Good news for the c.1880 Italianate Walton-Young House on University Avenue: a little TLC for the exterior! The Mississippi Department of Archives and History is supporting the repairs through its Community Heritage Preservation Grant. Architect for the work is Belinda Stewart Architects of Eupora, who have also done excellent work on other historic buildings owned by the University of Mississippi.
The original architect, possibly builder, was Gustavus Maurice Torgerson (Mississippi Department of Archives and History, Historic Resources Inventory database). For more photographs of the house behind that construction fence, check out the MDAH fact sheet for the Walton-Young House. Torgerson immigrated from Stockholm, Sweden to the South in the late 1800s (Torgerson Family Geneaology).
According to MDAH Historic Records Inventory, the house is
A wood-frame two-story L-front house with a one-story porch. The projecting block has a polygonal window bay that extends to both stories. “Lydia Lewis Walton, the widow of builder Horace H. Walton, married Dr. Alred A. Young. His son, Stark Young, became a well-known novelist and drama critic. The house was the First Presbyterian parsonage from 1925 until purchased by the University in 1974” (see Oxford Walking Tour, p. 26).
Categories: Cool Old Places, Grants, Historic Preservation, MS Dept. of Archives and History, Oxford, Renovation Projects
Preservation in Mississippi 
This is wonderful and encouraging. On the sad news side, and of interest to those who love Mississippi’s historic architecture, Mt. Holly (Lake Washington) is fully engulfed in flames this morning. Such an unnecessary waste.
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I’m speechless with horror at this news. It was so close to being in new ownership, and possibly saved.
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The news of Mt. Holly is heartbreaking. I read again your
MissPres post on January 16, 2013, about this beautiful home being part of Shelby Foote’s family. If only he could have bought it and restored it, perhaps this might not have happened. A good sprinkler system maybe could have saved it. It was a very beautiful home.
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I have searched for any news of the fire and been unable to locate it thus far, so hopefully, sec040121 can update us as news emerges.
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There is a little bit of info about it on a FB page called Abandoned Houses of the South. So tragic and sickening.
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Is the new roof for Prospect Hill being installed?
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