Entries - County: Hot Spring

Acme Brick Company

Acme Brick Company began operation in 1891 and is now the largest American-owned brick and masonry manufacturer in the United States, with more than $175 million in sales in 2007. Although Acme operates a number of companies that produce a variety of construction materials, bricks remain its primary product, making more than one billion of them each year. The company started production in Texas, but, in 1921, Acme opened a plant in Hot Spring County. Since then, the company has expanded its presence in Arkansas to become the major producer of bricks in the state. George E. Bennett founded the company and served as its first president. A native of Ohio, Bennett arrived in Dallas, Texas, in 1876. Several years …

Alderson-Coston House

The Alderson-Coston House is a one-and-a-half-story Craftsman-style home located on Pine Bluff Street in Malvern (Hot Spring County). Constructed in 1923, the house was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 26, 1995. The house is located in the Pine Bluff Street National Historic District, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. James Alderson was a businessman in Hot Spring County in the early twentieth century. The owner of the Malvern Meteor newspaper, he later served as postmaster of Malvern from 1934 to 1954. He was married to Lethe Alderson, who was active in a number of community organizations and served on the board of the Hot Spring County Library. The Aldersons …

Antioch (Hot Spring County)

Antioch is an unincorporated community in Hot Spring County located about six miles northwest of Donaldson (Hot Spring County) and ten miles southwest of Malvern (Hot Spring County). The area surrounding the rural community has long been used for agriculture. One of the earliest settlers in the area was Isaac Beason and his family. Originally from Alabama, Isaac came to the area with his wife, Dicy Fowler Beason, and their oldest children around 1844. The couple would go on to have fifteen children in total. In 1856, Beason obtained 160 acres of land in the area from the Land Patent Office and added another 160 in 1859. Two sons, Jesse and Jonathan, joined the Third Arkansas Infantry (Confederate) during the …

Arkansas State University Three Rivers (ASU Three Rivers)

Arkansas State University Three Rivers (ASU Three Rivers) in Malvern (Hot Spring County) is a comprehensive two-year college in south-central Arkansas and is part of the Arkansas State University System. In addition, the college oversees the Ouachita Area Career Center (OACC), post-secondary programs in cosmetology and nursing, the Ouachita Area Adult Education Center (OAAEC), and the Workforce Center. ASU Three Rivers is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission and is a member of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA). The college began as a vocational school. In 1969, the State Board of Education established Ouachita Vocational Technical School (OVTS) to offer occupational and technical training for Clark, Dallas, Grant, Hot Spring, and Saline counties, and the school …

Arkansite

Arkansite—a mineral that exists in ten U.S. states and eleven countries—is actually brookite, the rarest of the three polymorphs (minerals containing the same chemistry but different internal structures) of titanium oxide. All three polymorphs—brookite, rutile, and anatase—are found at Magnet Cove (Hot Spring County). The brookite crystals found at Magnet Cove are sharp, black, and lustrous as opposed to the transparent or translucent brown/black crystals found elsewhere. This results from the substitution of varying amounts of iron and niobium for titanium in the structure. Charles Shepard (1804–1886) laid claim to the discovery of arkansite in a report he published in 1846. He named the “new” mineral arkansite after the state where the specimen he examined had been found. When a …

Bank of Malvern Building

The Bank of Malvern building is a historic structure located at 212 South Main Street in Malvern (Hot Spring County). Constructed in 1889, the building was renovated in 1896 after a fire. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on March 13, 1987. The Bank of Malvern was founded on June 4, 1889, and received a charter from the state on June 24. The bank prospered in the growing town and survived multiple so-called panics and economic downturns, leaving it the oldest chartered bank in the state by the mid-twentieth century. The bank was housed in a two-story building on the site of the present structure. The second floor of the building housed a medical practice, and …

Beaton (Hot Spring County)

