Entries - Starting with H

Hooper, Philo Oliver

Philo Oliver Hooper has been called the father of Arkansas medicine. He was one of the founders of the Medical Department of Arkansas Industrial University, now the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS), a founder and the first president of the Arkansas State Medical Association, a founding board member and director of the Arkansas Lunatic Asylum, and vice president of the American Medical Association. P. O. Hooper was born on October 11, 1833, in Little Rock (Pulaski County) to Alanson Hooper and Magdaline Perry Hooper. After obtaining what education was available in the city at the time, he pursued his education at Nashville University in Nashville, Tennessee. Returning home to Little Rock, he found employment as the chief clerk …

Hoover, Dorothy M.

aka: Dorothy Estheryne McFadden Clarke Hoover

Dorothy M. Hoover was a pioneer in the field of aeronautical mathematics and physics. The granddaughter of enslaved people, she overcame the significant obstacles facing African American women in the Jim Crow era of the twentieth century to earn advanced degrees in mathematics and physics. One of her greatest achievements in aeronautical research was her contribution to the development of the “thin sweptback tapered wing,” which revolutionized flight and became the aviation industry standard. Her life story was essentially unknown until she was briefly mentioned in the highly acclaimed book Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race (2016), by Margot Lee Shetterly. Hidden Figures, which was made …

Hoover, Theressa

Theressa Hoover worked for human rights and unity through the United Methodist Church for nearly fifty years. Born in Arkansas, she represented those who, in the words of her 1974 monograph, were in “triple jeopardy”: female, African American, and Christian. Hoover worked for justice and empowerment for women and children around the globe. Her influence has been far-reaching, as she provided inspiration for others through her words and actions. Theressa Hoover was born in Fayetteville (Washington County) on September 7, 1925. She was one of five children of James C. Hoover and Rissie Vaughn. Her mother died when Hoover was a small child, and she was reared by her father, who worked for many years at City Hospital in Fayetteville. …

Hope (Hempstead County)

Hope is on Prairie De Roan in southwest Arkansas. It is divided by Union Pacific Railway tracks traveling from northeast to southwest and is the birthplace of William Jefferson Clinton, the fortieth and forty-second governor of Arkansas and the forty-second president of the United States. Hope received national attention when Clinton closed his nomination acceptance speech at the 1992 Democratic National Convention with the words, “I still believe in a place called Hope.” Reconstruction through the Early Twentieth Century The town developed as the Cairo and Fulton Railway (predecessor to the Union Pacific) tracks were being laid from Argenta (now North Little Rock (Pulaski County)) to Fulton (Hempstead County). The first passenger train pulled into “Hope Station” on February 1, …

Hope Girl Scout Little House

The Hope Girl Scout Little House, located near Jones Street in Fair Park in Hope (Hempstead County), is a one-and-a-half-story Rustic-style log building constructed between 1938 and 1939 with assistance from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a Depression-era federal relief program. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 27, 2015. The Girl Scout Little House movement had its origins in the 1923 Better Homes Demonstration Week when architect Donn Barber designed a house “for the American family of average size and moderate income” behind the White House in Washington DC for the General Federation of Women’s Clubs and the Better Homes of America organization. After the June 1923 celebration, Lou Henry Hoover, wife of future …

Hope Watermelon Festival

Hope (Hempstead County) annually celebrates its claim as the home of the world’s largest watermelons with a yearly watermelon festival. The event first originated in 1926 and has been ongoing, though not continuous, since 1977. There is no admission fee for the multi-day event scheduled for the second week in August at Hope Fair Park. It is sponsored by the Hope–Hempstead County Chamber of Commerce. Activities include watermelon-eating and seed-spitting contests, fiddling, arm wrestling contests, as many as 200 vendors displaying their wares, and much more. The competition for growing big melons was a creation of John S. Gibson, who, in 1916, began to offer modest prizes for the largest vegetables and watermelons. Hugh and Edgar Laseter, local farmers, developed …

Hopefield (Crittenden County)

