CEDAR RAPIDS, IA — The Mercer family granted historic district status to the second drawer to the left of the kitchen sink Sunday, ending a proposal to clear enough space for a pair of scissors.
The designation passed 2–1 at a special meeting convened by homeowner Dan Mercer after he found his daughter Emily standing over the open drawer with a trash bag. The district covers the drawer, the space behind it where a tape measure fell in 2014, and the strip of countertop where items are placed when the drawer won’t close.
“I asked him what the cords went to,” said Emily, who had come over to help her parents get the house ready for Thanksgiving. “He said that was exactly the sort of question future generations deserved a chance to answer.”
Dan presented the family with a survey identifying three distinct layers of settlement. The oldest contained a key to the house they lived in before this one. The middle layer was mostly takeout menus from a restaurant that had become a dentist’s office. The top layer consisted of things Dan had put in the drawer while preparing the survey.
Asked why the contents couldn’t be moved into a box, Dan demonstrated how a white phone charger had wrapped itself around a vegetable peeler in such a way that removing either would bring up most of the drawer. He described the arrangement as original to the site.
Emily initially had the support of her mother, Carol, who said she had been trying to get the drawer cleared out for years. Carol switched her vote after the proposed disposal list included four paper gift bags she’d been saving for nice occasions.
“I was under the impression we were getting rid of his things,” she said.
Under the new rules, family members may open the drawer approximately seven inches without a permit. Opening it farther requires lifting the front slightly while pulling, a technique Dan agreed to demonstrate during regular kitchen hours. The public may view the drawer from the hallway, provided nobody is trying to get to the refrigerator.
A request to remove three dead batteries was referred to committee after Dan insisted one of them could still run the TV remote if you rolled it a little with your thumb. The committee agreed to take up the matter once it located the remote.
By late afternoon, Emily had narrowed her proposal to a rubber band that had spent so long stretched around a bundle of takeout menus that it kept its rectangular shape. It snapped as she tried to stretch it, and the board ruled that the fragments should remain where they fell until it could establish whether the band had originally been used to hold something together.
The new designation faced its first practical test shortly before dinner, when Carol needed scissors to open a bag of rice. Dan told her the drawer contained two pairs, though one had come with a sewing kit and the other was holding down a spring that nobody wanted to see come loose. Carol opened the rice with a steak knife.
On Monday, Emily returned with a new pair of scissors and a wall hook so the family would have a place to keep them. Dan thanked her, said he’d hang the hook as soon as he found the right screw, and put both in the drawer.