2025 Madison-Morgan Spring Tour of Homes

2025

Madison in May Tour of Homes & Gardens

Friday, May 16 & Saturday, May 17

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day

Hosted by the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center | A special publication of the Morgan County Citizen

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Welcome y’all!

elcome to beautiful Madison! You are definitely in for a treat! We are thrilled you are here, and we are full of gratitude that you have chosen to attend the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center’s Madison in May Spring Tour of Homes and Gardens that supports the arts in our community.

Trust me: if you love historic cities and their homes and gardens, Madison will take your breath away — of that we are certain!

Truly, our city is never more beautiful than in the Springtime.

And, standing so regally against the backdrop of magnificent oak trees, magnolias, flowering gardens and lush vines, is our tour’s collection of magnificent homes. They will not disappoint!

Most of the homes on tour are historically significant and are rarely open to the public and many of our public museums, historic sites and churches are also part of this year’s tour. You’ll also find most of the home owners on site during your tour and teams of volunteer docents will be there to assist you along the way. It certainly takes a village to support the arts, and this tour is no exception. We offer thanks to our many volunteers, our homeowners, our sponsor Mad Hospitality and Thomas Preston Real Estate and you, our tour participants!

Please take the time to tour the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center, housed in a renovated and restored 1895 Romanesque Revival style former graded school building. It is one of our most prized treasures and is filled with a staff and volunteers that promote the arts and humanities throughout the region. If you are so inclined, we encourage you to join our Cultural Center and get involved. To experience everything Madison has to of offer, we also encourage you to check out our vibrant culinary and shopping scene while you’re here! You will be so happy you did!

And lastly, don’t forget what your momma always told you: look both ways before you cross the street, look after your neighbor and have a beautiful and joyful time!

Sincerely, Dianne Yost and Ann Huff Co-chairs, Madison in May Tour of Homes & Gardens

A Special Thank You To Our Tour Sponsors Thomas Preston Real Estate and MAD Hospitality!

Madison in May Tour of Homes Co-Chairs Dianne Yost and Ann Huff.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦

2

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Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 3

A: Madison-Morgan Cultural Center 434 South Main Street

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he Madison-Morgan Cultural Center is a multidisciplinary non-profit institution that endeavors to enrich the lives of the residents of its immediate community and the broader region by presenting highquality programming and educational opportunities in the fields of visual and performing arts, history, and other humanities. MMCC will preserve and interpret its historic building and will cooperate with other organizations that have mission-compatible goals.

The Romanesque Revival building that houses the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center was constructed in 1895 as one of the first graded public schools in the South. It functioned as a public school until 1957.

Since 1976, the red brick building has been home to the Cultural Center, a thriving arts organization and a venue for the performing and visual arts. It is also a history museum rich with local and regional history exhibits as well as a restored 1895 classroom.

The original brick facade is joined in the middle by an octagonal bell tower which houses the authentic school bell. Of special interest is the apse-shaped wooded auditorium which offers acoustical excellence for performances, such as those by The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.

The Madison-Morgan Cultural Center is open for visitors Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 4 p.m. To learn more about tickets to upcoming events, visual arts exhibits and other programming, please visit our website at www.mmccarts.org or reach out to us at (706)-342-4743. You can also support the MMCC by becoming a member of the Center or donating.

Contributed

Patrick yost y

Noted Broadway performer Shayna Steele played the historic Madison-Morgan Cul- Madisonian Dianne Hallran views an art exhibit in one of the Center’s upstairs tural Center’s auditorium last year. galleries.

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1: Chapman-Bell House, ca. 1895 373 South Main Street

The Chapman-Bell House faces Madison’s South Main Street.

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ddison K. Bell came to Madison with his parents shortly after the Civil War when he was only 5-years-old. As a youth he showed an interest in following his father (Dr. Addison A. Bell) into medicine. A. K. Bell earned his medical degree in New York in 1885 and returned home to Madison to establish his practice. By 1895 the young doctor had become prosperous enough to own this fine Victorian cottage on fashionable South Main Street directly across from the Baptist Church. In 1900, Bell was named the official “city physician.” Five years later when the busy doctor was in his forties, he married Mona Lyse Donnelson, a nurse and the daughter of an Alabama surgeon. The couple raised two children.

After having served patients for nearly 40 years, Dr. Bell died at home in 1926 of a debili-

tating illness. His obituary deemed him a man of “high personal character” who had become “one of the most popular physicians in this section of Georgia.” Mona Bell continued her volunteer work and returned to nursing for some years after her husband’s death.

Some 50 years after Dr. Bell passed away, a physician once again lived at 373 South Main. Dr. R. Harrison Rigdon, a native Georgian, and his wife Margaret moved to Madison after he retired from the University of Texas Medical School at Galveston. The couple refreshed the house and hosted many gatherings. Like Dr. Bell, Dr. Rigdon died at home.

The South Main Street facade reflects a blend of traditional Greek Revival elements such as sub-

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Chapman House owner Brad Chapman and his partner Hunter

See CHAPMAN-BELL, 8 Gaiotti.

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The living room of the Chapman House.

CHAPMAN-BELL From 6 stantial round porch columns with popular Queen Anne touches. The front and side gables are also nicely detailed. The most noticeable exterior feature of the house is the large bay window dormer overlooking Main Street.

The central hall and the main four rooms downstairs and up are original to the 1890s-style house.

The highly detailed interior woodwork was probably milled in Madison by Variety Works, owned by neighbor Paul Atkinson. The heart pine floors, front staircase, wainscotting, floors, ceilings, and the bay window to the left of the front door are all original to the house. Also original are the four fire-

place surrounds in the Empire style so popular in the late Victorian era. Of particular interest are the lacy Queen Anne screenwork that divides the foyer and the intricate parquet ceilings in the foyer, parlor, and dining room.

The rear of the house shows minor fire damage.

It cannot be fully confirmed, but it probably occurred then when the barn out back burned in 1913.

At that time Dr. Bell wrote the newspaper to thank the Madison fire department and his neighbor Paul Atkinson for their quick action. The barn was lost but “the nearby valuable property was saved.” Some charred but still structurally sound rafters continue to support the roof.

