Last week I saw one of my favorite blogs Public School posted about these beautiful covers to Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps between 1880 and 1920. All of the maps can be found here. These images blew up the design world blog stuff. All that to say, I realized I was sitting on a gold mine of beautiful design in my own home that I thought the internet should have.

My grandmother’s father, Mark McCann, was born in Ireland. He came over through Ellis Island to America. He left the home in Ireland with his two spinster sisters. He eventually settled in Dallas, Texas with his wife, Clarice Libbie. My grandmother, Peggy, was the oldest of three children. When they died, my grandmother and her brother and sister inherited the estate. Our house Beechmont was located in Bellaghy in County Londonderry. Everything in the house was divided when it was shipped to America between all of us. We have paintings, prints, furniture, linens, silverware and china, pictures, postcards and the list goes on and on of everything we inherited.

I am going to post some of the beautiful things from our estate. I’m starting it off with piano music. I think most of this you are viewing belonged to Nellie McCann. You can see in the upper right hand in some that she penciled her name and sometimes the date.

This huge stack of music has been sitting on my bedside table for a year now, but I thought it needed to be seen.