The Perry County Historical and Preservation Society will open doors and front gates across Marion next weekend for its annual Christmas Tour, a day-long showcase of historic homes, churches, and farmsteads decorated for the holidays.
The tour will be held on Saturday, Dec. 13, 2025, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tour headquarters is the Marion Female Seminary, 204 West Monroe Street, where visitors can buy tickets, pick up wristbands, and tour the museum. Tickets are $20 for PCH&PS members, $25 for non-members, and children under 12 are admitted free. Tickets will be sold only at headquarters, not at individual sites.
This year’s route highlights both familiar landmarks and places that rarely open to the public:
One stop is The Camellias on Albert Turner Sr. Memorial Highway is an 1830s Greek Revival house originally given by planter Joseph Crenshaw to his daughter Mary Crenshaw Reese. Rescued in the 1940s by Col. Earl Campbell Horan and his wife, Margaret Page Ellis Horan, the house has since been restored and expanded by their descendants. The home is surrounded by camellia bushes, from which it takes its name.
Another feature is Gus Mitchell Store and Fellowship Hall on Albert Turner Sr. Memorial Highway at Viula. While the store building itself is not open for tours, it can be viewed from the nearby equipment exhibit. Built in the early 1900s by Augustus “Gus” Mitchell, it served as a community center for events and is now being preserved with an equipment museum.
Breezy Point Farm on Dr. J.J. Howard Road traces its roots to 19th-century landowner John Holmes Lee. Current owners Manly “Parks” Lee and his wife, Ann Blalock, have restored the farmhouse, added modern systems, a wraparound deck, screened porch, six-acre lake, and planted pecan, fig, and Asian persimmon trees and zinnias.
On Perry County Road 6, the Weissinger Hamburg Plantation on Perry County Road 6 offers a look at early 1820s architecture. Charles and Enid Weissinger rebuilt the family home on its original footprint with a modern interior, six bedrooms, five baths, and a new pear orchard in memory of family preserves.
The tour also points back to Perry County’s literary life at the former home of short story writer Mary Ward Brown’s former home on Dr. J.J. Howard Road is offered as a drive-by only stop. Brown, a noted short story writer, lived most of her life in this bungalow and authored works such as “Tongues of Flame” and “It Wasn’t All Dancing”.
At 91 Forest Hill Drive, the Bixler-McCorquodale-Edwards house, represents more recent architecture. Retired engineer Donald Bixler, who worked on projects such as the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and major corporate buildings, designed the home in the 1970s after moving to Marion with his wife, Nelle Carlton of Thomaston. Later owners Robin and Gwen McCorquodale updated the interior. Today the house belongs to nursery owner Cary Edwards and his wife, Teresa, who have added landscaping, a fenced yard and garden features that reflect their work with plants and design.
The tour concludes at one of Marion’s most important historic churches. First Congregational Church on Clay Street, organized around 1869, is recognized as the oldest unaltered Reconstruction-era African American church in Alabama. The church will host live music on tour day, with vocalist Tiffanie Cosby performing from 1 to 3 p.m. Built largely by its own members with support from the American Missionary Association, the church has been closely linked with Lincoln School since its founding and once served as the school chapel. Coretta Scott King attended Bible study there while a student at Lincoln Normal School, and Andrew Young’s first pastorate was at this church, where he later married Jean Childs Young, great-granddaughter of founding member Rev. James Childs. The church, listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1982, will host live music on tour day, with vocalist Tiffanie Cosby scheduled to perform from 1 to 3 p.m.
Throughout the day, the Marion Female Seminary will serve as the tour hub, with museum rooms open and local vendors offering art, crafts, baked goods, honey, pottery, woodwork, toys, and food trucks, along with live music on the grounds.
For more information about the tour, contact the Perry County Historical and Preservation Society at 334-292-0319 or visit the society’s Facebook page.