Beaton (Hot Spring County) is an unincorporated community located in western Hot Spring County on the north shore of DeGray Lake about six miles west of Bismarck (Hot Spring County). In the twenty-first century, the community consists of a number of scattered homes and churches. The community is located within the Sixteenth Section of the township, land set aside to fund public schools in the township. The land became available for purchase around 1848. Jonathan Diffee moved with his family to the area that year and established a farm. At that time, the area was located in Clark County, and Diffee petitioned the Clark County Court in 1850 to establish a new township on the east bank of the Caddo …

Bennett, Fran

Fran Bennett is an actress who has worked in theater, television, and films. She appeared on stage across the nation and in Europe, and she has played roles on television from the 1960s onward in such hit shows as Guiding Light, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and Scandal. Bennett was inducted into the Arkansas Black Hall of Fame in 2005. Fran Bennett was born on August 14, 1937, in Malvern (Hot Spring County). Bennett earned a BS and an MA from the University of Wisconsin at Madison and went on to earn credit toward a PhD there before leaving the program. She studied voice under Kristin Linklater, a Scottish actress who relocated to the United States in 1963 to work …

Billings-Cole House

The Billings-Cole House is located on East Page Avenue/U.S. Highway 67 in a mixed-use commercial and residential area in Malvern (Hot Spring County). The house was constructed in 1948 and added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 27, 2015. With details of both the Art Moderne and International styles, the Billings-Cole House is an example of an uncommon architectural style for small-town Arkansas. The home was designed by Irven McDaniel of Hot Springs (Garland County). The house was constructed for Dr. Ammon Alexander Billings, a local optometrist and jeweler. Billings resided in the home until 1950, when he sold it to Dr. John Walton Cole, a general practitioner. Cole lived in the home and used the basement …

Bismarck (Hot Spring County)

Bismarck is an unincorporated community located in western Hot Spring County at the intersection of Arkansas Highways 7 and 84. Near DeGray Lake, the community serves visitors to the lake as well as serving as a bedroom community for Hot Springs (Garland County) and Arkadelphia (Clark County). DeGray Lake Resort State Park is located in the community. The first settlers in the area began to obtain land patents just before the Civil War. Neal McDonald obtained 240 acres on July 1, 1859, including the area where Bismarck is now centered. At this time, the area was part of Clark County. Several other settlers obtained patents on April 2, 1860, including Jonathan Fulton, Edward Howerton, Caleb Killian, and Elisha Williams. These …

Blakely House

The Blakely House was constructed as a dogtrot-style house in 1874 by the son of one of the early settlers in the Social Hill (Hot Spring County) area. Located on Arkansas Highway 84, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 3, 1976. Adam Blakely arrived in the area in the 1820s and, by 1837, owned almost 200 acres of land in the area. Over the next several decades, Blakely built a successful plantation near the Ouachita River and the waterway named for him, Blakely Creek. The house was constructed by Adam Blakely’s youngest son, Greenberry (or Green Berry) Blakely. Born on December 25, 1855, he married Martha Ingersoll (sometimes spelled Englesaw) on December 12, 1875. …

Bonnerdale (Hot Spring County)

Bonnerdale is an unincorporated community located in extreme western Hot Spring County. Located at the intersection of Mazarn Road and U.S. Highway 70, the community is closely associated with the nearby communities of Cross Roads (Hot Spring County) and Mount Moriah (Hot Spring County). Bonnerdale is located about ten miles northeast of Glenwood (Pike County) and about nineteen miles southwest of Hot Springs (Garland County). The nearby community of Old Bonnerdale is located just over the county line in Garland County. During the early days of the Arkansas Territory, Bonnerdale was part of Clark County. With the establishment of Hot Spring County on November 2, 1829, the area around what is now Bonnerdale became part of the new county. One …

Brown Springs (Hot Spring County)

Brown Springs is an unincorporated community in Brown Springs Township located in southern Hot Spring County on Arkansas Highway 51 just north of the Clark County line. The community is about four miles northeast of Joan (Clark County) and about seven miles south of Donaldson (Hot Spring County). The name of the settlement comes from a number of springs in the area, with various sources listing the number of springs as three or five. The water emanating from the springs was infused with sulfur, iron, and copper. The Brown family arrived in the area around 1855 and placed boxes over the springs in an effort to control the flow of the water. Two of the earliest settlers in the area …

