Aunt Aggie’s Lake City Bone Garden Story

A garden of roses and bones once turned a North Florida yard into a destination. We follow the trail of Aunt Aggie, a Black and Creek healer, poet, and fortune teller whose Lake City “bone garden” drew travelers, couples, and curiosity-seekers from across the country in the early 1900s. What began as a story for Black History Month becomes a vivid journey through local memory, segregation-era resilience, and the strange beauty of a landmark that was equal parts eerie and welcoming.

We dig into the geography—how Alligator became Lake City, why White Springs’ sulfur baths fueled regional tourism, and where the garden likely stood near today’s Richardson community and Annie Maddox Park. Along the way, we weigh lore against sources: animal bones woven into arches, rumors of human remains in the small store Aggie ran with her husband Jinx, and the postcards and photographs that prove how far her reputation spread. More than a spectacle, Aggie’s space doubled as a storefront, a healing practice, and a cultural beacon, where produce, potions, fortunes, and flowers met good manners and an unmistakable presence.

This story is also a guide to remembrance. We talk about the “Maddox Rose,” the power of naming, and a simple ritual—lay a red rose and say “Yes, ma’am, thank you, ma’am”—to honor a woman who shaped community identity. If you’re ready to rethink Florida history through local Black heritage, Indigenous roots, folklore, and place-based archives, press play and take the walk with us. When you’re done, share this with a friend, leave a review, and tell us: would you visit the bone garden at night?

Ready to explore more shocking true crime cases with us? Subscribe to Drink About Something for new episodes every Friday, and visit drinkaboutsomething.site with links to see all our content, including visual evidence from the cases we cover. 

AS ALWAYS D-A-S

Transcript

Setting The Stage And Intent

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey Lindsay. Hey Jesse.

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Hey Landon. Hey. We have guests, and this is my first time ever doing this.

SPEAKER_01 0:08

Oh my god. This is Jesse's story.

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Yeah, a little short story over here. I wanted to do a little something.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

Short stories with Jesse.

SPEAKER_00 0:14

I wanted to do a little something. Hello, everybody. And I have storage about storage? Storage? Is it storage or storage? I want to say storage or storage. I have, is that even a word? Storyage?

SPEAKER_01 0:29

No, you can make it your own.

SPEAKER_00 0:30

It's my word. Trademark. It's my my word trademark. Hashtag storyage. I have a story about an African American lady that lived here in our town.

unknown 0:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

Yeah. And did some amazing shit that people came to, and it was just something that I wanted to share because this is African American awareness. I mean, we want to Black History Month, and we want to share some things, you know. Not so much true crime in this one, but we need we need all to be aware what happens in your own little communities and things that are amazing. So this is history.

Who Was Aunt Aggie

SPEAKER_01 1:08

History, and it's Black History Month.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

Yeah. Aunt Aggie. Everybody remember that name. She is our aunt. Our Aunt Aggie in our town here.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Okay, Auntie.

SPEAKER_00 1:19

Yeah, so she was just famous in our town in Lake City. And she was some would say that she was a poet and a healer.

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Ooh, I love healers.

SPEAKER_00 1:31

And a fortune teller.

SPEAKER_01 1:33

Okay.

From Alligator To Lake City

SPEAKER_00 1:34

Yeah. So she had some stuff going on, man. So after everything happened in the 1800s, her parents moved from Georgia. They had moved to the town of Alligator, which in turn came to be Lake City. And her uh her parents was, you know, uh African American and Native American Creek, Muscogee Creek descendants. And and uh they came here, you know, freed people, and Aggie got a job and bought some property, you know, through her employer. And she decided to build a Which is amazing. Yeah, that's that's just they're coming up, right? Even though our our town has some fucking crazy ass shit that really happened. I mean, oh my god. But um so she has stuff going on. She decided to build a garden. This is no regular garden though, Lindsay. This is a beautiful, amazing garden that has like fruits and vegetables and the most amazing, beautiful flowers all over the place. And Aunt Aggie really, she didn't really know all the names of everything. So she she kind of called some of the flowers and plants and stuff. She kind of called them whatever she wanted to. But in that garden, there were bones all twisted through bleached white bones and ornate beautiful arrangements. Like we're talking about just a whole bone garden that became so popular that people were coming from all over the United States to come check this shit out.