Hopefield was a small town on the Mississippi River in eastern Crittenden County near present-day West Memphis (Crittenden County) and across from present-day Mud Island in Memphis, Tennessee. As a railroad terminal and river landing, the town was pivotal in the development of transportation and commerce between Tennessee and Arkansas during the nineteenth century, but devastation from war, disease, commercial setbacks, and the geological power of the Mississippi itself ultimately destroyed Hopefield in the early twentieth century. Hopefield traces its origin to a Dutch immigrant named Benjamin Fooy (also spelled “Foy”), who established a Spanish encampment (Foy’s Point) in 1795, which was built to regulate river traffic and discourage American encroachment past the Mississippi River. He had been appointed by the …

Hopefield, Burning of

This punitive expedition relates to Union army efforts to secure Memphis, Tennessee, as a supply and hospital base capable of supporting ongoing operations against Vicksburg, Mississippi. It stands as an early example of the shift toward hard war tactics that would increase throughout the remainder of the war. The decision to burn the village of Hopefield (Crittenden County), directly across the Mississippi River from Memphis, had roots in events initiated in January 1863, including a similar expedition conducted against Mound City (Crittenden County). In early January, under orders from Trans-Mississippi Department commander Lieutenant General Theophilus H. Holmes, Captain James H. McGehee led his unattached company of Arkansas cavalry on an extended raid through Crittenden County with orders to scout the …

Hopkins v. Jegley

Hopkins v. Jegley is an ongoing legal challenge to four abortion restrictions passed by the Arkansas state legislature in 2017. Unless Roe v. Wade (1973) is overturned before the case is settled, women’s abilities to continue to exercise their right to access legal abortion in Arkansas likely depend on the outcome of this case. Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Roe, opponents of the legal right to abortion have pursued legislation aimed at restricting access to the procedure. As these efforts have escalated since 2011, states have enacted more than 450 new abortion restrictions, which disproportionally impact the lives of young people, people with low incomes, and minorities. Anti-choice state lawmakers support measures that are designed to ban specific …

Hopper (Montgomery County)

Originally named Parks, the valley community of Hopper sits between the small town of Fancy Hill (Montgomery County) and the Caddo River. Hopper, considered a minor civil division, is at the southernmost edge of Montgomery County with a population of 198 as of the 2020 census. In the mid-1800s, Mexican War veteran Jack Parks and his wife, Jane Parks, moved from Tennessee to settle on and farm the fertile land they had found in Arkansas. Around 1868, William Jackson Hopper and his wife moved to Parks. Hopper had served in the Union army, which he joined because it paid more than the Confederate army, and was a federal marshal before moving to Parks. Because of his service, Hopper was given …

Horace Estes House

The Horace Estes House is a Tudor Revival–style house constructed in Gurdon (Clark County) in 1934. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 21, 1993. The structure is unique in Gurdon, as it is the only Tudor-style structure in a town where most of the homes from the same period are devoid of any decoration and are constructed solely of locally sourced materials. Gurdon was a company town built around the timber industry and associated railroad industries, and the majority of structures in the community were constructed using local lumber. While a brick plant operated in Gurdon, homes constructed from brick in this period were uncommon, although not unheard of. The house is a wood-framed, …

Horace Mann School Historic District

The Horace Mann School Historic District at Norfork (Baxter County) is a complex of four buildings constructed by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and National Youth Administration (NYA) during the Great Depression. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 29, 2007. The first school at Norfork was established in 1908, two years before the town was incorporated, but by the 1930s, the wood-frame school was no longer adequate for the area’s educational needs. The community turned to the WPA, one of President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal agencies, for assistance. Construction of the Main School Building started in 1936 under the direction of WPA supervisor Tom Collier, with the federal agency supplying $18,564 and the community …

Horatio (Sevier County)

Horatio is a second-class city in Sevier County. Located on the Kansas City Southern Railway about six miles south of De Queen (Sevier County), Horatio lies near the Little River. The poultry industry and various manufacturing jobs—including James McCoy’s sawmill, established in 1892, and EZ Products Inc., manufacturer of cleaning chemicals, established in 1984—have shaped the character of the city in recent years, and its population is now more than one-third Hispanic, according to census records. The Sevier County region has evidence of human habitation that stretches over the past 10,000 years. Hunting and fishing were the primary occupations of those who dwelt in the area or crossed through it. Settlers of European descent began to enter the river valleys …

