Changing lifestyle Guy, who has been a general contractor for 23 years, was having a tough time in 2001. His mother, Margie Baker, was diagnosed with lung cancer and passed away two days after Christmas that year. The construction business of the then 42-year-old had become overwhelming. He was working six to seven days a week, 10 to 12 hours a day, and it still was not enough. About four days out of seven someone would be waiting in his driveway with a job request when he came home, and he couldn’t say no. Kay, who had gone to school off and on part-time, was in school full-time at Jacksonville State then. They had the three boys and Guy was afraid for their future, he said. “I got up one day and decided I wanted to build a cabin and learn how to fish. The year was 2001 and 9/11 had happened. A lot of things changed in my life,” he said. That request from his friend for a place to rent a few years later was the impetus for the family’s permanent move to the lake. Guy said, “This was a weekend shack in the woods, no phone. Lake Wedowee was backed up to us. Then we said ‘Why spend just Saturday and Sunday here when we can be here all the time?’” Kay said they worked quickly, hooking up the water from the creek, using a generator for power and creating a room for the boys. They will have been living among the wild things full-time for three years on June 1. Coyotes, raccoons deer, bobcats, foxes and other roaming creatures can be seen through their windows. And today Guy can drive home, grab his line and be on his dock fishing in six minutes.
The construction Guy knew how how to do the rock work so evident in the cabin, and during the building of the massive fireplace, which is actually an art form, his sons became excellent rock masons, he said. His two oldest sons (Jeffrey and Kyle) now work with their father full-time in Guy Baker Construction. They did most of the rock work by the pool, and they remembered it as being 30 degrees when they built the outside fireplace. The fireplaces are made of cultured stone, which is man-made, but the rocks around the pool and water wheel were picked up on the property. One dates back to when Indians used it to grind corn, Guy said. “We generally start a fire the first of November and it doesn’t go out until spring,” Guy said. The heat rises the 22 feet from the floor to the open rafters, warming the entire house. From his years in construction Guy took the best of what he had seen to make this house. It may be the best example in the state of recycling to build a house. His eagle eyes spotted old barns, sheds and other outbuildings wherever he went. He incorporated these wonderful old boards, tin roofs, windows and other items he collected into the Bakers’ family-friendly house. Except for the heating and air-conditioning there was no debt associated with building the cabin. During much of the construction process he used a small Coleman generator for the
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