Purchase looms for songwriter’s house

The home of American songwriter Cindy Walker, who paved the way for female songwriters that came after her, is an overgrown and deteriorating piece of Texas history, Lindsay Liepman, award-winning former journalist and Mexia native said.

Liepman created the Cindy Walker Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, with the goal to stabilize, stop any further deterioration of, rehabilitate and designate the Walker home, located on Brooks Street in Mexia, as a Texas State Historic Site.

“Legends in the industry recorded her music and recorded her songs,” Liepman said. “She truly was one of the first female songwriters, certainly in the country music genre, but of all time.”

One of the first steps is to purchase the home for $30,000. At this time, the foundation is short about $4,000, Liepman said. People can make a direct donation to the Cindy Walker Foundation account at Vera Bank in Mexia. Or donate through GoFundMe at https://gofund.me/d57bdc1f.

The foundation will close the deal on Wednesday, Sept. 28, and is planning to get the property in better shape, before moving forward with restoration plans by organizing a community clean up event, she said.

Those interested in volunteering for a community clean-up day at the Cindy Walker home can email Liepman at lindsay@cindywalkerfoundation. org. Liepman has big plans for the house beyond the restoration and Texas State Historical Site designation, she said. Once the home is restored, conversations with the city and the community about her ideas can begin. “Our vision is for it to become a museum, and a community center where musical programming can happen, including free music lessons for kids, songwriter retreats and that sort of thing,” Liepman said. “But all of that is going to depend on how the city wants to kind of work with us on this project, and what the shared vision is, with the community.” Liepman, with the help of Mexia resident Valarie Friday, is also in the beginning stages of forming the Cindy Walker Days Committee. Cindy Walker Days would be a fundraising event to support the foundation and house restoration, she said. “We’d like to have a music festival surrounding her birthday in July, and have that be kind of the signature event of the Cindy Walker Foundation,” she said. Bringing people into the community to help local businesses and the economy, not just in Mexia, but the surrounding communities as well, is part of what the Cindy Walker Foundation wants to do, Liepman said.

They plan to have the first Cindy Walker Days fundraiser around July 2023, she said.

“That is just definitely going to be something that I think would be really great for the community, especially because Cindy Walker is so revered. It would be awesome having that event in Mexia,” she said.

It’s important to preserve this history because Cindy Walker paved the way for musicians people enjoy today like Dolly Parton, Taylor Swift and Miranda Lambert, Liepman said.

“There are people in younger generations that don’t know who Cindy Walker is, and when you talk to people in the music industry, she was so well respected,” Liepman said.

Walker was really a trailblazer in the music industry, she said.

It’s something Mexia residents can have a sense of pride in, and it will be great for the younger generation, especially the younger people in Mexia, to learn who Walker was, Liepman said.

“She could live anywhere in the world, and she chose to live in Mexia, Texas, and that’s pretty special for our community,” she said. “The most important thing is, it’s the right thing for us to do, as a community, to save this house, and to do right by her legacy because her history is our history too.”