In recent years the Addison Key Bell house has undergone restoration of the roof and chimneys plus, upgrading of bathrooms, and extensive addition to the rear. The back of the house now encompasses a

large family room with a new fireplace. The kitchen with seating on a large island is open to the family room, and there’s a wet bar and laundry room discreetly tucked away nearby.

The current owner, Brad Chapman, has renovated and decorated the house to reflect his combination of modern taste with respect for the past. What was a front bedroom is now Chapman’s home office painted a monochrome deep green. Photos of Dr. and Mrs. Bell are on the side of the fireplace. Across the foyer, the parlor is a monochrome blue, and the walls display some of Chapman’s collection of mirrors that have carved eagles at the top of their frames. The dining room walls feature a mixture of antique and new artwork. The main bedroom is across the foyer.

The upstairs bedrooms and baths are being updated for guests. A bathtub now sits below bay windows of the dormer that gives the house its distinctive look.

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A beautiful sitting room in the Chapman-Bell House.

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Visitors will receive a welcoming introduction to the Chapman House on Main Street.

Roses brighten the side yard of the house.

An interesting view from the kitchen area of the home.

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144 Academy Street Madison 706-342-8795 madisonmarkets.com Monday - Saturday 10 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

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2: The Porch House, ca. 1897 460 Academy Street

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n 1897 Essie Few LeGrande was a recently widowed dressmaker who needed a home to raise her two boys.

Possibly using funds from the estate of her late husband Robert, she had a small four-room, central hall house typical of many in Madison built on a lot that her brother had owned. At that time, Academy was Second Street and Hill Street was still dirt. The modest cottage was surrounded by some of the town’s oldest and largest homes. After her sons were grown, she moved to Oconee County to live near them.

After a couple of short-term owners, William T. Baugh, owner of Farmer’s Hardware Company on Jefferson Street downtown, bought the house in 1916 and soon enlarged it. His improvements appear on the city’s 1921 insurance map.

Baugh’s most notable addition was the wide wrap-around porch that provided the home with its now common name, The Porch House. The brick bases of the slightly tapered columns give the house a touch of the Craftsman style so popular in the early 20th Century. Rather than using a typical balustrade, Baugh installed porch railings made from large round pipes. Legend has it that he preferred to put his feet up on the curved pipe surface. Perhaps he just wanted to display a product from his hardware store, which, incidentally, is still in operation in 2025, now on Highway 278/83. Baugh also added the retaining wall of Stone Mountain granite and a garage, roughly in the location of the present enlarged garage. Twin Baugh sisters were born in the house in 1921,

and the Porch House remained in the Baugh family for the next 48 years until it was sold in 1964.

The house stayed in good condition, but little was done to it until the early 21st century when three successive owners undertook renovation and modifications. The main original rooms, the four working fireplaces, and the expansive front porch remained essentially as they had been; but significant changes were made to the rear. Most notably, space was added to the back and walls were removed to open up the kitchen and create a great room with a screened porch on one side and glass doors to the back yard in the middle.

Outside a large garage and a swimming pool were added, and the landscaping was upgraded.

Since acquiring the home just over six years ago, Mike and Laurie Becker have added their own touches. Most obviously, they walled in the screened porch and added a new fireplace to create a cozy sitting area with views of the yard. They updated the kitchen with new counter tops and an island. They also reworked the guest bathroom area to flow more smoothly. The renovated bathroom boasts custom-made cabinets and vanity along with a walk-in shower that is tiled all the way up to emphasize the approximately 12 foot height of the original ceilings. The house is sprinkled with classic and antique furnishing including an 18th Century Pennsylvania corner cabinet purchased from a dealer at one of the annual antique shows of the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center.

The Porch House on Madison’s iconic Academy Street.

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Current owners of the Porch House, Mike and Laurie Becker.

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Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 13

The front office at the Porch House.

Complete with a fireplace, a comfortable sitting area in the Porch House.

A beautiful fountain is the centerpiece of the side yard at the Porch House.

The front parlor has a beautiful fox hunting painting over the fireplace.

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DREAM BIGGER this Summer

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HOME EQUITY LINE OF CREDIT

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7 0 6 . 3 4 2 . 7 211 • a c c e s s u n i t e d . c o m Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 15

3: Alfred Shaw House, ca. 1847, restyled 1880s

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urniture merchant Alfred Shaw and his wife Susan had this house built around 1847, and it was here that their seven children — two boys and five girls — came of age. Legend has it that the 1869 fire that devastated much of downtown Madison may have started in Shaw’s establishment. He continued to operate his store which, according to an 1878 advertisement, “Keeps constantly on hand every article of furniture from the cheapest to the most costly.” Shaw also dealt in coffins and would “superintend the burial of the dead.”

A series of deaths set the stage for the next phase at 364 Porter Street. Susan Shaw died in 1868 and the Shaw’s younger son Horace, who lived next door, passed away two years later. In 1877, Horace’s widow Sarah opened a school in her widowed father-in-law’s house. She offered young

364 Porter Street

children instruction “in the rudiments of an English education.” After Alfred died in 1881, Sarah’s son Horace Junior and his wife Mattie took over the house.

The home of Horace, Jr. and Mattie was already a substantial residence in a fine neighborhood when it became theirs in the early 1880s, but it would soon take on a fashionable new look. The lower Piedmont region’s cotton-based economic recovery from the Civil War was beginning to flourish, so from the 1880s up to the First World War, Madison experienced a flurry of building and remodeling. It was in this period that 364 Porter Street acquired the Queen Anne facade that it retains today. Horace had become prosperous as the cashier and a director of the Bank of Madison, so he could afford to display the latest style. The renovation featured See SHAW, 17

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The idyllic front yard of the Alfred Shaw House facing Porter Street in the heart of the Madison Historic District.

SHAW From 16 a shingled gable, an arched trimmed balcony, and an expansive porch with gingerbread spindles, turned balusters, and elaborate brackets. It is highly likely that he purchased the embellishments from Madison’s Variety Works, which supplied most of the fancy millwork for the town and surrounding region.

(NOTE: Tour guests may note that it was also during this period that the folk Victorian houses at 933 Dixie Avenue and 373 South Main were erected and that Bonar Hall obtained its add-on Victorian porch.)

A series of owners shepherded the house throughout the early to mid-20th Century with no major changes.