Bryant, John Winston

John Winston Bryant is an Arkansas politician and attorney who held an array of high-level offices in state government. Beginning as a legislative assistant on Capitol Hill in Washington DC and serving for two decades in statewide offices, Bryant was an influential figure in Arkansas politics over the last quarter of the twentieth century. Winston Bryant was born on October 3, 1938, in Malvern (Hot Spring County) to Johnie Bryant and Hestie Killian Bryant. He graduated from Ouachita Baptist University (OBU) in Arkadelphia (Clark County) in 1960. He then earned a law degree from the University of Arkansas School of Law in 1963, and he earned a Masters of Law in administrative law from George Washington University in 1970. Bryant …

Butterfield (Hot Spring County)

Butterfield lies in the northern part of Hot Spring County, north of Malvern (Hot Spring County) on Arkansas Highway 51. This small residential community once served as an important stop for stagecoach and rail travelers. The Concord Stagecoach line established a stop in the mid-1800s at the present location of Butterfield, and a community emerged around it. The origin of the town’s name is unknown. Some sources state that the name came from the famous Butterfield stage line, while others say the community was named in honor of a Colonel Butterfield who made several stops at the community. Still others state that it was named in honor of a railroad supervisor named D. A. Butterfield. By 1891, the town had …

Caney (Hot Spring County)

Caney is an unincorporated community in southwestern Hot Spring County. Centered on the intersection of Arkansas Highways 128 and 283 and Caney Road, the community is about one mile north of the Clark County line and seven miles southeast of Bismarck (Hot Spring County). The community is located in Montgomery Township and is about two miles east of DeGray Lake. Early landowners in the area included John Riddles, who obtained a federal land patent for 160 acres in the area in 1856. (Riddles is also spelled Riddle in some documents.) Little information on John Riddles is available, but other Riddles family members in the area also obtained land patents around the same time. Eli Riddles received a land patent for …

Central (Hot Spring County)

Central is a community located in Hot Spring County along U.S. Highway 67 about five miles south of Malvern (Hot Spring County). The community centered on the school that existed there in the early twentieth century. Early landowners in the area included John Ross and Sha Tah O Ka, who obtained land through the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, which took land from Choctaw east of the Mississippi River while giving them land in Arkansas and the Indian Territory. Ross received a total of 318 acres in 1851, with most of it around the Central area but with additional land in what is now White County and Cleveland County. In 1857, William Ballard obtained 160 acres in the area. More …

Clark House (Malvern)

The Clark House in Malvern (Hot Spring County) was designed by noted Arkansas architect Charles Thompson. Incorporating design elements from both Victorian and Craftsman styles, the house was constructed in 1916 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. The home was constructed for Dayton D. Clark, a local lumber mill manager. His wife was Louise Clark, and the couple had two daughters. Clark commissioned the plans for the house from Charles Thompson’s architectural firm. The east-facing, one-and-a-half-story home is located on a corner lot at 1324 South Main Street. A porch fronts the house, wrapping around the eastern edge of the structure, which is accessed by a set of concrete steps from the circular drive. …

Clem Bottling Works

Clem Bottling Works in Malvern (Hot Spring County) was a bottling company in operation from 1907 to 1972. It produced about a dozen original flavors of soft drinks. Clem Bottling Works was started in March 1907 by J. M. Clem and his son, Dock. The Clem family produced and bottled soft drinks in a small building behind their home. In May 1914, the Clem Family built a bottling plant and warehouse at 937 South Main Street in Malvern. The first bottles the company used were embossed with “J. M. Clem Bottling Works” and were sealed with a wire and an inner seal. In the early 1920s, the company converted to bottles sealed with metal caps. The bottles at this time …

Cove Creek (Hot Spring County)

