Hillside house in Oyster Bay saved

It may still look like a handyman's special, but work on the deteriorating historic Hillside house in Oyster Bay has stabilized the structure and protected it from weather.

A contractor hired by the North Shore Land Alliance, which bought the East Main Street site in May, has shored up a sagging interior bearing wall, replaced rotting gutters and exterior framing, and patched up leaks.

The $38,000 emergency repair project was paid for with $20,000 raised in the summer from an Oyster Bay Historic Preservation Roundtable fundraiser and money contributed by the alliance, which bought the 1844 Greek revival house for $905,000 to save it from demolition and plans to develop the site.

The alliance planned to keep the property for as long as two years while seeking a buyer willing to restore the house, once rented by Theodore Roosevelt's Uncle James and preserve the rest of the 2-acre site as open space.

The organization had not anticipated putting any money into the structure. That changed because "there was a lot of water damage, and the middle of the house was sagging," alliance president Lisa Ott said.

In the past two months contractor Timothy Lee of Cold Spring Harbor tackled the sagging section of the 10-bedroom house by building temporary walls in the basement on either side of the main girder to take the weight off it. He added additional wood support posts under the girder to take some of the stress off the original rough-hewn locust floor joists.

The process was repeated on the first floor with the main bearing wall supporting the second floor. "The wall was actually buckling in the middle," said Lee, whose firm specializes in restoring old structures, such as the Cedarmere mill in Roslyn Harbor.

Much of the damage was caused by water coming through the roof, Lee said. Rotting gutters built into the roof were removed and replaced with exterior gutters. Rotted wood in the framing also was replaced.

"Now the house should be fairly watertight," said Lee, who is working with volunteer architect and project manager Bernard Austin of Harrison Design Associates of Locust Valley to ensure the repairs meet preservation standards.

Ott said she has started showing the property to prospective buyers. The final use of the house will be up to the buyer. "We'd like it to provide some kind of community purpose" such as a bed-and-breakfast inn, Ott said, noting that use would be fitting because the house had been a tavern and inn in the 1850s.

FACTS ON HILLSIDE HOUSE

BUILT in 1844 on East Main Street in Oyster Bay as summer home for Cornelius and Adelia McCoon.

STYLED in Greek Revival with 10 bedrooms.

OPERATED as a tavern and inn during the 1850s.

THEODORE ROOSEVELT'S Uncle James rented it in 1870s.

THE LAST PRIVATE OWNERS were Dr. James Trousdell, who also had an office in the house, and then his daughter, Elizabeth, who sold the house to the North Shore Land Alliance in May for $905,000.