Dr. Charles Lower and his artist wife Martha refreshed and maintained the house in the 1980s and 90s. At the dawn of the 21st Century, Ron and Rhonda Erwin, who had previously expanded the historic Boat House across the street and operated it as a B&B, bought the LowerShaw property, which had solid bones and architectural character but was in need of substantial restoration.

The Erwins replaced the original metal roof with the exact pattern. They expanded the kitchen and added the high-style Queen Anne screened porch. The Erwins also constructed period-appropriate outbuildings including a guest house, barn/garage, and a potting shed with a roof salvaged from the original house. Ron Erwin maintained the large backyard with flowering shrubs and an extensive garden widely known for the vine-ripe tomatoes he

was happy to share.

Cade Cowan, who acquired 364 Porter Street from the estate of the Erwins, had previously owned and renovated two other homes nearby while admiring his late friends’ impressive Queen Anne. Now he has made the house his own with a sensitive eye to maintaining the long-standing historic character of the room layout, intricate woodwork, and pine flooring. Visitors will notice several historic fireplace mantle pieces, high ceilings, and details such as how the pattern of the glass window in the front door matches that in the window of the staircase landing. Out back, Ron Erwin’s tomato garden is now adorned with flowers, and a new tea olive hedge frames a developing outdoor living space.

Cowan has done extensive redecorating downstairs, but he did little physical renovation except in the kitchen, which was extensively overhauled. There he replaced the ceramic floor with heart pine flooring and refaced the existing cabinetry with both heart pine and painted wood. The second floor includes a newly wall-papered home office, a large guest room, and a renovated guest bathroom at the end of the hall.

The most notable upstairs space is the owner’s suite.

The bedroom now features tall wainscotting of heart pine with William Morris wallpaper above. The bathroom was completely redone. The sheetrock was peeled back to reveal the original wood boards, and a custom-built vanity was installed. Vintage doors now discreetly hide the toilet and washer/dryer nooks. The clawfoot bathtub is original to the house.

The historic rooms and recent renovations are complemented by a carefully designed décor featuring the

Owner Cade Cowen is an avid gardener who has helped transform the large back yard of the Alfred Shaw House. owner’s eclectic collection of art in every room. Visitors will see impressive Moulthrop wooden bowls, a lifesized early edition woodprint, several original charcoal drawings, photos from world-class photographers, and much more.

Summer is here!

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The back of the house from the perspective of the expansive garden.

The front parlor of the Alfred Shaw House.

A renovated potting shed on the back property of the house. The roof of the shed consists of materials from a renovation of the house.

A whimsical piece of art adorns a wall over a fireplace in the front parlor.

Owner Cade Cowen completed extensive renovations to the large kitchen.

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4: LeSeuer-Overby-Rhodes House, ca. 1875 933 Dixie Avenue

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n 1875 deed refers to the property “on which the said [Joseph A.] LeSeuer is now building his house.” Over the century and a half since LeSeuer first built the home, a succession of owners, especially the Overbys and the Rhodes, have made numerous expansions and improvements and sold off parts of the property; yet the home retains its historic core and ambiance.

As Civil War combat was beginning, young Josephine Thrasher was present when the soldiers of the local Panola Guard marched off from the front steps of the Georgia Female College to join the fight. Shortly after the war she married Barton Overby, a cousin from a well-established local family. In 1889 “Mrs. Josephine See LESEUER, 21

The LeSeuer-Overby-Rhodes House on Dixie Highway.

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The main living room of the LeSeuer-Overby-Rhodes House.

Reginald and Kebby Holden, current owners, added a beautiful garage where a previous outbuilding had been located.

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LESEUER From 19 Overby” acquired the property in her own name. (Barton Overby lived until 1907). Josephine continued to own the place for 40 years. In 1920 she sold some of her property to the north. Perhaps the sale was to raise funds to upgrade the old house for the following year The Madisonian reported, “Mrs. Josephine Overby is having some nice improvements made on her home on the Dixie Highway.”

In 1930, the estate of Josephine Overby sold the home to Wade J. Rhodes, and it remained in the Rhodes family for more than 70 years. Rhodes was a prominent businessman who made, according to a news account, “much improvement and now has one of the nicest and best arranged residences in

town.” He soon wed Susie Van Epps, “a lovely young woman with a charming personality.” Mrs. Rhodes was known as a civic leader and gracious hostess.

A 1937 article observed that her “reception rooms were beautifully decorated with artistic arrangements of gladioli, sweetheart roses, and other summer flowers.” Her husband raised hogs and chickens at the rear of the property.

In the early 1940s, the Rhodes moved to the Macon area but kept their house in Madison, visiting on weekends and holidays. They returned to Madison after Wade retired. He died in 1970, and Susie lived in the home for another two decades. She passed in 1993, 63 years after marrying Wade and moving into their newly refurbished home.

Her nephew inherited the house and held onto it for a decade. He sold it to Clarence and Kathy Whiteside, who then owned the adjoining large estate.

The Whitesides made renovations with

careful attention to saving the historic windows and other woodwork.

They held the property for 10 years and sold it in 2015. The new owners added significant family gathering and kitchen space to the rear, and the present owners, Reginald and Kebby Holden have continued the long process of stewarding and improving this historic home in a glen of large trees on the edge of Madison.

The gable-and-wing configuration, the wide wrapping front porch, and the doorway with classic Greek revival touches combine to welcome visitors into an updated and charming interior.

As one enters the central hall today, the original 4-room layout is evident.

The principal bedroom and master bath are immediately on the left. The permanently closed door by the bedroom fireplace once led directly into the room behind, which is now the family room. Mrs. Holden’s home office is on the right side of the central hall as one enters, and another bedroom is directly behind it. The door at the end of the central hall is where the right side of the house originally ended as evidenced by the clapboard siding still exposed. A half bath added by the Whitesides is now on the right

of this little transition room. On the left one enters the cozy family room.

This original room extends back further than the right side of the house.

The family room fireplace was built to burn coal and now has a gas-fired insert that honors that heritage. Where possible, the wooden ceilings, windows, and millwork have been retained in the four historic rooms. Continuing to the rear of the house, the mudroom and utility space on the right was an earlier kitchen. Inside the closet on the left there are remnants of the old wood siding marking the back side of the original house.

