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Arkansas sparkles
By JUDY WELLS, The Times-Union
Jul 20, 2008
L ITTLE ROCK, ARK. - Arkansas rocks with its diamonds and quartz crystal underground and surprises above ground. The Ouachita Mountains, known as "zigzag mountains" because they run east-west, are the land of Charles Portis' True Grit .
To the northwest, Fort Smith was the jumping off point to the Indian Territory. To keep order on this wild frontier between 1875 and 1896, Hangin' Judge Isaac C. Parker presided over 13,000 cases and sentenced 160 men to hang; 79 of them did. Bass "Iron Man" Reeves, the only known black U.S. Marshall at the time, tracked outlaws into the territory for the judge. Miss Laura's still welcomes visitors, only now as the Visitors Center instead of the town's fanciest bordello. Fort Chaffee is where Elvis was inducted into the Army and lost his locks.
The Pfeiffer family of Piggott turned a barn into a writing studio for the man their daughter, Pauline, married, a fellow by the name of Ernest Hemingway. He wrote portions of A Farewell to Arms there. Pauline's uncle gave them a car, their Key West home and their African safari. Memorabilia from the couple's 13-year marriage is on view at The Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum and Educational Center.
Eureka Springs is arty and smarty; Team Eureka topped 111 teams from around the U.S. to win MENSA's 2007 CultureQuest Superbowl.
Tyronza is home to The Southern Tenant Farmers Museum, an homage to survival.
The Peabody Hotels' famous ducks originated after the general manager of The Peabody Memphis and a pal went hunting in Arkansas. Live decoys were used then and upon their return the hunters put three live decoy ducks in the hotel's fountain. The ducks liked it, guests loved it and a tradition was born that continues today in all three Peabodys, including the one in Little Rock where the mallards march down to the lobby fountain at 11 a.m. and back up to the "duck palace" at 5 p.m.
Color it green
One surprised Dublin-born lass admitted the countryside was as green as Ireland. In the summer, oak, hickory and pine trees form opaque, emerald-toned walls along roadsides.
You don't find houses along the banks of many Arkansas lakes, but houseboats island hop within them. Less than 3 percent of Lake Ouachita, the state's largest at 48,000 acres with depths to 200 feet and 1,000 miles of shoreline, is developed, according to Rodd Gadberry, who runs the marina at Mountain Harbor. It is one of only four lakes in the U.S. where island camping is allowed and may be the only one to have a self-guided, 16-mile-long geological float trail.
"It's truly a wilderness lake," Gadberry said.
Wilderness doesn't mean discomfort; "cabins" at Mountain Harbor are lush. At DeGray Lake Resort State Park, site of another wilderness lake, there's a handsome lodge. Both have pools and stables.
The stunning Anthony Chapel and the photo-perfect surroundings at Garvan Gardens inspire 150 brides a year to select it for weddings.
Mobbed and bathed
Hot Springs is where even enemies get along. Guide Bill Kincaid said American Indians found it first. They so valued the restorative hot water springs and novaculite quarried here for weapons and tools that enmities were set aside, the resources were shared and the area became a neutral trading ground. They probably showed it to Hernando de Soto and trappers and traders frequented the spot, but they had moved out of Hot Springs by the time Jesse James robbed stages heading here and Al Capone, Pretty Boy Floyd, Machine Gun Kelly and Ma and Pa Barker hit town. Later, Bill Clinton graduated from high school, and his mother followed the thoroughbreds at Oaklawn Race Track.
Rain heated 4,000 years ago bursts out in 47 separate mineral-filled hot springs here. In 1832, it became the first and smallest national park and by the turn of the century was where the sick and the swells came for relief and recreation. Today only the blue awninged Buckstaff Baths on Bathhouse Row is still active, but its neighbors are being preserved. The Fordyce, fanciest of its day, is Park Service headquarters; visitors can tour its beautiful and sometimes bizarre facilities.
In its Prohibition heyday, Hot Springs was the mob's vacation spot. Capone, a major customer of area moonshiners, bought suite 442 of the still impressive Arlington Hotel. Owney Madden, "the English Godfather" and owner of New York's Cotton Club, mediated the neutral territory, said Jimmy Sample, director of visitor services for the Hot Springs Convention & Visitors Bureau, who grew up here.
"He came here to watch over the New York mob's interests and married the postmaster's daughter," Sample said. Owney became a pillar of the community but still scared his father, who had to deliver telegrams to the mobster. "He was a short man but a big tipper."
Sample remembers putting eggs in a pillowcase into the hot spring pool when his family came downtown in the morning and having hard boiled eggs for snacks on the way home.
Citified
Little Rock, the state capital at the beginning of the Oauchita Mountains, is named for its "little rocks" and the Arkansas Statehouse, now a museum, is the oldest surviving one west of the Mississippi. The TV series Designing Women was set in Atlanta but Julia and Suzanne Sugarbaker's houses from the show are here.
Gen. Douglas MacArthur was born here; so were Florence Beatrice Price, the first African-American female symphony conductor in the U.S., and Baseball Hall of Famer Brooks Robinson.
Buses and universities were integrated by 1956, and no one expected problems integrating Central High School until Gov. Orval Faubus realized he couldn't win reelection without the segregationists' vote and called in the National Guard to prevent nine black students from attending. Today the student body is 51 percent black, 41 percent white, with the rest international students studying through the Clinton Foundation.
Doe's, where George Stephanopoulos and Bill Clinton met in the back room to plan Clinton's presidential campaign, still dishes up hot tamales, cheeseburgers and the steaks Clinton favored. Speaking of food, a growing number of adventuresome chefs are making Little Rock a foodie's destination.
The William J. Clinton Presidential Library complex has made Little Rock a destination for global thinkers and doers. In the library, if you aren't researching the archived documents, you can follow the timeline of his presidency, stopping at significant dates to read the daily briefing and president's schedule books; see an exact replica of the Oval Office or wander through an art exhibit.
Nearby is the corporate headquarters for Heifer International, a non-profit dedicated to ending hunger and caring for the earth through projects from village gardens in the U.S. to aquaculture in Indonesia, as well as a heifer - or chicken, milk goat, water buffalo - or 30,000 fish fingerlings at a time.
Together, these two complexes are a lesson in green construction and technology as well as developing a better future.
Which is a good thing with so many people digging into their home state.
judy.wells@jacksonville.com,
(904) 359-4155
Copyright 2008
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