Cove Creek is an unincorporated community in Hot Spring County. Located about six miles northwest of Malvern (Hot Spring County), the community is directly south of Magnet Cove (Hot Spring County) and directly east of Jones Mills (Hot Spring County). An alternate name of the community is LeCroy, named after a local landowner. Early landowners in the area included John M. Ross, who obtained 162 acres in the section in 1858 using Choctaw scrip. Nehemiah Woods obtained 160 acres the same year, also using Choctaw scrip. Settlement of the area occurred slowly until the construction of the Diamond Joe Railroad. Officially known as the Hot Springs Branch Railroad, the more colorful nickname honored founder Joseph Reynolds. A section crew stationed …

Cross Roads (Hot Spring County)

Cross Roads is an unincorporated community located in far western Hot Spring County. It is also known as Crossroads. The community is located about one mile southwest of Bonnerdale (Hot Spring County) and nine miles northeast of Glenwood (Pike County). Cross Roads is located about three-quarters of a mile east of the Montgomery County line. The community of Bismarck (Hot Spring County) was also known as Cross Roads in the nineteenth century. The first settlers arrived in the area in the early nineteenth century, but the first federal land patents in the area were not issued until 1897. In that year, Jesse and Samuel Ballard each obtained about 160 acres in the Cross Roads area. Samuel Ballard was a North …

DeRoche (Hot Spring County)

DeRoche is located in the area of Arkansas Highway 84 between state highways 128 and 7. Located just south of Jack Mountain, the township lies about fifteen miles south of Hot Springs (Garland County) and eight miles east of Bismarck (Hot Spring County). The DeRoche community is enclosed on three sides by the Caddo and Ouachita rivers. Although the DeRoche Creek name appeared on maps in 1806, development of the area did not begin for another twenty-five years. “De Roche” is French for “of rock,” a possible reference to the rocky bed of DeRoche Creek, for which the community was named. Squatting was the primary way to obtain land in the area. Some worked the land for many years but then moved …

Dial, Rick

Rick Dial was a character actor, musician, and businessman from Malvern (Hot Spring County). Dial acted in fourteen Hollywood films, first appearing alongside childhood friend and fellow actor Billy Bob Thornton in Sling Blade (1996). In addition to his acting, Dial was part-owner of a furniture store in Malvern and was “the Voice of the Malvern Leopards,” announcing high school football games. Richard Halley Dial was born on March 9, 1955, in Malvern to Bill J. Dial and DeNora VanDusen Dial; he was one of three children. He graduated from Malvern High School in 1973, where he earned All-Conference honors on the Malvern Leopards football team. Dial married Phyllis Voss on September 22, 1973; they had three children. After high …

Dixon, Giles (Execution of)

Giles Dixon (sometimes spelled Dickson or Dickerson) was hanged at Rockport (Hot Spring County) on September 7, 1877, for the shooting death of Nathaniel (or Matthew) McCall, a man in Clark County, several years earlier. The 1870 federal census shows Giles Dixon living in Clark County’s Caddo Township with his wife Mary, six children, and his 102-year-old mother. The thirty-five-year-old African American man was employed in a brick yard. On the evening of December 30, 1873, McCall, who lived on the Draper farm south of Arkadelphia (Clark County), opened the door to his house to see why his dog was barking and was shot with a double-barreled shotgun, which the Southern Standard newspaper reported was “loaded with buckshot, three taking …

Donaldson (Hot Spring County)

The community of Donaldson in Hot Spring County was established in the 1870s. The timber industry and the Missouri Pacific Railroad were important to the town’s development. John Easley was appointed the first postmaster in 1876. There are two local stories regarding the town’s naming. One version posits that the town was named for a Mr. Donaldson who owned a sawmill there. According to another, there was a railroad superintendent named Donald there in the 1870s. His son opened a store for railroad employees, and so when people were going shopping, they were going to “Donald’s son.” A third possibility is that the community was named after William Rhind Donaldson (1843–1917), the son-in-law of Thomas Allen, president of the Cairo …

Duffie (Hot Spring County)