The newest addition to the home is the large kitchen and sitting area across the rear. The countertop of the large island is live-edge wood as is the cozy window seat leading to the kitchen. The sitting area opens onto a long porch across the back. (The space below the porch is Mr. Holden’s office.) From the porch one can survey the expansive backyard and the woods beyond. The large pergola is built on the foundation remnants of Mr. Rhodes’ old chicken house, and a new swimming pool is just past the pergola. The newly built garage is roughly in the location of a previous outbuilding.

Just past the front room, a grandfather clock awaits visitors to the house.

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F: Heritage Hall, ca. 1811 277 S. Main Street

The core of this home dates from 1811 and the early days of Madison.

It was built by Dr. William Johnston, a prominent Madison physician, and later sold in the 1830s to his brother-in-law, Dr. Elijah Evans Jones, who transformed it into the grand Greek Revival mansion that we know today. The front entrance appears to have been based on illustrations from popular builders’ manuals of the period.

The Jones-Turnell-Manley Home is unique in that it is the only home in town with four Doric columns flanked by two square piers. This same design is repeated in the front entranceway. Also of interest, this home is known for window etchings See HERITAGE, 23

One of Madison’s oldest and most iconic houses, Heritage Hall is home to the Morgan County Historical Society.

H: African-American Museum, ca. 1895 156 Academy Street

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he Morgan County African-American Museum was established in the early 1990s under the leadership of Martin L. Bass and Fred Perriman, the current mayor of Madison. A large and diverse group of supporters and contributors joined Perriman and Bass to help bring the dream to fruition.

The mission of the non-profit organization is “to research, collect, educate, and preserve the history and the art of the African-American culture.”

The museum is housed in the turnof-the-century Horace Moore House, which was donated by the Rev. Alfred Murray and relocated to a vacant lot that the Board of Directors had purchased near Calvary Baptist Church.

The Moore house originally stood in the Plainview-Springfield area, a small African American community southeast of Madison.

John Wesley Moore was born in January See MUSEUM, 23

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Courtesy of Madison CVB

The Morgan County African American Museum has a permanent exhibition featuring the art works of Morgan County native Eugene Swain.

MUSEUM From 22 1862, one year before President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation which declared slavery ended in Georgia and the other states still in rebellion. In 1881 Moore married Dora Gordon, and they had four children.

In this period when few black citizens owned property, Moore acquired five acres in 1890 and about 40 more nine years later. The larger plot was deeded to Moore by the white farmer for whom he had labored as a tenant in consideration of “five dollars [and] the service he has given me.”

Local historians estimate that the original three-room, gable-and-wing house with detached kitchen was constructed by Moore sometime between 1895 and 1904. After J.W. Moore died in 1908, his widow continued to live in the home until 1932. Now filled with historical exhibits and artifacts, the relocated house tells not only its story but also the story of how the African American community in Morgan County has struggled yet endured for more than 200 years.

The Morgan County African-American Museum envisions “a community that is increasingly responsive, engaged, and resilient because it understands its history and takes responsibility for building its future.”

HERITAGE

“E.E. Jones” and “I love Will.” One etching connects the home to the famous Allman Brothers Band. TourFrom 22 ists hear the full story of that event.

An integral part of Madison’s Histhat appear in seven of the eight toric District, the house was built on rooms. Members of Dr. Jones’ fam- a four-acre in-town farm about 200 ily inscribed personal phrases like feet from its current site.

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5. Bonar Hall, ca. 1839 1962 Dixie Highway

The front entrance to Bonar Hall facing Dixie Avenue. The original home place was set on 100 acres.

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his elegant property with its grand two-story brick townhome and a mix of original and relocated outbuildings spread across its 13 acres richly deserves its place on the National Register of Historic Places. Unlike many large antebellum homes that have been much enlarged and changed over the years, Bonar Hall is a special architectural gem because it has undergone little modification since the young couple John B. and Eliza Fannin Walker combined her inherited wealth with his substantial assets to erect this showcase in 1839-1840. Reproductions of

their portraits hang over the fireplace in the parlor. The original of Eliza (attributed to famous portraitist Thomas Sully) is on display in the museum at the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center.

Constructed of bricks manufactured by enslaved workers on the grounds, the four-over-four Georgian style house has 20’ x 20’ main rooms, 12’11” ceilings, and 18’ thick walls. Still functional pocket doors separate the main rooms.

The house is strategically surrounded by dependencies also built of brick.

The front is flanked by an orangery (greenhouse) and a teahouse. The orig-

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inal kitchen and matching “necessaries” stand out back. Further back are a smokehouse and other outbuildings.

John Walker’s main plantation of more than a 1,000 acres lay to the south and west of the townhome, which stood on more than 100 acres. In addition, Walker owned considerable farmland in Texas. Walker’s Lone Star connection led to his offering his home for the convalescence of about 30 wounded Confederate soldiers, mostly from General John Bell Hood’s regiments after the Battle of Chickamauga just south of Chattanooga in the fall of 1863.

According to an oft-told story, Bonar Hall’s formal boxwood garden began around 1845. Each year Eliza would take advantage of her husband’s absence in Texas to plant early spring flowers near the townhouse. Upon his return he would replace them with cotton. This battle of wills ended with victory for Eliza, and John hired a landscape architect to design and install the garden.

Her legacy is that Bonar Hall’s grounds and formal garden merited considerable mention in the authoritative Garden See HALL, 28

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BONAR From 26 History of Georgia in the 1930s and still exist today.

In the economic disruptions following the Civil War, John Walker lost his townhome and most of his holdings. By 1880 the property was in the hands of William A. Broughton, son of John Broughton, a local planterbusinessman. The Victorian style of fancy millwork was then the height of fashion, so the Broughtons replaced the original Georgian portico with the two-story veranda one sees today. The new owners also stenciled the ceilings of the formal double parlor, installed the stained glass that can be seen at the top of the stair landing, and built the fancy carriage house. On the occasion of a lawn party in 1898, the local newspaper declared, “the Broughton home is one of the most cultured and refined in the state.” Early in the 20th century John Broughton died and his widow moved to Mobile to live near family.

In 1920 Josie Newton Bacon, the widow of Edward T. Newton and the wife of the local newspaper editor, purchased the property. Mrs. Bacon was a distant cousin of Eliza Fannin Walker, so after some 80 years the house found itself in the hands of the extended family of its original builders. Josie Bacon gave the house its now century-old moniker “Bonar Hall” in honor of William Bonar, her distinguished British ancestor whose family settled in Virginia. His portrait now overlooks the sitting room.

