‘The Talking Walls:’ This Florida house is covered in drawings. No one’s sure why

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – A historic house in Gainesville is known for having thousands of words and artworks written on its walls.

Nowadays, the Historic Haile Homestead is owned by the Alachua Conservation Trust and the Haile Family Trust, but its roots stem back to the 1850s.

According to the Historic Haile Homestead’s website, this is when the Haile family — headed by husband-and-wife Thomas and Serena Haile — moved to Florida to start up the Kanapaha Plantation.

However, family and friends would regularly scrawl messages and drawings all over the home’s walls.

The museum says that more than 12,500 words have been found scrawled in the home’s rooms and closets, which have since come to be known as “The Talking Walls.”

Some of these messages are unnervingly cryptic, such as one that reads, “THE HOUSE WAS BRIEFLY ALIVE.”

Others are more comedic, including this poem that stemmed from the “Party Days,” which were weekend parties held at the homestead in the early 1900s:

“A girl can flirt, a girl can dance, a girl can play croquet. But she can’t strike a match on her pants because she’s not built that way.”

Message inscribed on “The Talking Walls” at the Historic Haile Homestead

Another message describes how 22 rats were caught in the home on Dec. 29, 1889. Yet another features a rhyme that goes, “If love be cold do not despair. There’s always flannel underwear.”

Images can also be found etched on the walls, such as one cameo that was drawn by an unknown party-goer in the early 1900s, Kirkman says.

According to the museum, the home was abandoned by the early 1930s, though it was ultimately restored in 1996 with the help of a state grant.

Years later, historian Karen Kirkman — president of the nonprofit that maintains the home — uncovered even more writings that had been covered up by plasterers during the restoration.

“In the office, a crack appeared down the southern wall. Eventually, some plaster fell off, revealing some lines in pencil,” Kirkman said. “I talked to one of our Board members, Jay Reeves… He greenlighted us to chip off the plaster to see if there was writing underneath. Indeed there was!”

Despite the history, no one’s completely sure about why the family and its friends wrote so much all over the walls.

However, Kirkman told News 6 that she has a theory, which goes as follows:

“Having transcribed the walls and Serena Haile’s diary, my theory is that Mrs. Haile would normally write in her journal until she ran out of paper. Then, she would write on whatever she could find, including the walls. Her journal is mostly in neat sections — writing packets, if you will. Horizontally lined, folded in half and threat put through the fold and tied in a neat bow on the outside. Then, there are days when she has written on the back of a steamship schedule, a seed order form, or the walls. Then, when the new writing packet came, she would rewrite the entry in the new packet. But she kept the scrap or wall writing she did in the interim. There is a record of a freeze on January 1886, when the temperature did not go over 36 (degrees) for four days. It’s written on the wall next to the southern window AND in her journal. That’s my theory anyway. The oldest dated writing is 1859, done by the 7-year-old son, Ben. Maybe his mischief started it all?”

Karen Kirkman, president of Historic Haile Homestead, Inc.

For those interested in seeing “The Talking Walls” in person or learning more about the plantation, the nonprofit offers tours to guests.

Kirkman says the homestead is open on Saturday and Sunday, with tours available at the following times:

• Saturday: 10:15 a.m. / 11:15 a.m. / 12:15 p.m. / 1:15 p.m.

• Sunday: 12:15 p.m. / 1:15 p.m. / 2:15 p.m. / 3:15 p.m.

Admission to the museum is free, though the guided tours are $5 per person. Anyone under 12 years of age can join these tours for free.

The museum also offers educational videos on the history of slavery in the area, including the names and stores of some of the people enslaved at the Kanapaha plantation.

“Besides the Talking Walls, we are known for our truthful interpretation of slavery,” Kirkman told News 6. “We even help descendants of the enslaved make connections to their ancestors.”

For more information, visit the Historic Haile Homestead’s website by clicking here.

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