SPEAKER_01 3:11

Really?

SPEAKER_00 3:12

In our own town.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Well, I mean, okay. Was it human bones, animal bones?

SPEAKER_00 3:16

I will tell you.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:18

But not yet.

SPEAKER_01 3:19

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:20

I will not tell you yet.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:22

So people were coming for all around because uh just north of us in White Springs.

SPEAKER_01 3:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:27

Sulfur.

SPEAKER_01 3:28

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

They had the sulfur springs right there. People would come from all over the United States. It was like the first like natural theme park of Florida.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

Right. So I'd feel better.

SPEAKER_00 3:39

Like presidents and everybody would come down.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

Oh, I remember all that history. I've been there several times.

SPEAKER_00 3:46

And it was a whole big thing. Like, you know, in the the late 1800s and the 1900s and all that, they would come down. So right just south, here we are in Lake City, and Aggie had this bone garden. People would come from all over the place and they were they would they would go on date nights and walk and shit in the fucking garden. It was crazy.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Wow. Lover's lane.

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Bone garden. She didn't really charge from what I hear. She didn't really charge to go and check it out and walk through it or whatever. But kids would even come on Halloween and stuff, and they would take some of the bones and stuff and borrow them, like the skulls and the things that she had. I mean, she had fucking archways built out of bones and stuff.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 4:25

Really crazy stuff. It's a real thing. I mean, as a kid, we used to go uptown and we just walk around downtown and stuff, and we would see like postcards with stuff on it. Check this out. That's her card.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

What?

SPEAKER_00 4:40

That's a real thing.

SPEAKER_01 4:43

What's crazy is I've never heard about this.

SPEAKER_00 4:45

You've never heard about this? And you're full on Lake City.

unknown 4:49

Born.

SPEAKER_00 4:50

Have you ever heard anything about this?

SPEAKER_02 4:52

No.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

I haven't heard anything about this at all. Aggie, I mean, really happened. So just north in Lake City, the uh that where the African American community and stuff was, which is now where the Richardson School is now, right?

SPEAKER_02 5:07

Yeah, the Richardson community.

SPEAKER_00 5:09

Yeah, you've you've been there, you know. Okay, well, they call the little park right there, Annie Maddox Park, right?

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Animatdox Park.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

Okay, well, Annie Maddox was the principal at the Richardson School in the early 1900s. She was the principal principal at that African American school because they had segregation and all that stuff, right? She was the principal from 1905 to 1913, and they have a little plaque right there. And they believe that whole area was where the bone garden was. Where the school was? That whole area. So wow. We've all visited the bone garden. And as history goes, though, you have to pay homage to a woman that lets you come and check out all of her stuff, and she tells you fortunes, and she sells you potions.

SPEAKER_02 5:53

So like a witch, basically.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

I think it's Lake City's own version of Marie Laveau. Okay. I think they had somebody doing some really cool stuff. Now, her and her husband, they had like a store and there was human bones in that store. Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 6:09

And she would say that they was uh But her bone garden was animal?

Visitors, Postcards, And Local Lore

SPEAKER_00 6:12

It was mostly animal. Okay that's that's she said it was mostly animal. I mean, I don't know. I mean, isn't that crazy? You can look this stuff up. Anybody needs to check this stuff out. A whole ass bone garden. There's so many pictures and stuff. A lot of them are black and white, and they added color and stuff to it. Beautiful woman, though. I mean, just beautiful presents. They said that, you know, whenever people would go and buy fruits and vegetables or whatever, she would also always say, Yes, ma'am, thank you, ma'am. No, sir, thank you, sir. It was kind of she was very pleasant, very happy to have her own thing going on, you know, just selling different things out of the store, out of the garden, people coming and visiting, just everybody came and flocked to her, and her presence and her vibe was just always amazing. Even how horrific that kind of is at the same time when you got this whole bone garden. Right. Imagine this whole ass garden right there where you get where you pull up to Richardson. So my thing is as keeping history alive and things for people in North Florida or whatever, if you visit Lake City, I think you should go to the Annie Maddox park and see that little plaque where you can see where um Annie Maddox was there, and her favorite rose, Aunt Aggie's favorite rose, was called the Maddox Rose.