Horn, Robyn Hutcheson

Robyn Hutcheson Horn is a full-time, self-employed sculptor and native-born Arkansan whose work has drawn regional and national recognition and is shown in galleries throughout the United States. Her art is regularly illustrated in craft and woodworking magazines. Horn is the founder and first president of the Collectors of Wood Art, an organization set up in 1997 for the purpose of fostering interest in wood art. She has befriended and supported many craft artists whose work she has acquired while also amassing an impressive collection of wood art, furniture, metal, glass, and ceramics. Robyn Hutcheson was born in Fort Smith (Sebastian County) in 1951 to Bill and Dede Hutcheson; she has a brother, Richard, and a sister, Karen. Her early …

Horner, Elijah Whitt

Elijah Whitt “Lige” Horner served in both World War I and World War II before retiring as a lieutenant colonel. He was instrumental in the first use of Native American languages as military code, selecting the men who eventually became known as the Choctaw Code Talkers in France during World War I. Elijah Horner was born on May 19, 1893, near Mena (Polk County) to James Lafayette Horner, who was a farmer and real estate businessman, and Corah Elfleda Holman Horner. Horner was the youngest of the five children who lived to adulthood. His mother died when he was four years old, leaving him and his brother John to be raised by his older sisters—Mary Belle, Susan, and Oma. After …

Hornibrook House

aka: Empress of Little Rock

The Hornibrook House, constructed in 1888, is one of the finest examples of ornate Victorian architecture in the state. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 30, 1974. In 1867, James H. Hornibrook and his wife, Margaret McCulley Hornibrook, moved from Toronto, Canada, to Little Rock (Pulaski County). Upon his arrival in Little Rock, Hornibrook entered a partnership with Miles Q. Townsend in a liquor sales and saloon business that flourished for twenty-two years. After Hornibrook’s financial success, he wished to build a home for his family that was worthy of his accomplishments. The lavish home took approximately seven years to construct. It was completed in 1888 at a reported cost of $20,000. Designed by …

Horseshoe Bend (Izard County)

Horseshoe Bend is the only city in Arkansas that includes land from three counties within its city limits. The bulk of the retirement and resort community lies in Izard County—in fact, it is the largest city in Izard County, with a population of 2,184 as of the 2010 census—but parts of Horseshoe Bend extend into Sharp and Fulton counties as well. The Strawberry River runs ninety miles through the forested hills of northern Arkansas. About half the river has been designated part of the Arkansas Natural and Scenic Rivers System. Prior to 1960, no single bend of the river was called “Horseshoe Bend.” The descriptive name was used to identify several parts of the winding stream. At the time of …

Horseshoe Lake (Crittenden County)

The town of Horseshoe Lake is located on the old Seyppel area in Crittenden County at the east end of the lake from which it takes its name. Horseshoe Lake is predominately a bedroom community, with the surrounding area consisting of farmland where cotton, feed corn, soybeans, and milo are grown. Some cattle are also raised on the high ground of the levee. The Great River Road encircles the lake. Several legendary blues musicians, including B. B. King, Howlin’ Wolf, and Hurbert Sumlin, once played in juke joints on the plantations. Pre-European Exploration The remnants of Native American civilizations surround Horseshoe Lake. The oldest recorded Indian mounds in the area are believed to be pre-Mississippian, as evidenced from artifacts found dating back to around …

Horton, Zilphia Mae Johnson

Zilphia Mae Johnson Horton was an influential educator, folklorist, musician, and social justice activist who collected, adapted, performed, and promoted the use of folksongs and hymns in the labor and civil rights movements, notably “We Shall Not Be Moved” and “We Shall Overcome.” These two, respectively, became labor and civil rights movement anthems. She served as the first cultural director of the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee—the precursor of today’s Highlander Research and Education Center, founded by her husband Myles Horton—until her untimely death in 1956. Zilphia Johnson was born in Paris (Logan County) on April 14, 1910, the second child of Robert Guy Johnson, a coal mine superintendent, and Ora Ermon Howard Johnson, a schoolteacher. She was the eldest of …

