Adam, Urban clear fresh path for new home

FAIRFIELD — Charlie Adam and Leslie Urban turned a patch of ground south of Fairfield that was once all timber and prairie into a beautiful home complete with a pond.

The home is located a couple of miles south of town on about a 50-acre property on Glasgow Road. The location is perfect because it’s right next to several of Adam’s siblings. His brother Bob lives on the property just north of them, brother Joe lives just east of them, and sister Bonnie lives around the corner, and Danny is just a half mile south of her on the family farm. Apart from their brother Jim, who passed away earlier this year, the Adam siblings live within 1.5 miles of each other.

In fact, Adam said the main reason he wanted to build in the area was to be close to his brother Bob, who was going through health problems, and he wanted to take care of him. Bob lives just off Glasgow Road, and Charlie looked at building a house set back farther from the road, in what was then a timber.

“I decided it would be a great place to live,” Adam said. “I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, with the water and electricity a long way from the road.”

Adam and Urban had looked at homes in and around Fairfield, but none of the properties they visited had exactly what they wanted. They decided to take a leap of faith and build new on a piece of land that had never been developed. The first thing they did was to build a pond, which Adam did with Jacob Adam and Jeff Kurtz in the summer of 2020.

“We had to build a road through all this honeysuckle,” said Adam, who cleared a path for the road, the pond and the house. He even did his own bulldozing.

After the pond was finished, it took only six weeks to fill with water. Adam and Urban needed a place to run their septic line, and the most obvious place for it to flow would be down to the pond, but Adam was adamantly against it. He had to figure out another place for it to go, so he and Tim Tedrow ran the line to a ditch west of the pond.

“It was the most stressful part of the process,” Adam said.

Adam and Urban hired Judd Connor as his general contractor, and they were very pleased with his work. Urban said she liked the idea of an open floor plan, and that’s how they laid out the house.

“When we’re entertaining or we have family breakfasts, it’s nice to see everybody,” she said. “It’s big enough for family and kids, but small enough that it’s easy to take care of.”

One of the things Urban likes about the home is the large patio overlooking the pond. Both Urban and Adam are outdoorsy people, and Adam said he had fun doing a lot of the outdoor. However, he acknowledged that it was a challenge.

“I’m pushing 70, so this was an adventure for me,” he said.

There’s still some work to do outside such as seeding. In fact, Adam said he wants to plant food plots to attract pheasants and quail.

“I’ll probably plant sorghum and some small grains,” Adam said.

Adam and Urban said they were proud that they were able to hire local labor and use local suppliers for most of their needs. They went with Keosauqua Lumber for some building supplies, and got their fireplace from Heatilator in Mt. Pleasant.

“We tried to keep the money local as much as possible,” Adam said.

The couple have a deck on the pond, which is great for sitting and relaxing, or trying to catch one of the fish down below. Adam said his grandkids love playing in the pond so much that they’re “half ducks.” However, the couple don’t see eye to eye on what the next improvement to the pond should be.

“The grandkids want us to put a zip line in,” Adam said. “We’ll run it from Bob’s all the way down.”

Urban interjected, “The most I’d let them put in is a big rope so they can swing out over the pond. But a zip line? No.”

“It’s in the works,” Adam joked.

Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com