Cleaned my 500th chimney this morning and it hit me

I was finishing up a job on a 1920s house in Oak Park, and my app ticked over to 500 total sweeps. When I started 15 years ago, I was just a kid with a set of rods and a dream. Back then, half the jobs were just basic brick flues, now I'm dealing with all these fancy stainless steel liners and high-efficiency inserts. The number itself isn't huge, but it made me think of all the soot, the weird stuff people drop down there, and the faces of folks when they see a clean fireplace. Anyone else get hit with a milestone that made you look back?

2 comments

2 Comments

skylerbell4d ago

Read an article once about a guy who found a sealed whiskey bottle from the 1800s in a chimney he was cleaning... said it was the best tip he ever got. That number, 500, it's like a photo album of weird finds and quiet houses in the morning. Makes you think about all the history that just... piles up.

joseph9324d ago

Found a silver dollar under some floorboards once.