Duffie is an unincorporated community in Hot Spring County, located about one and a half miles northeast of the entrance to DeGray Lake Resort State Park and about four miles southwest of Bismarck (Hot Spring County). The community is about nineteen miles southwest of the county seat of Malvern (Hot Spring County). Early settlers in the area included Zacheriah Prince, who obtained a federal land patent for 160 acres in 1856, with an additional 160 acres in 1860. Born in North Carolina, Prince appeared in the 1860 federal census with his wife, Suseanah, and their four sons and two daughters. The family lived in Alabama before moving to Arkansas. Zacheriah Prince owned about $3,000 of real estate and $800 of …

Ebenezer (Hot Spring County)

A small unincorporated community in Hot Spring County, Ebenezer is located about three miles southwest of Malvern (Hot Spring County) and less than two miles northeast of Central (Hot Spring County). The community is centered on U.S. Highway 67. Few people lived in the area before the Civil War. Small numbers of settlers began to arrive in the mid-1870s after the construction of the Cairo and Fulton Railroad about one mile to the west. The establishment of Malvern to the northeast in 1873 attracted people to the area, as large tracts of land were still available for settlement and the railroad offered a nearby option to ship goods to market. Early settlers included Huston Robinson, who obtained a land patent …

Elmore (Hot Spring County)

Located about six miles southwest of Malvern (Hot Spring County), four miles northeast of Donaldson (Hot Spring County), and two miles southwest of Etta (Hot Spring County), Elmore was an unincorporated community related to the timber industry in the late nineteenth century. John Kelly (J. K.) Hall was born in Hot Spring County in 1856. During the Civil War, his father, James Hall, died as a Confederate prisoner of war in St. Louis in 1862; James’s wife raised Hall and his siblings. After spending a few years in Texas, where he married Nancy Guinn Nichols, Hall returned to Hot Spring County and worked for the Christopher and Clark Lumber Company. Purchasing the company in 1886, he renamed it the J. …

Etta (Hot Spring County)

Etta (Hot Spring County) was an unincorporated community located about six miles southwest of Malvern (Hot Spring County) and about two miles northeast of Elmore (Hot Spring County). Formerly a stop on the Iron Mountain Railroad, the community became depopulated in the early twenty-first century, with the land returning to timber production. Early landowners in the area included James Darnell, who obtained a federal land patent for eighty acres in 1881. Mary A. Williams, who was born around 1837 in Georgia, obtained eighty acres in 1882. In the 1880 federal census, a recently widowed Williams appears with her four sons and daughter; her youngest son was only two years old at the time. Her oldest sons, twenty-one-year-old Phillip and fifteen-year-old …

Fleming (Hot Spring County)

Fleming is an unincorporated community located in Hot Spring County about five miles south of Malvern (Hot Spring County) and six miles northwest of Lono (Hot Spring County). One of the earliest landowners in the area was Isiah Salyers, who obtained a federal land patent for 120 acres in 1857. More extensive settlement took place after the Civil War, with Oliver Norwood obtaining a patent for eighty acres in 1885. In the 1880 federal census, Norwood appeared as a farmer living with his wife, Margaret, and their five sons and two daughters in Hot Spring County. In 1903, Norwood (or his oldest son who shared the same name) obtained an additional eighty acres to the north. Nathan Stiles received a …

Foley, Blaze

aka: Michael David Fuller

Singer-songwriter Michael David Fuller worked under the names Depty (or Deputy) Dawg and then Blaze Foley, being best known by the latter. His songs have been recorded by singers such as Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, Lyle Lovett, and John Prine. Blaze Foley was born on December 18, 1949, to Edwin Fuller and Louise Fuller in Malvern (Hot Spring County). His family traveled as gospel performers and were known as the Singing Fuller Family. Foley began singing with the group at the age of eleven with his mother, brother, and sisters. When Foley was a baby, the family left Arkansas for Texas, settling in San Antonio and later the Dallas/Fort Worth area. While an infant, he contracted polio, which was cured …

Friendship (Hot Spring County)