In 1952, upon the death of her mother Josie Newton Bacon, Therese Newton and her brother inherited Bonar Hall. Though the adventurous Therese travelled widely and sometimes lived elsewhere, Bonar Hall remained her official residence for over 70 years.

When she died in 1994 the property passed fully to her nephew Alex Durham Newton. By that time the grand place suffered from deferred maintenance and was in sore need of repair and restoration. The grounds were overgrown, especially with wisteria.

Three years earlier, Alex Newton had married Betsy Wagenhauser, who had never been to Madison. Knowing that he would someday inherit Bonar Hall, Newton soon took his new wife to see See HALL, 29

A side porch framed by flowers at Bonar Hall.

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Deanna Newcomb

Dogwood blooms near the front of Bonar Hall.

HALL From 28 the property to find out if she would be comfortable taking it on as a marital project and eventual home upon retirement. She happily agreed. Together they spent the next 20 years stewarding the house from afar while simultaneously raising their children and spending most of their time overseas for Alex’s job with the U. S. Department of State. Alex, Betsy recently told a magazine writer, “was a fanatic about the house,“ and he knew “every minutiae of its history.” Alex and Betsy employed two highly skilled local craftsmen who carried out most of the restoration work from 2005 until 2010 when Bonar Hall finally became the official residence of the Alex Newton family.

Today the central hall and four main rooms of the house are furnished and decorated with

family antiques and portraits supplemented by various pieces of folk art from Africa and other parts of the world where Alex and Betsy lived and worked. Most of the furniture came with Josie Bacon when she acquired Bonar Hall in 1920. She had previously lived and raised her children in the still standing 1840s Carter-Newton house on Academy Street, which was furnished with early 19th century Georgian-style pieces that her family had inherited from relatives in Burke County. Those family pieces remain in Bonar Hall, and many of them have been in the same spot for over 100 years. The prize piece is the large dining room table at which it is said that General William Tecumseh Sherman dined when the troops of his March to the Sea were near Waynesboro.

Tragically, Alex Newton died in early 2024 following a long illness. Betsy now carries on the stewardship of one of Georgia’s most historic homes and welcomes tour visitors to take Bonar Hall home owner Betsy Wagenhauser with her loyal and faithful their time to wander the house and grounds. friends.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 29

6. Whiteside House, ca. 1920 1730 Dixie Highway

The Whiteside House, also known as Dixie Belle, sits on an expansive lot off Dixie Highway.

O

scar Powell Whitley grew up on a farm in Walton County. In 1904 he and his relatively new bride Earlena W. Whitley moved to the Dorsey community of Morgan County and took up farming themselves. As he became more prosperous, he purchased a large tract closer to Madison in the Brown-

wood area. There, around 1920, he built a substantial story-and-a-half house facing what was then the main road to Atlanta. Over the years, O. P. gradually acquired more land. On the occasion of the Whitley’s golden wedding anniversary in 1947 the Madison paper declared, the Whitleys “have made a substantial place

30 ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ Morgan CounTy CiTizen

for themselves in the life of the county.”

About a quarter of a century later in 1973 O. P. Whitley died at the age of 94.

His six children had given him 14 grand, 32 great, and 12 great-great grandchildren. As O. P. Whitley aged, much of his large farm was sold off to become the acreplus lots of the Whitley Lake Subdivision,

but the family home and the eight acres around it remained a separate enclave. For more than 25 years the Charles W. Merritt, Jr. family updated and cared for the old Whitley home until 2018 when they sold it to Clarence and Kathy Whiteside.

See WHITESIDE, 32

Clarence and Kathy Whiteside made several renovations to the house after purchasing the property in 2018.

The stairwell leading to the second floor of the Whiteside House.

GA & SC

174 West Washinton St. Madison, GA 30650 706.342.000 Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 31

The front room of the Whiteside House.

WHITESIDE From 30 The house sets nicely back from the Dixie Highway with grand pecan, oak, Catawba, and walnut trees in the yard and tall stands of pines on three sides.

(Alas, some of these were lost in recent storms.) The Whitesides added a rock garden area, and the landscape is full of flowers.

When they were purchasing the house, the Whitesides were charmed by their real estate agent calling it “Dixie Belle,” so they adopted the name. They brought with them a fine collection of American antiques from the large historic estate that they previously owned in Madison and from their former mountain home.

They maintained the formality of the

front rooms, but they took a more casual approach to the rear. They reconfigured some of the ceilings to hide mechanicals and return the rooms to their original height. The downstairs guest bedroom was upgraded to become the new master with plenty of room upstairs for family and friends. The old master bedroom upstairs became a den filled with Clarence Whiteside’s collection of western art and other memorabilia.

New construction included removing the screen porch on the back and replacing it with a mudroom and a studio for Kathy’s rug hooking and painting. Some of her hooked rugs are displayed around the house. The Whitesides also added a breakfast room and a new back porch.

In short, Kathy explained, their goal was to make the place comfortable for their retirement and “to take it back to being a farmhouse.”

House owners Clarence and Kathy Whiteside on the front porch of their home.

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7. The Madisonian Building, ca. 1906

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131 East Jefferson Street

his two-story brick edifice has been known as The Madisonian Building since 1969 when the newspaper of that name moved its office to this location. But it hasn’t always been that way.

Madison’s Town Square was laid out in 1809, and many of the original wooden buildings burned in the great fire of 1869 and in two others later in the century. The Jefferson Street side of the square was slow to develop compared to the Main Street and Washington Street sides, which by 1901 were almost completely lined with commercial buildings of masonry construction. At that time, a grocery and hardware store stood on the corner of Jefferson at Main Street, the City Hall and firehouse (now the Visitor Center) faced Jef Jefferson next door, and a new building housing a bicycle shop and a barber was next to that.

Aside from a tiny wooden structure, the rest of the block toward Hancock Street remained empty. All of that was soon to change in the first decade of the 20th Century. In quick succession three new buildings finished out the block by 1910. The construction of the news-

paper building at the corner of Jefferson and Hancock got the ball rolling in 1903 (more on that later). Soon after that a bank was built next to the barber, and John Wesley Bearden erected the building now on tour at 131 East Jefferson stood in between.

