Outhouse Rebuild Milled from Tree that Fell on It

Chris Seguin

LT40

Project Description
Little Red Schoolhouse was built in 1885 and is the longest running one room schoolhouse in Canada, located on Salt Spring Island, BC. My kids went to preschool there , and the location is well known and cherished in the community. During a major windstorm, a huge 2nd growth Douglas fir tree fell and obliterated the outhouses (that we had just built a few years ago with LT40 lumber as well) and also damaged the corner of the school. Fortunately, the school was empty when it happened! The tree that blew down was pretty straight and tight grain, and a big size that barely fit on the mill. We were able to save the beloved doors of the old smashed outhouses and then completely rebuild the new one almost entirely out of the one tree that took it out (we decided to use some Cedar for the partitions). Pretty fancy for an outhouse as the posts ended up coming out pretty much clear and FOHC. My best friend and great carpenter Jesse Burke took on the build of their outhouse on a deck project and I laboured along with Volunteers from the Xwaaqwum Project lead by Joe Akerman. Jesse commented on how convenient it was to be able to order on demand his cutlist right on site and called it, “the biggest table saw Id ever had onsite”.

Finished Dimensions
Approximately 100 sqft, 100% woodmizer milled lumber

Money Saved
The BF rate instead of the lumber rate and the superior quality and bigger true sized dimension made for great savings. A lot of the work done was volunteer, hard to say exact amount of savings, but noticed and appreciated it was from the community and school to have the ability to bring the mill on site