Friendship lies along U.S. Highway 67, which runs through the center of the town, and is a quarter of a mile south of Interstate 30 in Hot Spring County. During the Civil War, it was the site of an important salt-making operation. Pre-European Exploration Residents near the Ouachita River in Friendship have reported finding mounds and various artifacts consistent with the Caddo tribe. The town is located just four miles from the junction of the Ouachita and Caddo rivers, an area in which the Caddo have a well-documented history. Louisiana Purchase through Early Statehood Explorers William Hunter and George Dunbar passed through the area during their survey of the new Louisiana Purchase in 1804. With documented stops in Arkadelphia (Clark County) …

Garvan, Verna Cook

Verna Mary Cook Garvan was one of the first women in Arkansas to own a construction/manufacturing business and was the benefactor of what is now Garvan Woodland Gardens in Hot Springs (Garland County). Verna Cook was born on January 22, 1911, in Groveton, Texas, to Arthur Bacillius Cook and Essie Louise Bordis Cook. Verna Cook and her sister, Dorothy, were raised to be “proper ladies,” but Verna often accompanied her father to work and absorbed his business acumen. In 1916, her father moved the family to Malvern (Hot Spring County) to manage the Wisconsin and Arkansas Lumber Company, an enterprise producing oak and pine flooring. Malvern Brick and Tile was also purchased by Verna’s father, who later served as a …

Gatewood House

The Gatewood House, designed in the Shingle architectural style, is gambrel-roofed home located in Malvern (Hot Spring County). Constructed in 1905, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 24, 1992. The house was constructed by Matthew and Hannah Duffie for their daughter, Annie Sinney Duffie Gatewood. Amie married Edwin Lee Gatewood in Dallas County in 1893, and the couple had three children between 1894 and 1902. Edwin died in Beebe (White County) on April 14, 1905, and Annie lived in the home with her children, Anita, Edwin, and Estell. She died on March 2, 1947, and is buried with her husband in Malvern. The home is located at 235 Pine Bluff Street and faces north. …

Gentry, Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson (Tom or T. J.) Gentry Jr. served two terms as Arkansas’s attorney general (1953–1956) and, during his tenure, was the state’s most influential racially moderate elected official. He helped guide the state’s initial response to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, putting the state on an early path that won accolades from national Black press and condemnations from segregationists. Gentry’s (and the state’s) moderation, though, could not survive the rise of massive resistance that followed the Arkansas congressional delegation’s signing of the Southern Manifesto in March 1956. He would never win statewide office again, and a once promising political career had been derailed. Tom Gentry was born in Malvern (Hot Spring County) on April 3, 1915, …

Gifford (Hot Spring County)

Gifford is an unincorporated community located in Hot Spring County about five miles northeast of the city limits of Malvern (Hot Spring County). It is located about one mile northeast of the intersection of U.S. Highway 67 and U.S. Highway 270 in Gifford Township. Early settlers in the community include John West, who obtained eighty acres of land in 1857. He farmed the land with his wife and children. Other land grants were awarded after the Civil War, with John Richardson receiving eighty acres in 1875 and Christopher Chapman claiming land three years later. Additional residents moved to the area after the completion of the Cairo and Fulton Railroad in 1873. The railroad proved to be an important part of …

Glen Rose (Hot Spring County)

Glen Rose is located ten miles northeast of Malvern (Hot Spring County) on U.S. Highway 67. Residents of this community have Malvern mailing addresses and phone numbers, but the population of the area is served by its own school district. There are two stories as to how the community of Glen Rose got its name. One story states that when a salesman called on the school, he learned that the school did not yet have a name. He suggested Glen Rose—Glen for “valley” and Rose for the rose bushes on the campus. However, a 1941 Malvern Daily Record article states that the community was named for a coach, Glen Rose, at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County). Rose served …

Hall, Claris Gustavius “Crip”

