The True Story Of Foreclosures And Depression Hidden In An Attic
Each old house has a story to tell but in the case of this one in West Asheville the true tale of foreclosure and depression was hidden in an attic. Last November David Powell and his wife had bought a sturdy house in Garden Circle. Thumbing through they found a bundle of newspaper tucked away below the attic insulation. David was interested in old newspapers but opening the bunch he found a packet full of old papers carefully tied with a piece of string.
The packet consisted of old bills, correspondences, receipts and defaced cheques giving a view of the times ranging from 1927 to 1931. At one time the family could afford a record player but then days came when the family was flooded with letters form creditors and attorneys. In the end the house was foreclosed upon. The newspaper clipping announcing the foreclosure was yellow and stiff with age. Some of the edges of the findings were singed with unexplained fire. David said he felt odd going through frozen time and relived the pain of a foreclosure that had happened many years ago.
David found a name scribbled on a school workbook – Albert H. Bier. He used the Internet to trace the boy of yesterday to be a nonagenarian of today living in Raleigh, thanks to technological advancement. Bier has a clear memory of the house. At that time he attended a nearby school – Hall Fletcher School. Bier’s mother never told him about the financial problems but he could guess that things were rough during the days of the Great Depression. Even then he had been working selling newspapers, cleaning yards and removing ashes from the furnaces of people during winter. He had been brought up to work and knew that after returning from school he could not play around.
From the faded yellow papers David got a glimpse of those years. After the death of Bier’s father, Albert G. Bier in 1920, his mother remarried and moved into this house in1927 with her husband E.L. Montieth. Bier’s mother Hazel separated from Montieth in 1930. Bier lived in the house with his mother until it was foreclosed in 1931. He was fourteen years old when they shifted. Today looking back he said the house had a mixed bag of memories for him – good and bad. After the foreclosure they moved to Virginia.
