house and the British upper classes. Both proved to be more resilient than anyone could have anticipated during those bleak days of World War II.

This morning the heavy wrecking equipment arrived onsite to demolish the house of our longtime and much beloved neighbor, E.L. The house was sold earlier this year to a professional buyer of distressed properties, a "knockdown" house like so many in these older neighborhoods of Minneapolis and Saint Paul.

10 minutes into the job

E.'s lovely little house was no typical knockdown property. She completed home projects with predictable regularity, one every year or so: the kitchen, her pretty little porch, the roof, metal siding. She loved her garden and especially relished her annual "first ripe tomato" contest with my husband. E. won every year, until I tied store bought tomatoes on one of Bob's bushes so that he would finally be credited with his first win.

E. spent a few years in a nursing home before she died in August two years ago. Her house has been vacant since then, and we had been hoping for new neighbors as pleasant as recent arrivals on our block. It seems, however, that the estate sale last January was the beginning of the end.

The little house is half gone after an hour

We have been dreading this day since the remodelers' sign went up last spring. Since then, we've taken note of the many large boxes built on our small city lots, designed to blandly fit reasonably well into our neighborhood of early 20th century construction. Sometimes the little houses on either side look out of place, and they are almost always deprived of light by their new neighbor. And, of course,occasionally property values increase and neighbors are happy with this urban renewal.

Today I feel very sad. Selfishly, I hope that we don't lose the eastern sun when the new property is raised. My greater sadness is for Saint Paul and for our lovely old Macalester Groveland neighborhood. I hope that I, like Evelyn Waugh, will be pleasantly surprised by the impact of what today seems like the beginning of a great decline.