BY MEGAN ASHLEY FINK

The Natchez Democrat

NATCHEZ — If Mother Nature cooperates, the public could soon set eyes on a newly renovated 1830s kitchen at Auburn Antebellum Home.

Ongoing renovations of the kitchen dependency at the city-owned antebellum house seek to restore the building as closely as possible to how it looked when it was built.

“There are no pictures of back in 1830 when it was built, so a lot of (the restoration) is speculation as to the type of building that it would have been in those days,” Auburn Antebellum Home President Clark Feiser said.

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History approved a grant for $157,688 to repair the roof and restore the interior of the kitchen dependency in December 2013.

The two-story kitchen dependency building, separate from the main house, was in need of repairs from water damage as well as restoration from age and neglect.

The renovations are progressing, despite supply setbacks and weather delays, Feiser said.

The renovations would likely have been completed by now if a shipment of bricks that arrived last week had come in before the recent bout of wet weather.

The project’s contractor, Butch Johnson, said if the weather cooperates, the construction portion of the renovation project should be complete in a month.

Feiser said some of the bricks in the shipment would be used to create drainage paths to solve a water-flow problem. The floor will also be redone in brick to mimic the original brick floor, which now lies under a layer of poured concrete. The new floor will be installed on top of the existing concrete.

“Archives and History (which oversees the renovations) didn’t want to jackhammer the concrete out, because that might damage the side walls,” Feiser said.

The rest of the bricks will be used to create the bases of the wooden columns that will hold up the second-floor balcony. This design is meant to mimic the oldest available pictures of the dependency.

Electrical work was being done on the second floor this week as part of the installation of the new heating and air conditioning system. Roof repairs have been completed, and the outside of the building and the second story have been repainted. The kitchen’s staircase has been removed pending repairs to some of the steps.

The length of time until the project is complete will largely depend on weather, Feiser said, but the building will be opened again to the public as soon as the state allows.

“MDAH has final say and an inspection before we can open it back up,” Feiser said.

Feiser’s final vision for the building includes period furnishings in both the downstairs kitchen and in the second-story house slaves’ quarters. It may take more time and money to realize that goal, though.

“But we’ll have it open to the public before we have it completely furnished,” Feiser said. “We were tickled to get the grant and get things going.”