The dogtrot hallway, wide as a generous heart at twelve feet and crowned with an eleven-foot ceiling, breathes as the very soul of this old house. Once, it stood open at both ends, front and back, like a breezeway in some modern city dwelling, catching every whisper of air that wandered through. Around 1915, they closed it in, taming its wild openness, and added a railed landing to the stairwell, as if to give the house a moment to pause and consider itself. Two twenty-six-pane transoms, steadfast as old promises, remain from the beginning, while the center transom, once nudged out of place, was gently returned to its rightful spot when the rear ceiling was lifted back to its proud, original height.

All four rooms open off this hallway, each door a quiet invitation, though the left rear room’s doorway came later, carved out after the house had settled into its bones. You can see it in the rough saw marks, the plain board trim, the square nails—marks of a hurried hand, yet honest, from some early day of change.

The rear opening tells its own story. There was no wall, no door, only steps rising from the earth to meet the hallway, set a few feet inward to shield them from the rain’s reach. You can trace the ghost of handrails in the wainscoting, feel the practicality of it, and the modern brick flooring underfoot speaks of a time that wanted things solid and sure. A roofing ledge, too, once jutted out along the back, warding off the weather like a mother’s hand over a child’s brow. Every bit of this house remembers itself, even as it shifts and sighs into the present.