The Great Depression made everyone in America much more aware of the need to save everything they may be able to use for a rainy day. Houston native John Milkovisch was no exception, and today his beer can house stands as a monument to American ingenuity and frugality.

Milkovisch has been described as a "child of the Great Depression" and over the years lived up to that name by saving an estimated 50,000 cans of beer in his house's attic. When aluminum siding became all the rage back in the 1970's, Milkovisch decided it was high time to get on board with the fad and put his beer cans to use.

"He used cans, bottles, marbles, redwood," said Ruben Guevara, head of restoration and preservation of the Beer Can House. "He drank a lot of beer, him and Mary, and he collected all the beer cans that he would drink. He stored them because he knew he was going to use them, but he didn't know for what."

Eventually Milkovisch decided that he would arrange the cans in a garland-type arrangement that would span the outside of his home. He would painstakingly carry all of the thousands of beer cans from his attic and flatten and cut them one-by-one in order to bring his idea to fruition.

"The funny thing is that it wasn't ... to attract attention," said Guevara. "He said himself that if there was a house similar to this a block away, he wouldn't take the time to go look at it. He had no idea what was the fascination about what he was doing."

Since he put up the beer cans around his property in the 1970s, drivers have been doing double-takes as they pass the oddity in Houston's Memorial neighborhood. Milkovisch admitted that he got a childish pleasure out of other people's surprise, and said that he would even invite the occasional onlooker in for a beer.

"It tickles me to watch people screech to a halt. They get embarrassed. Sometimes they drive around the block a couple of times. Later they come back with a car-load of friends," Milkovisch once said about the reactions his house received.

Though Milkovisch died in the 1980s, his wife Mary and the couple's sons maintained the property. Eventually Mary Milkovisch died as well, but still, the house persisted. Local nonprofit Orange Show Center for Visionary Art bought the property about a decade ago, and have been preserving Milkovisch's unique vision ever since.

For those living in the Houston area who would like to see this truly unique residence, you can drive by 222 Malone St., Houston. The house is open Saturday and Sunday, from noon to 5 p.m. year-round. Between Memorial Day and Labor Day, the house is open Wednesday to Friday, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. Admission to Beer Can House grounds is $2, and guided tours including the inside of the house are $5.