SPEAKER_01 7:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

So that's yeah, that's that crazy. Yeah, so she had big rose bushes and then you know the all throughout the garden and things, and she would name certain flowers and things, which is it's like a piece rose, I think is what it kind of looks like. What it really was was probably like what they call like a piece rose or something like that. So it's a red rose and it has like a little white on the outside of it. So I think as a tradition, though, if you can get like a red rose and just lay it right there in that area and say, Yes, ma'am, thank you, ma'am. And remember Ann Aggie. I think that would be a really cool thing. Just sharing uh some awareness of amazing African American people that are just here and present, and they did some amazing things. People would come from all over the place to come and check out this garden. It was famous. Famous garden.

SPEAKER_01 8:12

I'm really sad that I've never heard about it before.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

Oh, yeah. I mean, I dug this stuff up because I remember, like I said, I remember going to like the stores and stuff downtown. They had all old postcards and things, and that's that's exactly what we've seen. I have a picture of this on uh my little notes here. So, and there's there's this is just kind of my little rendition of of some history on Aunt Aggie, but um, you can check out so many different things on Google. You can just Google Aunt Aggie's boneyard. There's like whole, there's a whole book and everything you can find on some of this stuff, goes deeper dives into a lot of the things like that. Um, you know, it was uh it was really cool finding all this stuff and just going through just some of the history and you know the hardships that Native Americans have been through and African Americans have been through. Um, because she was like kind of half Creek native and African American, so I kind of tie both of them together because that kind of hits home with me because you know I just want to support culture on history, old history things and and all that. I am very proud to be able to share this story and try to keep it alive.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

That was a real that's really cool. Like I said, I I yeah, like I said, I'm really sad that I never knew anything about this woman before.

SPEAKER_00 9:26

So I don't know how she got the the bones that were in the little house. It was kind of like a museum type store type, and they lived there too, her and her husband.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

And but you could order like when was this time period?

Where The Garden Stood

SPEAKER_00 9:42

Well, this was in the late 1900s, early or early 1900s. Okay, early 18s. Late 18, early 1900s. Well, yeah, yeah, Annie Maddox was. Annie Maddox was, not Aunt Aggie. Yeah, so Aunt Aggie, she she died like in 1913. Oh, wow. And but they built the school and the whole area, and you know, did all the stuff. But I believe that was the area, you know. Check all that stuff out, man. I mean, go and visit that area and just kind of remember there's there's so much more deep diving you can do into all this stuff.

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:12

And I want everybody to check that story out.

SPEAKER_01 10:15

Did you find any books or anything?

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Yeah, you can go to like Floridamemory.com. Okay. Um, there's uh Frontier Florida, there's a blog spot you can go to. If you Google Aunt Aggie, um, you know, just on anything, Aunt Aggie's Boneyard, you can check all that shit out. Um, yeah, and there's Instagrams, there's Facebooks and stuff that just dive into this stuff. So you can check out Ann Aggie.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

And I'm gonna find links to a lot of this and share it on Instagram.

SPEAKER_00 10:41

Yeah, porta.folk.history, and you just check out Aunt Aggie. There's a whole book on there, and you can go a little bit deeper dive into that. Aunt Aggie Jones.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

Aunt Aggie Jones. Yeah, that is I don't love that name.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

Yeah, and Jenkins was her husband, and they called him Jinx. Is this a real picture?

SPEAKER_01 10:57

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 10:58

Isn't that crazy?

SPEAKER_02 10:59

Is this a real picture?