Hospital Unit T

When the United States entered World War I on April 6, 1917, the need for trained medical personnel was great, and medical units of doctors, nurses, and enlisted men were recruited heavily. The American Red Cross asked for units to be formed from hospitals and medical schools across the United States to go to France and England. Arkansas’s contribution was Hospital Unit T, Medical Department, National Army (called Hospital Unit T for short). Dr. William A. Snodgrass, a Little Rock (Pulaski County) physician with the University of Arkansas Medical School (now the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences) was authorized to form a unit for military service. His authorization was announced in the Arkansas Gazette on July 1, 1917. This …

Hospitals (Civil War)

A wide range of Civil War hospitals in Arkansas included field hospitals established in the immediate aftermath of battle, commandeered houses and churches, and somewhat permanent post hospitals in occupied areas. Union bases tended to have more purpose-built hospital facilities, while Confederate doctors made use of any available buildings, such as colleges, hotels, churches, and private homes. The need for hospital facilities became obvious soon after Arkansas seceded from the Union and the new Confederate recruits became ill from the myriad diseases that afflicted their camps. Hospitals were established wherever large groups of troops gathered, often treating soldiers from specific regiments or from the same states. In early 1862, for instance, Confederate forces in Washington County established the Mount Comfort …

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 (Garland County)

Hot Springs is situated along the Ouachita River in the Central Ouachita Mountains division of the Ouachita Mountains. It is the largest city in the Ouachita Mountains and has been a resort center since its establishment in the early nineteenth century, but it is also known as a historic locus of illegal gambling, mafia activity, and political corruption. President Bill Clinton, born in Hope (Hempstead County), grew up in Hot Springs, and the city has attracted and produced many noteworthy politicians, artists, and writers throughout the years, including Mary Lewis and Marjorie Florence Lawrence. The daily newspaper the Sentinel-Record, in one incarnation or another, has been circulating in Hot Springs since its inception in 1874. Pre-European Exploration through European Exploration and …

Hot Springs Central Avenue Historic District

The Hot Springs Central Avenue Historic District extends from 205 Park Avenue to 702 Central Avenue in Hot Springs (Garland County). It contains some of the state’s finest historic buildings built between 1886 and 1930. The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 25, 1985. The buildings reflect the growth of Hot Springs as one of the nation’s premier resort destinations in the late 1800s through the mid-1900s. The Central Avenue area has traditionally been the main commercial district of Hot Springs. Fronting Bathhouse Row, the stores, hotels, offices, and restaurants located on Central Avenue served local residents as well as the visitors who drove the city’s booming tourist trade until the last half of …

Hot Springs Confederate Monument

The Hot Springs Confederate Monument is a commemorative sculpture erected in 1934 at Landmark Plaza by the Hot Springs Chapter No. 80 of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) to commemorate men who had served in the Confederate army during the Civil War. The Hot Springs Chapter of the UDC, like its sister chapters around the state, sought to commemorate Confederate soldiers and veterans, and much of its early work focused on the Confederate Section at Hollywood Cemetery, which the chapter took over from the Albert Pike Camp of United Confederate Veterans (UCV) in 1906. That project was completed in 1919 when a granite monument inscribed “Our Confederate Dead” was placed in the southern end of the plot. The effort …

Hot Springs Country Club

Hot Springs Country Club is home to Arkansas’s first golf course and is considered one of America’s oldest country clubs west of the Mississippi River. Plans for the course in Hot Springs (Garland County) were announced in November 1897, and construction began the following January. Local hotel interests came up with the idea to provide entertainment and recreational activities for their ever increasing numbers of guests. Play formally commenced on March 19, 1898. World Hall of Fame golfer Willie Park Jr. is credited with the original layout of the 2,465-yard, nine-hole course. An existing two-story frame dwelling on the northwestern corner of the property was renovated to become a clubhouse. Officers of the club included many of the city’s prominent …

Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival (HSDFF)

Billing itself as the longest-running documentary film festival in North America, the internationally recognized Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival (HSDFF) takes place each fall over about nine days in Hot Springs (Garland County). Since its inception in 1992, sponsored by the Hot Springs Documentary Film Institute, the HSDFF has become renowned as a prestigious venue for showing documentary films and attracting celebrities, filmmakers, industry figures, and audiences from across the nation and around the world. It bills itself as the oldest nonfiction film festival in North America. The festival is a qualifying event for filmmakers competing for Academy Awards in Best Documentary Short Subject. The festival is one of about three dozen such qualifiers among thousands of film festivals. Celebrity …

