my essex battle

ive been trying to get all my info together and all to keep my 31 essex all stock. so far its showing me that it really doesnt want to be stock. i bought the car with the engine partially dissasembled, the old owener broke bolts on everything he removed. probably not his fault. every bolt on the exhaust manifold was broken and you couldnt even get the manifold off. i put a little heat to it, got it free to find one mounting ear was broken, it was broken long ago as the crack was all black from carbon. one mounting ear for the exhaust flange was also broken except the piece was long gone, it was broken, brazed, broken, ni rod welded, broken, brazed, and broke again. i romoved all the bad material and built it up with braze and brazed the mounting ear back on where it bolts to the block. i have to have my bud machine the face down. the carb/heat riser had about 8-9 cracks in it, and a few pin holes going through the exhaust into the intake side, i sent that out to be repaired by a cast iron specialist. even he told me its going to be tuff to save. over the weekend i started cleaning the head up and removed 2 broken bolts for the water manifold to find i have a crack from a core plug to one of the water outlet ports. im going to weld that up today and hope for the best. if it doesnt work, ill be looking for another head. if that doesnt come through, ill be either dropping a nailhead or big block mopar in it. i dont want to hot rod it just yet, but it sure is putting up a fight. i have decided im not tearing the engine down, im going to try to get it running as is and see what i have before i put too much time, effort and money into it, if its not going to work out. my original plan with the heat riser and exhaust manifold was to just lose both of them, build my own little intake for a holley 94 or stromberg, and my own header, but the situation with the head has changed that plan.