The second floor at the Hans Herr House is essentially unheated space, which is not perfectly protected from the outside elements. Snow sometimes blows through the cracks between the shingles. Since this area was the children's bedroom, the question is how did they stay warm. The favored technique in colonial times was to put as many children as possible into one bed and to cover them with all the blankets that were available. It wasn't easy to live in those times. At least, when you broke the ice on the bucket in order to get some water to wash your face, you were assured of a quick wake up.
There is a third floor to the house, the purpose of which is less clear, but it was probably used for light agricultural products. There is an opening in one end wall at the level of the third floor. Probably a beam protruded from this on which a pulley was hung. With a rope through the pulley down to the ground (outside the house), objects could be lifted up to the third floor. Some of the things they might store there include dried peas and beans, pumpkins, squash, dry onions, grain that had been threshed, and herbs that were drying. Perhaps some of the older children might have preferred this as a bedroom space.
In addition to the above ground space that I have been talking about, there was a cellar which some of us might call a root cellar. Being below the level of the ground outside, the floor of the cellar was dirt which maintained a rather constant and moderately cool temperature the year around. The cellar was constructed by excavating a space below the ground. An arched wooden form was built and a concrete roof was poured. Then the house was built over this but it did not rest on the arch which formed the cellar ceiling.
If one visualizes the time is December, then the cellar would be holding the most. At this time, it had to have enough food for twelve people for almost a year. From the cellar's ceiling, the hams and bacon that had been smoked would be hanging. Many vegetables would be evident, especially turnips and cabbages. The cabbages could be in two forms, fresh heads and sauerkraut. Apples were well represented, not as fresh frui, which did not keep well, but as dried fruit and as drink. There were fifteen hogsheads of drink, based on the apple, in the cellar when Christian Herr died (he did own two stills). Access to the cellar was by "stairs" down from the kitchen, but this was not practical for the hogsheads. Heavy, bulky objects could be brought in by an outside entrance.
The fresh food would have included eggs and chickens, milk, cream, and butter, and, for part of the year, fresh vegetables. A few geese might have provided holiday food. The grains were well represented in the diet, especially in breads and dumplings. Water, at first, was from a spring a few hundred feet away. The house sits on higher ground which provided drainage and more importantly a solid footing. A few feet below the surface, there are very large stones, almost bedrock. This solid foundation has kept the house from settling unevenly.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.