SPEAKER_00 11:00

That's a real picture, yeah. Isn't that wild? Yeah, that is wild. Whole bone garden. Like people go on romantic walks and stuff, and she'd of course read their their fortune and palms and I would love to go on a romantic walk in a bone garden.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

Wouldn't you? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 11:12

And just to think that this is in Lake City where where we're at right now. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_00 11:17

Yeah, you've literally stood on the grounds where the just that that ornate boneyard was just amazingly extravagant bone yard with all this stuff. I mean, that's amazing. So just a little bit of history on that, you know, and all the hardships. Yeah, all the uh hardships and things that people went through. That was just something positive that you know you can kind of share because you know, her existence, I guarantee it was just a complete pleasant vibe to be around, you know.

SPEAKER_02 11:45

Like looking at that picture, that's crazy to think because there's a gym, there's a whole baseball field and houses and stuff right there. Yeah, and school, yeah.

Healer, Fortune Teller, And Storefront

SPEAKER_00 11:55

Yeah, and a spot for people to go to that were segregated, that they were going there and getting their education, you know. There's so much good that came out in that area. So I wanted to share any any and all of that with everybody. It's kind of like she blessed the place right there. So take you a red rose and drop it off. Yes, and say yes, ma'am, thank you, ma'am.

SPEAKER_01 12:12

I want to find the ads rose. Yeah, I want to Google that shirt right now.

SPEAKER_00 12:17

So that's just my story, and I just wanted to share good story a little something, something there.

SPEAKER_01 12:23

Thank you, Jesse. I appreciate you contributing to the pod with your own little story. That's super cute.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

I won't give my own hoorays, but you know, hooray. Why not? No, because I'm the one that pushes the button for the hoorays. I'm gonna give my own hoorays.

SPEAKER_01 12:36

But I want to look up this Maddox rose.

SPEAKER_00 12:38

Yeah, hopefully you guys enjoy that. I just uh I dug some stuff up and I wanted to say some stuff.

SPEAKER_02 12:41

Some stuff.

SPEAKER_00 12:43

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

And he has been mentioning Aunt Aggie for a while, and I was like, well, tell your own story.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

Yeah, Aunt Aggie and Uncle Jinx Jones. That's awesome stuff, though.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

I can't see find anything on a Maddox rose, but I see a rose Maddox.

SPEAKER_00 13:01

Right. Well, it probably came from the Maddox family, you know?

SPEAKER_01 13:04

The actual flower? Like it was like a crossbreed or something.

SPEAKER_00 13:07

Annie Maddox or the Maddox family gave her that rose is what she called it.

SPEAKER_02 13:11

She she made up names, so she could have just put Oh, okay. She could have just put the Maddox in front of the rose instead of saying rose on the road.

SPEAKER_00 13:19

Yeah, just in the in in uh because I I read like several stories, and she would kind of name a lot of the flowers whatever she wanted to, just to give them their own name.

SPEAKER_02 13:26

So she probably it she probably put the the Maddox in front of the rose instead of the rose in front of the flow.

SPEAKER_00 13:32

This is my Maddox rose because I got it from the Maddox family, and yeah maybe they gave her that to put in the garden, you know? So it's really cool stuff. Check it out, check it out. There's so many pictures online.

SPEAKER_01 13:44

There is. I'm looking at it right now. I'm gonna show Landon a colored one.

SPEAKER_00 13:47

Let me see.

SPEAKER_01 13:48

A colored picture. Oh wow, yeah, and I'll post some of these in stories.

SPEAKER_02 13:53

That is very beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 13:54

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

So the Bone Garden was mostly popular between creepy, love it so much between 1900 and 1918.

SPEAKER_00 14:01

There's a lot of sports where she passed away.

SPEAKER_02 14:05

There's a lot of things a lot of bad history, too.

SPEAKER_00 14:07

Bad history, yeah, happen in Lake City. There's a lot of hidden things, yeah. Battles and things, yeah. So, but anyhow, I just wanted to share a little uh there's a black and white one.

SPEAKER_01 14:19

Oh wow, yeah, yeah. That that's like yeah, early 1900s.

SPEAKER_00 14:22

Check all that stuff out, and we'll see you guys on down the road. Thank you for letting me share this, Lindsay. We'll see you guys later on, though. And I get to say it this time, though, Lindsay.

SPEAKER_01 14:30

Okay, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 14:31

I get to say it this time, Landon.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

Bye.