Video: Historic Homes Draw Crowds During Pilgrimage

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COLUMBUS, Miss. (WCBI) — Spring Pilgrimage 2016 in Columbus is rapidly coming to close, and the event is saving some of their best homes for last.

One of the homes on display Thursday night was the Temple Heights home, formerly known as the Carl and Dixie Butler home.

The home is a part of Pilgrimage history, and has been hosting tours for the last 48 years.

A new family now resides in the historical home, and they tell WCBI that living in the home offers a new piece of past time every day.

“When we were putting central air and hear in, we found a crate from the original owners and some letter that had been left…”, said Kathy Novotny, who now owns the home with her husband.

The Novotny’s have been living in the home for the past eight weeks and this is their first Pilgrimage tour

The family is the sixth that have lived in Temple Heights.

Novotny said Dixie Butler has been a huge help to the family when preparing for Pilgrimage tours.

She said her favorite part of the tours is “sharing the history” with people from around the country, saying she’s met people from “upstate New York, all the way to Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon, it’s been wonderful…”

Novotny also thanked the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Sciences students, as well as military wives, for donating their time to be storytellers and tour guides.

Pilgrimage 2016 wraps up Saturday, April 9th with tours happening from 9 A.M. to 10 P.M.