The lot that Bearden purchased had 35 feet of frontage on Jefferson, but the office building he erected in 1906 was only 23 feet wide.

There was an exterior stair leading to the upstairs space. Why he left the gap between the buildings is not known for sure; but most likely it was to provide direct access to the cotton yard at the rear, which was included in the lot he purchased. Bearden died soon after the building was completed, so his son managed the property until it sold in 1911.

Among the building’s first tenants was the telegraph company, still an important service in those days when having a telephone at home was not common for most residents.

Over the ensuing decades tenants included a doctor, an insurance agency, several beauticians, and others until it became home to The See MADISONIAN, 34

The Madisonian Building owner Thomas Eichloff and partner Rene Brewer with the couple’s pet Brooklyn in the Editor’s Walk of the property.

We know historic properties better than anyone...

121 East Jefferson Street, Madison, GA 30650 | 706-342-0693 | www.madisonrealtyinc.com Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 33

MADISONIAN From 33 Madisonian in 1969.

The Madisonian newspaper began publishing under that name after the Civil War, but it carried on a legacy of local papers dating from the 1840s. During its more than a century of publication under that name, the Madisonian functioned out of several different locations including two on Madison’s town square just steps from where it finally landed.

By 1895 the paper’s office with its handcranked press was in the grand old Turnell Butler Hotel building on Hancock Street roughly where the Community Roots store is now. Then, as mentioned above, in 1903 the newspaper company built a new building on the northwest corner of Jefferson and Hancock where Wing Nights operates today. That purpose-built office and plant included a new gasoline-powered Cranston cylinder press of the type preferred by many small-town newspapers. It remained The Madisonian’s home for 65 years.

In August 1957 Graham and Adelaide Ponder purchased The Madisonian and announced that they would give the venerable paper a “facelifting.” He became publisher and she put her journalism education and experience to work as editor. By the 1960s the old press in the building on the corner of Jefferson and Hancock had become obsolete, so the Ponders transferred the printing of The Madisonian to a modern central plant in Crawford, Georgia. In 1963, no longer needing the large space for the press, the Ponders bought the office building next door with intentions to remodel it “into a functioning newspaper office.”

When the renovations were complete, the downstairs had reception space upfront with the composition and dark rooms at the rear. Job printing along with the publisher and editorial offices were upstairs.

In the gap between the two buildings, the Ponders designed a garden to honor editors of Madison’s various newspapers since the early 19th Century — all of whom had been males except for the then current editor of The Madisonian, Adelaide Ponder. At the open house for the remodeled building in the fall of 1969 the fitting door prize was an Olivetti typewriter.

In February 1996 The Madisonian sold to Robert Booth. The new owner ran The Madisonian until April 1998 when he sold it to Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc. while under the duress of a newspaper war with the start-up Morgan County Citizen,

The Madisonian Building once housed the then-community newspaper of the same name. founded by Patrick and Dianne Yost. Patrick Yost had been a former managing editor of The Madisonian. Three years later in May 2001, the Yosts purchased The Madisonian in a sale that did not include the building. Yost merged the two papers and continued publishing from The Morgan County Citizen’s building on South Main Street. The paper is now located on North 2nd Street.

For the past quarter-century, 131 Jefferson had retained its name as the Madisonian Building and has served as a residence upstairs with gallery, office, or retail

space below. For several years the building served as the rectory for the Episcopal Church of the Advent.

Today, the exterior of the Madisonian building retains the basic dimensions and proportions of the 1906 original. The deck over the garden is located at what was once the top of the exterior stairs. The details of the current façade date from 1969 prior to the establishment of the Madison Historic Preservation Commission. In accordance with the then trendy style of faux colonial revival the building’s original 1905 windows were replaced with

new ones that, in Graham Ponder’s own words, “were copied from those in Williamsburg.” ( Similar colonial details were tacked onto to other downtown buildings during that era) The current owner, Thomas Eichloff, has enhanced the Editors Walk garden with a water feature and has significantly refreshed the interior. The Madisonian building is now an upscale space for a resident who wants to live near the restaurants and shops of historic downtown Madison while having an office or retail business downstairs.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 34

An upstairs living space in the renovated and restored building.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 35

Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 36

8. House of Janus, ca. 1998 1050 East Avenue

The House of Janus, the home of Steve and Linda Huggins on East Avenue.

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his elegant home is located on a private road with only a half dozen lots, all of which are seven acres or more; yet each home is only about a mile from the square in downtown Madison — it is country living near the heart of town.

The original owners were attracted by the large lot that rises gracefully from the narrow road and were inspired by a house and setting that they had seen in low country South Carolina near

Beaufort. Their architect took that idea and designed a home that smoothly blended formality and comfort. The formality is seen in the foyer and the equal-sized dining room and parlor on either side. The comfort emerges as one enters the family room, which is focused on a large fireplace flanked by views of the back yard.

Twenty-three years later, the original owners moved out into the Morgan County countryside and sold their

house to Linda and Steve Huggins. The Huggins have retained the low country façade of the house and the formality of the rooms flanking the foyer; but they expanded to the rear and left side to provide space for their respective passions — pottery, gardens and quilts for Linda — books and films for Steve.

They added a new garage connected to the house by a wide breezeway and converted most of the old garage into a three-tiered, state-of-the-art home

theater. At the other end of the house an addition made space for Steve’s expansive library. Linda’s pottery collection is displayed in several rooms, and she does her quilting upstairs. But her emerging garden in the backyard is her pride and joy. The new sunroom and breakfast area just off the large kitchen looks out on the swimming pool and a large gazebo directly ahead See JANUS, 38

Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 37

JANUS From 37 and a water feature on the side. The fence encloses about a half-acre and discourages all but the most hungry and curious deer, who still leap in. The carefully chosen plantings, many of which are deer resistant, are young but already well established. Tour visitors can wander to their heart’s content.

And why, visitors may wonder, “the House of Janus.” Perhaps it is because

the gazebo by the pool vaguely suggests a Roman temple. Yet the name means more than that to the Huggins.

Janus was the Roman deity often depicted on the coin of the realm with two faces, one looking backward toward the past and one looking forward to the future. The front of 1050 East Avenue looks as it did; the rear is new.

The Huggins have memories of the several other houses where they lived during their long marriage, and they look forward to making new memories in the house that they have made their own for their retirement years.

