Anchor Plates and Wild Turkeys

Building features seemed to stand out to me today as we drove to our inspections.  We are in East Killingly, CT which is situated on the Connecticut and Rhode Island border in the northern part of both states.

You see abundant examples of wall washers on the older buildings in New England.  An anchor plate or wall washer is a large plate or washer connected to a tie rod or bolt.   Anchor plates are used on exterior walls of masonry buildings, for structural reinforcement. Being visible, many anchor plates are thus made in a style that is decorative.

Research on the subject says that one popular style is the star anchor—an anchor plate cast or wrought in the shape of a five-pointed star.  Other names and styles of anchor plate include earthquake washer, triangular washer, S-iron, and T-head.   Anchor plates are made of cast iron, sometimes wrought iron or steel, and are often used on brick or other masonry-based buildings. They are also easy to find in cities with substantial legacies of 18th- and 19th-century brick construction and in older earthquake prone cities such as San Francisco.  The tie-rod-and-plate assembly braces the masonry wall against lateral bowing.

The photo below shows the example of two anchor plates  I saw today on one attractive (in my humble opinion) stone building that we passed.  I captured this view of two different styles of anchor plate (diamond shape and elongated diamond shape) on one building here in Killingly, CT. 

We also passed several brick buildings that appeared to be an old factory buildings that were being dismantled in such a way as to salvage the old bricks.  Reused in current construction, they lend an interesting texture and color to the finished product.  I can remember my parents using the same type of recovered bricks in the 1960’s to remodel a 100 year old home in Chatham, N.Y.  It is nice they are making use of these bricks rather than planting them in a landfill somewhere.

One of the camp grounds we reviewed today had a cute log cabin playhouse or garden shed near their entry.  They also had several large carved wooden bears and a huge rocking chair for the bears (I presume) but a child would have looked adorable in the chair too.   

On the camp’s property we also saw a wild turkey!  He was alive and well-dancing in circles and gobbling!  

Lastly, this was a cool rock we saw driving through our second campground.  There are so many rocks here from the time of glaciers of all sizes and shapes, but this one is amazing because it is shaped like this by nature.

Snoopy’s Corner:
This morning I was trying to help Mom make coffee.  Now I grant you I don’t care for coffee, but Mom and Dad seem to like it every morning so I thought it would be nice if I helped.  I also thought I’d give Mom a hand with the dishes, but she had them under control so I played with my toys instead.  We are in a new park tonight for a week.  I can hear all kinds of birds singing outside tonight, the windows are open and we are in the woods here again.  I like it here.