posted 07-08-2020 10:52 AM               

We couldn't afford not to [rebuild on the same lot]. By the time we went to rebuild, the building costs had gone up so high that they rebuilt the same house for us, minus the slab, for an increase in price.

posted 07-12-2020 06:06 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by 4allmankind:
I Let’s all invest together and turn it into a space fans' Graceland.

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posted 05-07-2022 09:12 PM               

I really enjoyed the back patio, the swimming pool had been re-plastered and given a new diving board but was otherwise completely original. I was told that a frequent visitor was George Abbey who would sit beside the pool with Armstrong and the two men would discuss their concerns about the up coming Apollo 11 mission.

Armstrong’s home office looked exactly the same but all of his personal effects were long gone. The kitchen had been completely remodeled and updated and although it was beautiful I was disappointed. I’d seen photos of Neil Armstrong in the original kitchen wearing a silly apron and chef’s toque as he proudly showed off his famous fresh baked pizza. No frozen pizza here. The kitchen is now unrecognizable.

What can we deduce about the house’s first owner? Clearly Neil Armstrong liked cars and he liked working on them as well. There’s an attached three car garage with plenty of space for work benches, tools and auto parts. This is a true auto mechanic’s garage.

But a subsequent owner liked cars even more than Armstrong. There’s a second detached garage suited to be a professional auto repair shop. It has three high bays each with twenty foot ceilings. If you installed lifts you could stack cars one atop the other.

Also quite interesting was a small empty shelf in the living room. It looked out of place but I was told that it once held the NASA “squawk box” a device that provided a live audio feed from mission control during space missions. I got the impression that the Armstrong squawk box was first installed for Gemini 8 but was left in place and operational throughout the remaining Gemini and Apollo missions. I had always thought that the device was only used for families of the current flight crew but I can see how it’d be useful for members of the backup and support crews to keep abreast of current events while at home.

It’s been said that during the Gemini 8 emergency NASA deactivated the Armstrong’s squawk box so as to not upset Jan Armstrong. This had the opposite effect. Understandably conceded she rushed to mission control which was only three miles away but was barred from entry. This upset her all the more.

Some of the windows of the house had been frosted over to prevent people from looking in but otherwise there were no security measures what so ever, at least none that I could see. And this wasn’t a gated community. Armstrong’s address was never a secret. Apparently anyone could just walk up and ring the doorbell. All this seems quite unbelievable today.

I was told that the film makers of the Neil Armstrong biography FIRST MAN asked (and offered to pay) to film the Armstrong family scenes in the house but the previous owner declined. I don’t know why.