Local veteran sees Tiny House vision become reality

A Native American Army veteran living in Poplar Bluff envisioned a shipping container becoming a tiny house on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota.

John Cornelius’s vision became reality Dec. 14 when he and his friends oversaw the delivery of the completed home to the reservation.

“What a journey,” said Cornelius, as he looked at photos of the bright blue home.

The project began when Cornelius and his wife used their stimulus money to purchase the shipping container earlier this year.

The project gained momentum when another donor, Darline Thurman, came on board financially. Until recently, Thurman wanted to be known as Cornelius’ silent partner. Other of friends became involved donating a site to store the container while volunteers transformed the container into a home.

Word spread to the Oglala Sioux Tribe and Collins Clifford, tribe housing authority and emergency manager, visited Poplar Bluff to see the project first hand.

The house is being stored in a secure location waiting for the Veterans Committee on the reservation to find a homeless veteran, or a veteran in general, to receive the home.

Cornelius said, “They’re hoping to have that done by the third week of January. I’ll go back for the ceremony when they give it away.”

The Pine Ridge Veterans Committee is overseeing the process and veterans already want to see it.

The house is “parked right outside of town,” he said. “Everybody who comes in and out of town on the main road has to look at it. It’s bright blue. You can’t miss it.”

Cornelius said, the tribal elders “are ecstatic and very interested in duplicating this process.”

The tribe is basically using this one as a blueprint, Cornelius said. They’re going to try to carbon copy the process. They’re already looking for places to start building them. “Once they figured out how much it cost and how fast we got it done, they’re very interested in doing this. It’s a very sustainable option for housing and a place where there’s really little housing options,” he said.

Kyle Kurz started boxing in the container in September. Kurz did all the retrofitting working in the evenings and weekends because he has his own construction crew. The tiny house interior walls are ship lap. The home has electricity and plumbing as well as windows and a door. Sanders and Son Trucking, who transported the house, “really worked with us and getting it there and getting there on time,” Cornelius said. “It showed up right when they said it would be there. So a big thank you to them. That was the probably one of the hardest things we had to deal with was transporting it 1,000 miles.”

Thurman and Cornelius have a rough cost estimate.

“We figured it was between $9,500 and somewhere about $11,000 was the highest end,” they agreed.

“We had about $3,000 donated through a website,” Cornelius said. “The rest was personally funded. The venture was between our two families.”

Cornelius said, “With the cost effectiveness I think it really is a viable and sustainable option for them. I think now that they’ve seen it can be done, hopefully there be a stir to encourage some more effort from people in general and stir some interest in what’s going on the reservation.”

While local families and their friends have spurred others into action, “I think we want to build one for a veteran here now,” Cornelius said. “We’ll get in contact with the veterans organizations here and let them know what’s going on. Maybe they can duplicate the process here and find a veteran who can use it on this end.”

Rethinking ideas, the duo is considering going from a shipping container to a pre-constructed building that already has doors and windows.

Cornelius said, “I think a decent catchment area would be to say we’re going to try to shoot for somebody inside the John J. Pershing VA catchment area because that’s about 32 counties. If we’re doing this in the foreseeable future we tentatively hope we’ll have somebody to give one to. Hopefully we run out of homeless veterans.”

Thurman told Cornelius, she is “proud of this project and what you’ve done. Doing it locally and maybe doing it with the building that’s already constructed would be cheaper. You won’t have near as much expense retrofitting something that’s already got a door and window. You skip right to the electric, plumbing and insulation.”

Thurman said, “this has been a tremendous experience for me. It was an experience there on the reservation to meet these people in person. I had a lot of soul going into this project of my own. I had this young man to lead me and bless me through it.”

Cornelius said, “We learned a lot on this journey. A lot of growing, more ways than one. I think we have opened people’s eyes here locally. I don’t think they realize there was even such a project. Now the door is open, I hope that we’ll get people interested in coming through and join us. If you build it they will come.”

“Such a blessing to see it come from idea to it’s right there,” Cornelius said. “When we pulled the last chain off of it, I broke down in tears to see it sitting there. You know there’s only going to be one more time to move it and that’s to give it to whoever is getting it. I want to say it is a very happy successful moment.”