The Walton-Young Historic House is a registered Mississippi Landmark and a typical middle class home of the Victorian era. Horace H. Walton, who owned a hardware store on the Oxford Square, built the house in 1880. Walton and his wife, Lydia Lewis Walton, lived in the house with their three children, Lewis, Victoria, and Horace, until his death in 1891.
After Walton passed away, Lydia boarded university students in an upstairs bedroom to provide for her family. In 1895, she married Dr. Alfred Alexander Young, a country physician and widower from Como, Mississippi. Dr. Young moved into the house, bringing his son, Stark, and daughter, Julia.
Stark Young was the most famous resident of the Walton-Young house, and he remained there while attending Ole Miss at the turn of the century. Young became a well-known novelist and playwright.
Dr. and Mrs. Young lived in the house until their deaths in 1925. The First Presbyterian Church of Oxford purchased the house for use as a parsonage. Four ministers’ families occupied the house over the next fifty years.
The university purchased the house in 1974, and it housed the Center for the Study of Southern Culture and the Honors College. The house became a part of the University Museum in 1997.
The house is located at the corner of University Avenue and Fifth Street, adjacent to the University Museum. The house is currently closed to the public.
Please call 662.915.7073, or email museum@olemiss.edu for more information.