Hot Springs Fire of 1905

The Hot Springs Fire of 1905 was one of the most destructive in Arkansas history. It destroyed nearly 400 buildings and caused $2 million in damage. The horrific blaze forever changed the unique architecture of Hot Springs (Garland County). Hot Springs quickly rebuilt after the Civil War years of 1861–1865. The pre-war population of 201 had exploded to 9,973 residents by 1900. By 1904, it was the region’s most important tourist destination. Of the 120,000 people who visited at least one of America’s national parks in 1904, roughly eighty-four percent visited Hot Springs National Park. Unknown numbers of additional travelers visited the town but not the park. Most of the visitors came to bathe in the waters (thought to have …

Hot Springs Fire of 1913

The Hot Springs Fire of 1913 was one of the most destructive in Arkansas history. It caused $10 million in damage, destroyed twenty acres of Hot Springs (Garland County), and left more than 2,500 people homeless. By 1910, Hot Springs was one of the most important cities in the region and the pre–Civil War population of 201 had exploded to 14,434. Many travelers also visited the town and the National Park. People from all over the world came to bathe in the city’s hot spring water, thought to have healing properties, but many also partook of the town’s illegal gambling and prostitution. In a state best known for rural poverty, Hot Springs was a rare island of wealth and modernity. …

Hot Springs Medical Journal

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Hot Springs (Garland County) was home to the Hot Springs Medical Journal, first published in January 1892. Although medical journals were published in nearby locations including Little Rock (Pulaski County), Memphis, Tennessee, and St. Louis, Missouri, the founders of the publication felt that the natural hot springs for which the city was named provided a great resource for many patients. They stated in the first volume: “The city of Hot Springs, Arkansas is…the greatest sanitarium on earth, and in a few years is inevitably destined to become the most universally frequented health resort in the world.” At that time, Hot Springs was already quite a tourist area. The resident population was 15,000, …

Hot Springs Music Festival

The Hot Springs Music Festival is a non-profit organization whose dual mission is, first, to provide exceptionally talented young musicians with intensive mentoring to prepare them for the early stages of their professional careers, and, second, to have them share the music they make with people in central Arkansas. To fulfill its mission, the festival organization produces a two-week annual event by the same name every June in the historic downtown district of Hot Springs (Garland County). The festival was founded in 1995 by Richard Rosenberg, an orchestra conductor and music educator, and Laura Rosenberg, an arts administrator. Prior to founding the festival, Richard Rosenberg had been acting director of orchestras at the University of Michigan, associate conductor of the …

Hot Springs National Guard Armory

The Hot Springs National Guard Armory at 210 Woodbine Street in Hot Springs (Garland County) is a single-story, Art Deco–style structure built in 1937–1938 with assistance from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a Depression-era federal relief program. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 5, 2017. Citizen-soldier militias have had a constant presence in the United States since the colonial era, but it was not until Congress passed the Militia Act of 1903—also known as the Dick Act for sponsor Senator Charles W. F. Dick, chairman of the Committee on the Militia—that the National Guard became an official partner in the nation’s armed services, receiving federal support for training, equipment, and wages. Arkansas’s state militia …

Hot Springs National Park

When the United States acquired the “hot springs of the Washita” as part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the practice of medicine was still in its infancy, but the therapeutic benefits of hot mineral spring water had been well established worldwide for millennia. Over the next twenty-nine years, a few local settlers worked to turn the springs into a privately owned health resort, while others petitioned the federal government to make them accessible for everyone. The latter group prevailed. On April 20, 1832, the United States Congress set aside the area now known as Hot Springs National Park to preserve the springs for public benefit. As the “Government Spa” evolved, it continued to operate for the benefit of the …

