Indiana Man Renovating Old House Finds Hidden Room

AP ^ | 2/12/09

[nickcarraway]

A man who's renovating a 120-year-old house has discovered a hidden room in its basement — a find he said shows that some old buildings definitely hold secrets. A friend of Carl Thoms was working recently on plumbing in the 1890 home's basement when he noticed that he could see around those pipes into a hidden room covered in tiles.

He also spotted a staircase — a discovery that led Thoms to a bedroom off of the home's kitchen, where he pried up some floorboards and accessed those stairs.

[LearsFool]

Al Capone’s pantry?

[G Larry]

The poor guys property taxes are going to go up now that the amount of living space just increased 12%....

[nickcarraway]

I was thinking: Why did he make this public?

[nickcarraway]

If thou wert my Fool, I’d have thee beaten for being old before thy time.

[CMailBag]

Whorealdo will be there tomorrow..........

[smokingfrog]

They opened it up without calling Geraldo?

[Cindy]

http://www.google.com/search?&rls=en&q=terre+haute+%2B+bootlegging&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

[Venturer]

Yeah if he had kept quiet he could have hidden his guns in there before Obama’s gun grabbers arrive.

[Drew68]

But he also wonders whether it might have been a bootlegging room during Prohibition — or any number of possibilities.

"You never know what it could have been," Thoms said. "It's really cool to find something like that."

Maybe it was a secret masturbatorium?

The 32-year-old said he plans to do some library research his old home's history.

Knock yourself out, Carl.

[JoeProBono]

[NewJerseyJoe]

I had the same thought — a very foolish thing to do. That could have become his new armory room and surplus food pantry, for when the next revolution begins.

[Drew68]

Ouch! My eyes!

I guess they made their point.

[BillyA]

Call Geraldo Rivera.

[BBell]

short article but neat.

[ansel12]

That is where ‘Bad Ronald’ hid.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wY1CpjlGO-4&feature=related

[PackerBoy]

6 people. 886 square foot house. That’s tight quarters.

[CurlyDave]

Thoms began renovating the 886-square-foot house near the city's downtown for him, his wife and their four children after buying it in 2007.

1. How can a room really be "hidden" in a 866 square foot house? That is a tiny little thing. Even down in the basement, anyone who went down there must have noticed that the basement was a lot smaller than the house & started wondering.

2. Best of luck to him, but I can not imagine 2 adults and four children living in 866 square feet.

[peggybac]

In this day and age, he’ll have to use it as a smoking room in his own house. Don’t board it up just yet!

[Daffynition]

Homer: “’There was nothing in Al Capone’s vault, but it wasn’t Geraldo’s fault’ D’oh!”.