Claris Gustavius “Crip” Hall was a promoter of the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County), an ardent Razorback football fan, and a noted politician. Hall served as Arkansas’s secretary of state from 1937 to 1961, dying shortly after being reelected in 1960. He also served as president of the National Association of Secretaries of State. C. G. Hall was born in Social Hill (Hot Spring County) on October 8, 1901, to John R. Hall and Elizabeth Hodges Hall. At the age of eighteen months, he contracted polio. Over the years, he acquired the name “Crip” due to his handicap, coming to prefer it over his given name. He attended public schools in Malvern (Hot Spring County), even playing catcher on his high school baseball team, and entered the University of Arkansas in 1919, graduating with a degree in journalism in 1924. On October 5, 1929, Hall married Nancy Pearl Johnson, and the couple had one …

Handywagon

The Handywagon, built in 1964 for the Arkansas Louisiana Gas Company (Arkla), was intended as an economical vehicle for use by the company’s Gaslite and domestic appliance servicers, meter readers, collectors, and meter setters. The small wagon was designed to be easily reparable and average thirty-five miles per gallon. In mid-1963, Arkla board chairman Wilton “Witt” R. Stephens asked company lawyer Raymond Thornton to design a utility vehicle that could operate economically, have a 900-pound load capacity, weigh less than a ton and a half, and be company-built. In 1964, Thornton chose Ed Handy, a company construction engineer, to collaborate with him on the project. After much research, the two men found the power train they needed in Holland. Van …

Harp (Hot Spring County)

Harp is an unincorporated community in Hot Spring County located on Arkansas Highway 9 about one mile south of the city limits of Malvern (Hot Spring County). Two of the earliest settlers in the area were Emanuel and Marguerite Harp. The family name also appears as Harps in some records. Originally from Georgia, the family moved to Arkansas in the 1850s. Emanuel received forty-two acres from the federal government in 1860, and over the next twenty years, the family acquired more than 200 additional acres. The couple had at least seven children, including eldest son Emanuel. The elder Emanuel donated three acres of land for a cemetery in 1862, and many members of the family are buried in it. The …

Harrison, John Henry (Lawsuits Relating to the Lynching of)

On February 3, 1922, an African American man named John Henry Harrison was lynched in Malvern (Hot Spring County) for allegedly harassing white women and girls. He had been arrested, taken to his victims for identification, and then jailed. Sheriff D. S. Bray, fearing mob violence, decided to take Harrison to the jail in Arkadelphia (Clark County) for safekeeping. Finding the roads out of town intentionally blocked by cars, he decided to travel by train instead. Bray, Harrison, and two deputies (S. J. Leiper and W. T. Gammel) boarded the train around 10:30 p.m., and Harrison was hidden under the seat in the “negro car.” According to the Malvern Daily Record, just as the train was beginning to leave, a …

Harrison, John Henry (Lynching of)

On February 3, 1922, an African-American man was lynched in Malvern (Hot Spring County) for allegedly harassing white women and girls. While a number of newspaper accounts, as well as a National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) annual report, identify him by the name of Harry Harrison, and the Arkansas Gazette identified him as John Harris, research conducted in large part by the Hot Spring County Historical Society indicated that his name was John Henry Harrison. Harrison was living in Malvern at the time of the 1920 census; he was thirty-eight years old, married, and worked as a laborer in a lumber mill. He was a native of North Carolina and could both read and write. According …

Henry, Natalie Smith

An artist of national significance, Natalie Smith Henry made her reputation as an easel painter and muralist during the Depression era. At the height of her career in 1939, the U.S. Treasury Department commissioned her to paint post office art in Springdale (Washington and Benton counties). In later years, Henry combined her interest in art with her business acumen, managing the Art Institute of Chicago School Store for twenty-three years. Natalie Henry was born on January 4, 1907, in Malvern (Hot Spring County). She was the eldest of five children born to Samuel Ewell Henry, circuit clerk and Hot Spring County judge, and homemaker Natalie Smith. After his wife died, Samuel Henry married Minerva Ann Harrison. They had two children. …

Hodges House

The Hodges House is located on Arkansas Highway 7 in Bismarck (Hot Spring County). Constructed in 1907 in the folk Victorian style, the home was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 2, 1995. The home was constructed by Dr. Lee Bray and his wife, Clara. The couple lived in the home until 1925, when Dr. Thomas Hodges and Charlotte Hodges bought the house. It appears that the Hodgeses bought the Brays’ medical practice. Thomas Hodges was born in Kentucky in 1868 and grew up in Missouri. After medical school, he established a medical practice in the state and married Charlotte Mikulus in 1925. The couple moved to Bismarck shortly after the wedding. Thomas worked as a …

Hodges, Thomas L.

