Opec Oil Embargo 1973

Man builds underground house of his dreams

Rather than call him crazy, his wife, Mickey, their parents and friends all supported the endeavor.

It took a while. From the time they started in about 1975, when their daughter Terra, was born, it would take about eight years of mostly weekend work before they moved in it in 1983, the year his son, Joshua, was born.

Even then, the house was still "a work in progress" he says.

During those years, the only help they hired was a plumber, a concrete block layer, and someone to smooth the concrete floors and roof slab of the 2,500 square foot house. Everything else, from pouring concrete to installing rebar, woodworking, wiring and waterproofing the house they did themselves.

Mortensen worked as a telephone technician for AT&T before retiring after 33 years and opening jmbamboo in rural Dora where he grows and sells bamboo on about 20 acres.

The house is nestled between tall bamboo groves, hardwood forests and two streams on each side of house that run into the Locust Fork River about a mile from their house.

The exterior is limestone rock he and Mickey gathered on their land one rock at a time and transported with a wheelbarrow. Mickey laid it all, Jim mixed the mortar for her by hand, and she jokes how the last wall she built is her best. But it's what's underneath the rock that has recently meant as much to them as its energy efficiency.

"I didn't realize how much I'd appreciate the fact that it's storm proof," says Mortensen. "These last few tornadoes I tell the kids to come down whenever there's a bad storm. We usually have a houseful of people when the weather's really bad."

What's under the rock exterior is 12-inch-thick concrete block walls reinforced with rebar and poured concrete. Inside support walls are eight inches thick. The roof is a 2,500 square foot slab of concrete with two feet of dirt on top supported with steel beams bolted on support columns.

Mortensen knows every detail because he and childhood friends and family, with the help of an old logging truck, a chain hoist, scaffolds and jacks, picked up, placed and bolted the beams in place.

"We've had two trees come down on top of the house, one of them was from a tornado," he says. The family was in the living room when the tree fell over the entire roof. "I heard a whomp." But there wasn't any damage, just a big job cutting up the tree.

Inside the house, Mortensen did things before they were in vogue. The concrete floor throughout the house is stained, grooved and grouted and looks just like tile. In the early 1980s, few people even knew what stained concrete was.

Silently Revolting...: OPEC OIL EMBARGO - 1973

Silently Revolting is a collective that organise nonprofit parties that explore politics, society and economics whilst having a great time! The parties are strictly not for profit. The aim is to provide a space where people can come together, have fun, get critical and celebrate it, while paying the least possible amount for drinks. Silently Revolting aims to bring down the cost of drinks the more people join. Bring along 10 friends and the cost will go down as the shared cost of the party decreases, 10 more and the cost will go down further. Our first party will be in January so if you want to keep up to date send us a friend request.

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