House of Janus owners Steve and Linda Huggins in their beautiful backyard.

Guests get a peak at the entrance to the library in the house.

A daylily opens up in the beautiful backyard at the home.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦

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The expansive library in The House of Janus.

A powder room with wall coverings inspired by Picasso doodles.

Steve Huggins office is adorned with moments of a fascinating life.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦

39

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40 ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ Morgan CounTy CiTizen

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The History of Dixie Highway in Morgan The two-lane highway was part of a larger system to get people and things across the South

By Brad Rice Special to the Citizen

The address of the O. P. Whitley Farm on this year’s tour is 1730 “Dixie Highway.” Two other tour homes are on Dixie Avenue which runs directly into town from the highway. That raises the question of how these roads earned the name Dixie and why they have retained a name that for the most part has fallen out of favor in the 21st Century.

It was not enough just to be a paved road in a southern state to earn this special designation. How then did some highways in the region, and this stretch of highway in particular, earn the official capitalized T and H to become part of “The Dixie Highway?” It all had to do with branding and marketing in the early days of interstate motoring.

In the 19th century and the early days of the 20th, the nation had no highway system designed to connect distant cities. Rural roads were unpaved, maintained by myriads of local governments, and intended primarily for travel from farm to town and from town to town. In order to travel long distances by road at that time, a driver had to cobble together a route composed of local roads usually named for the next town ahead.

Long distance travelers rode railroads whenever possible.

Then in the 1910s along came the Model-T and other reasonably priced and reliable automobiles and trucks that made horse and mule drawn wagons seem unbearably slow. Something had to be done, so a movement arose to demand that a coherent system be built to connect states and cities with numbered highways. The earliest efforts focused on connections between the populous northeastern and midwestern regions and then on to the west coast. The Lincoln Highway from New York City to San Francisco was the initial accomplishment.

Some of the same promoters sought to connect the Midwest and Northeast to the South. In 1915 a group of governors convened in Chattanooga, and the Dixie Highway was born. It was actually a planned system of highways rather than a single route. The Dixie See HIGHWAY, 44

Dixie Highway leaving Madison near the western edge of the Madison city liimits.

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The cover of a 1925 publication about the Dixie Highway.

A 1925 map showing the ‘official’ Dixie Highway route.

Close up of the highway in 1925.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦

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Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 43

HIGHWAY From 41 Highway Association published a magazine and lobbied states and the federal government to get behind the plan.

The Dixie Highway magazine ran stories and advertisements about towns and sites along the way. Where possible, the new routes would be based on improving existing roads and linking them together into a comprehensive system. The Dixie Highway concept called for one route that would run from Chicago to Miami and another that would go down the east coast. Subsidiary highways in the system would connect the two principal paths.

That’s where Morgan County came in; it was on the proposed link between the midwestern and eastern iterations of the Dixie Highway. The plan was intended to straighten and improve the existing local roads that paralleled the Georgia Railroad eastward from Atlanta to Madison and then cut south toward Milledgeville. This was the very path that General Slocum’s left wing of William T. Sherman’s army had used when it came through Morgan County on the March to the Sea in 1864. By 1915 Atlanta had been the state capit0l for nearly 50 years, so the Dixie Highway to Milledgeville came to be known as the Old Capitol Route.

In 1916 Congress passed the first of a series of acts whereby the federal government would pay part of the cost if states would coordinate their highway building with the national plan. Morgan County and Madison leaders lobbied hard to make sure that they were not bypassed when the routes were finalized. Paul Atkinson, owner of Variety Works which built homes and manufactured millwork, was among the early advocates to get the “federal highway” to come through his town and help local business. World War I temporarily put talk of funding highways on hiatus, but the war effort proved the need for a better system.

In 1919 Morgan County held a bond election to match federal funds for highway and local road improvements. The local promotional committee ran an advertisement that proclaimed: The millions of American boys who went across [the ocean to War in Europe] have all returned enthusiastic boosters for good roads. The old muddy roads must give way to permanent highways. . . . Morgan County must not lag behind.

For every dollar we spend on permanent roads, the United States government will spend another one.

The bond issue passed overwhelmingly. Just two years later in May 1921 some 500 people gathered in Madison to celebrate the completion of the new paved portion of the Dixie Highway from Rutledge to Madison. A mile-long caravan of 100 cars departed from the town square and headed to Rutledge where there was another celebration. The editor of the Winder News congratulated “our sister county of Morgan on such a magnificent highway.”

When it came time to widen and further improve the highway to Atlanta, issues with right-of-way made it infeasible to make significant improvements to original route along the railroad from Rutledge to Madison, so it was by-passed by what is now U. S. 278. By the 1970s, Highway 278 itself had become obsolete, so it was in turn bypassed by Interstate 20.

As a result, the once “magnificent” stretch of highway that opened in 1921 alongside the railroad tracks from Madison to Rutledge is now a pleasant and lightly used pastoral drive that remains as one of the best preserved and most historic parts of the entire Dixie Highway system.

Dixie Highway was once the main route connecting cities in the South. This image shows the highway heading towards Rutledge.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ Thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 44

D: Episcopal Church of the Advent, ca. 1842 338 Academy Street

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his Gothic-influenced house of worship, now the Episcopal Church of the Advent, was originally erected by Madison’s Methodists. It served that congregation for 70 years until they outgrew the small building and moved into their new church building on South Main Street.

After the Methodists vacated, various groups used the structure, including Christian Scientists in the 1950s.

Episcopalians first formally organized in Madison in 1846, and among the founding vestrymen was Joshua Hill, later to become a U.S. congressman and senator.

The small parish had several buildings over the years.

Their first permanent building, a simple wooden chapel built in 1853 and demolished in the 20th century,

was located near the city cemetery.

The popular 19th century Gothic Revival style that the Methodist builders employed in 1844 is most evident in the pointed arch windows and in the brick pilasters on the sides that suggest the buttresses of medieval cathedrals. The gables of the steeple carry through the gothic theme, as does the rounded apse at the rear of the sanctuary. The balcony now used by the choir provided seating for slaves prior to emancipation.

After the Episcopalians acquired the building in the 1960s, they refreshed the exterior, made critical structural repairs and refurbished the interior to suggest the classic Anglican/Episcopal edifices typical of the low country south.