Thomas Luther Hodges was a noted physician and amateur archaeologist in Hot Spring County in the early twentieth century. Focusing on materials related to the late prehistoric Caddo, the collection accumulated by Hodges and his wife, Charlotte, is now held by the Joint Educational Consortium in Arkadelphia (Clark County). Thomas L. Hodges was born in Morehead, Kentucky, on January 17, 1868. It is unclear what happened to Hodges’s birth parents, but he became the adopted son of William and Sarah Hodges and moved with his adoptive family to Knox County, Missouri, in the early 1870s. His father died in 1874, and Sarah Hodges remarried the following year to widower George Sloan. In the 1880 federal census, Hodges appears with his …

Hot Spring County

Hot Spring County was established by an act of the territorial legislature in 1829 with land taken from Clark County. Located southeast of the Ouachita National Forest, Hot Spring County is bisected by the Ouachita River and includes landforms ranging from mountains to lowlands once covered in hardwood and pine forests. The combination of rock types and fault lines is responsible for the hot spring that provides the name for the county. This county, located in the southwest region of the state, has a diverse economy based on timber, manufacturing, mining, and agriculture (corn, cotton, and some rice). Ironically, the spring for which Hot Spring County is named is no longer within the county limits. Garland County was created in …

Hot Spring County Courthouse

The Hot Spring County Courthouse, located on 210 Locust Street in downtown Malvern (Hot Spring County), is a three-and-a-half-story building made of brick and steel. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program declared it architecturally and historically significant for its Art Deco design and status as a former project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a New Deal program. The National Park Service added it to the National Register of Historic Places on November 7, 1996. After the Cairo and Fulton Railroad established Malvern as a stop along its railway in 1873, the city felt the economic benefits of being connected to other parts of the country. At that time, the adjoining town of Rockport (Hot Spring County) stood as the county …

Hot Spring County Historical Society

Since the late 1960s, the Hot Spring County Historical Society has worked to preserve the county’s history and culture through writing, publishing, and teaching. It also publishes an annual journal and hosts activities. The organization incorporated in 1968 with seventy-six charter members and two corporate members. As of 2012, the organization has a membership roster of more than 400. When the organization established its articles of incorporation in January 1968, it did not have a physical home. Its main office was listed in care of the first president, William C. Gilliam, at his office on West 2nd Street in Malvern (Hot Spring County). Since its inception, the organization has stored some items in a portable storage building and has held its …

Hot Spring County Museum

aka: Boyle House

The Hot Spring County Museum in Malvern (Hot Spring County) is centered upon the historic Boyle House and includes exhibits dedicated to the history and unique geography of the area. The Boyle House, a white, two-story-tall building, was built in 1890 on the lot across from where it now sits on East 3rd Street. It was bought by Jacob and Agnus Boyle in 1897. They had come from Hope (Hempstead County) to Malvern to work for the railroad. They had ten children in the home and entertained so much that they had a table that could seat twenty-four people. Today, only four items relating to the Boyle family are in the museum: a couch, the Lena Boyle salt and pepper shaker …

Hot Springs Railroad Roundhouse

The Hot Springs Railroad Roundhouse is located at 132 Front Street in Malvern (Hot Spring County). The roundhouse was constructed near a turntable (later removed) that allowed trains and railcars to be moved into the structure for maintenance. Constructed in 1887, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 29, 2003. It fell into disrepair by the twenty-first century. Construction on the Hot Springs Railroad began in 1875. The tracks connected Malvern, then known as Malvern Junction, with Hot Springs (Garland County). Malvern was on the Cairo and Fulton Railroad, and with the construction of the new line, visitors to Hot Springs could avoid taking an uncomfortable stagecoach ride between the two settlements. When the railroad …