Public Schools of New York Open Doors

While people are gathering across the country and organizing protests and Occupying against corporate greed, failed leadership and failing schools, I just wanted to comment that the Public Schools of New York actually open doors for people.
                                         Specifically S and myself.
                                                               More specifically, our bedroom door.

Years ago, my Aunt Carol worked at Andries Hudde Junior High School in Brooklyn, NY. In the 70's there were doing massive renovations and everyone went a little 'gut the sucker' happy. Carol gave my folks these doors knobs. They are solid brass - designed by Sargent - and the earliest sold ones we've seen date back to 1893. They were sitting in a bag inside the foyer closet of my parent's house for more than 20 years, before that, in a bag inside a foyer closet in our home in New Jersey and before that, on a door inside the school.

We had already used antique crystal door knobs as curtain ends and wanted something interesting looking to hold back the curtains. 

 The curtain rod, like the interior one behind it, is made of PVC. S capped one end, filled it with boiling water, capped the other end and then bent the PVC into the curve we needed to accommodate the glass block wall.

I was talking to my folks about the curtains and hold backs and dad suggested we use the old brass knobs from Brooklyn. After several visits to the hardware store we gave up on the notion -  the knobs are rather heavy and we were going to need some serious reinforcement and retrofitting to find threaded dowels that would fit the knob and go into the wall. They'd have to go past the drywall and into the concrete blocks. Big pain.

So we decided to use them for the door itself and set out to find a retrofit kit that would work for the knobs. Online the knobs auction for anywhere between $150 to $345 - who says public school education doesn't pay? I found a company in DC called The Brass Knob and S and I spoke with Richard Lock,  talk about a fitting name, about retrofitting and finding backplates that would cover the hole in the door from where the old standard door knob went.

Richard was a tremendous help and put together a package for us with antique brass backplates, the kit, and a new spindle since the one above would not fit the modern kits.

The kit assembled easily but the spindle would not secure in place unless the knob was turned 45 degrees so you couldn't see the words unless you turned your head on an angle to the right. S, had a Eureka moment and using a awl he marked a spot on both sides of the spindle where the set screw touched. He then filed down one side of the spindle where the mark was, so that when the knob was in the proper place the set screw secured against a flat edge and not a corner. It was rather genius.

The result?

New York Public Schools work. Well, at least their knobs do.