E: First United Methodist Church, ca. 1914 296 South Main Street

B

y the early 20th century the congregation of the First Methodist Episcopal Church, South had outgrown its Gothic building on Academy Street. (That original location is also on tour as the Episcopal Church of the Advent.)

A successful building campaign led to the construction in 1914 of a fine new building unlike any of the more traditional churches in town. The Akron Plan, popularized by the

First Methodist Church of that Ohio city, featured a central auditorium surrounded by rooms for Sunday school and other functions. The plan remained popular with churches of several Protestant denominations through the 1920s.

This elegant Madison example features a classical Greek cross design with the sanctuary situated under a large dome with a smaller cupola-like dome on top of that. The Main Street and

Central Avenue façades of the church incorporate Roman Tuscan columns supporting ornamented pediments with broad entablatures. The Greek crosses embedded at the points of the pediments reflect the shape and purpose of the building.

The interior is equally dramatic. (In order to build the church, the house now known as Heritage Hall had to be turned and moved to its present location next door.)

B: Madison Presbyterian, ca. 1842 382 South Main Street

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he Presbyterians of Madison were already well organized by the mid 1820s, and in 1842, they built the elegant structure that still stands. The walls are stucco over masonry, which gives a formal appearance to the façade. The Doric pilasters that frame the three doors present the Greek Revival style without grandiose columns.

Originally, the side windows were nine-over-nine panes like the three remaining on the front, but later they were replaced with the fine Tiffany-style stained glass windows one sees today, which were donated by a member in memory of her family. As in all three of Madison’s extant antebellum church buildings, there was a balcony for slaves — in this case with an outside entrance.

Among the worshipers before the Civil War was Alexander H. Stephens, who would become Vice President of the Confederate States. During Madison’s brief occupation, the congregation’s silver communion service was taken by Union soldiers. Entreatments to the Union command resulted in the return of the treasured set, which is now on display in the museum of the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center, except when being used on special occasions by the congregation.

In the immediate post-Civil War period, the congregation was pastored by the Rev. I.S.K. Axson, father of Ellen, who lived with her parents on Porter Street. She would later become Woodrow Wilson’s wife and first lady of the nation until her tragic death from kidney disease in 1914.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 45

J: Rogers House, ca. 1809 179 East Jefferson Street

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onstruction on the Ruben Rogers house began on one of the city’s original lots in 1809, the year that Madison was incorporated. It was originally built as a simple two-over-two Piedmont Plain house, typical of prosperous, but not wealthy, owners. The tworoom shed roof addition on back dates to 1820.

In 1873, during the same era that many of Madison’s plain antebellum houses acquired their Victorian flourishes, Martin L. Richter, son of Charles Richter of Richter Cottage, added the front porch with its dainty wood scrollwork and spindles.

John H. Hunter purchased the house in 1886, and it stayed in his family for over ninety years.

The house had evolved to commercial use as a dentist’s office by the 1980s when a cooperative effort among Morgan County, the City of Madison, and the Morgan County Historical Society resulted in the 1992 purchase and restoration of the structure as a house museum managed by the Historical Society.

The interior is carefully interpreted with antique furniture and other artifacts, so that visitors can step back into the mid-19th century.

Construction of the Rogers House began in 1809, the same year the city of Madison was incorporated.

K: Rose Cottage, ca. 1891 179 East Jefferson Street

A

deline Rose, an African-American woman born in 1864 just two months before Union Troops reached Madison, built this house in 1891.

It remained her residence until her death in 1959 at the age of 94. The widow Rose earned her living and supported her two children by washing and ironing for white families and businesses including the Hardy House hotel, which stood on West Jefferson Street where Town Park is now.

The vernacular cottage with Victorian trim represents a style typical for established working class families of all races around the turn of the Twentieth Century.

Rose Cottage was moved from its old neighborhood to its current site and restored in 1996 to represent the resilience of African-American life during the height of the Jim Crow era, which coincided with Adeline Rose’s residency.

The structure, owned by Morgan County, was restored by the City of Madison, and is managed by the Morgan County Historical Society.

The Rose Cottage now sits in the shadow of the historic Morgan County Courthouse in downtown Madison.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦

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G: Calvary Baptist Church, ca. 1880 503 Academy Street

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n 1873 the congregation of Calvary Baptist Church, composed mostly of recently freed slaves, purchased a lot and began construction of a substantial brick building in a Gothic style quite similar to the white Methodist church (now Episcopal) just three blocks south on Academy Street. Congregants including masons, carpenters, and general laborers performed most of the construction work in their off time. Around 1880 the work was finally done.

At about the same time, the Saint Paul’s African Methodist Episcopal building was taking shape in similar brick style across the railroad tracks at 811 Fifth Street. It is safe to assume that the black Baptists and the AME brethren shared construction tips and experience.

The brick detailing on the front of Calvary Baptist suggests a unified tower rising all the way to the steeple with its ornate Italianate detailing. Brick arches with keystone effect accent the front windows, and pilasters at the corners give the impression of substantial construction. Major restoration was undertaken in the mid-1970s.

Courtesy of Madison CVB

The Calvary Baptist Church was constructed by church members who purchased the lot in 1873 and completed construction of the church in 1880.

C: Madison Baptist Church, ca. 1858

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he Madison Baptist congregation was organized in 1834, and by 1855 it was prosperous enough to erect the present structure, which probably was not fully finished until 1858.

John Byne Walker of Bonar Hall was a leading layman of the congregation, and the building’s red bricks (stamped JBW) were manufactured by slaves in the brick works on his plantation. One of the church’s 20th century dedicated stained glass windows honors Walker.

As was typical in antebellum southern Protestant churches, slaves attending services were confined to the designated gallery. Following eman-

328 South Main Street

cipation, some freedmen who had at- course, been updated and redecorated, but it is still steeped in history. tended Madison Baptist were among the founders of Calvary Baptist Church on Academy Street.

Although grand Greek Revival columns like those on the church’s façade are strongly associated with antebellum architecture, in fact, the ones currently gracing the church were not added until around the time of the First World War when Classical Revival was popular.

Also, the current steeple is much modified from the original. The brick work and windows under the portico are, however, original to the building.

The interior of the sanctuary has, of

Madison Baptist Church is located in the middle of the Madison Historic District on South Main Street.

Morgan County Citizen ♦ thursday, May 15, 2025 ♦ 47

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