Hot Springs National Park Quarter

The 2010 Hot Springs National Park Quarter was released for circulation on April 19, 2010, the first coin issued in the America the Beautiful Quarters Program. Fifty-six quarters will be issued sequentially, five each year, by the U.S. Mint in the order in which the honored site was first established as a national site. Hot Springs National Park garnered the distinction of being featured on the first quarter dispensed because it was the first federal government land reservation set aside for public use, a status achieved on April 20, 1832, when President Andrew Jackson signed the legislation to protect forty-seven hot springs on the slope of Hot Springs Mountain. The 110th Congress passed Public Law 110-456, the America’s Beautiful National …

Hot Springs Normal and Industrial Institute

aka: Mebane Academy

The Board of Missions for Freedmen of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. (PCUSA), or the “Northern” Presbyterian Church, began opening schools for freed slaves in the South as early as the 1860s. However, no schools were started in Arkansas until 1889, when a new presbytery was established and significant numbers of African Americans from the eastern states were resettling in the state. During the early 1890s, the Reverend A. E. Torrence, pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church, opened a parochial school for black students in Hot Springs (Garland County). He conducted it independently but did receive some aid from the Board of Missions. By 1895, there were 100 students in attendance. According to Inez Parker, while the school was …

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 …

Hot Springs Schools, Desegregation of

Hot Springs (Garland County), a tourist town, had one of the largest school districts in Arkansas at the time the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its 1954 Brown v. Board of Education school desegregation decision. Black students made up 14.7 percent of the school population, with 2,778 white and 522 Black students at elementary level and 1,942 white and 357 Black students at junior and senior high level. In October 1955, the Hot Springs School Board appointed an advisory committee of twenty-three white and five Black citizens to draw up plans for desegregation. In April 1956, the committee recommended beginning desegregation with a high school auto mechanics course. On September 4, 1956, the course admitted four white and six Black …

Hot Springs Shootout

aka: Hot Springs Gunfight
aka: Gunfight at Hot Springs

The Hot Springs Shootout, also known as the Hot Springs Gunfight or the Gunfight at Hot Springs, occurred on March 16, 1899. Sparked by a dispute over which agency would control gambling in Hot Springs (Garland County), this shootout between the Hot Springs Police Department and the Garland County Sheriff’s Office resulted in the deaths of five men. The shootout represented a continuation in the battle for control of gambling in Hot Springs and was preceded by the Flynn-Doran blood feud that lasted from 1884 until 1888. Frank Flynn controlled gambling in Hot Springs until former Confederate major Alexander Doran began opening gambling houses there in 1884. The first blood was drawn when Flynn challenged Doran to a duel. Flynn was …

Hot Springs Smallpox Outbreak of 1895

In the early months of 1895, Hot Springs (Garland County) suffered through a blizzard, numerous fires, and a smallpox outbreak. These collective disasters left the community economically crippled. The Blizzard of 1895 that swept across much of the country in late January/early February had made travel to the spa resort town impossible during what was normally its busy season. By mid-February, travel had resumed, and visitors soon filled up the town. Then, a series of unexplained fires started flaring up across the city, culminating in a large conflagration in the early hours of Friday, February 22. The fire started around 3:30 a.m. and, within minutes, it had engulfed four and a half blocks of businesses and residential buildings while thousands …

Hot Springs Village (Garland and Saline Counties)

Hot Springs Village, which stretches across the Garland–Saline County line, began as a developmental project and became a gated community. As the population grew, Hot Springs Village began to attract wealthy retired citizens. Its golf courses and trails also make the town a regional tourist destination. As of the 2020 census, the population is 15,861 (Garland County and Saline County populations combined). A frequently repeated claim that Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto traversed what is now Hot Springs Village accounts for the use of de Soto’s name for one of the lakes in the village and one of its main streets, as well as his image in the community logo. French trappers were probably the first Europeans to enter the …

Hot Springs Village Voice

The Hot Springs Village Voice, founded in 1990, is a weekly newspaper in Hot Springs Village (Garland and Saline counties). The publication’s major emphasis is producing feature stories and covering local news, community events, feature stories, newsworthy area residents, recreational activities, and sports, along with locally oriented business reports, political coverage, display advertisements, and classified advertisements. Having an estimated circulation of 4,500, it is published once a week, with subscribers receiving their copy via the U.S. Postal Service each Tuesday. Jennifer Allen bought the newspaper from the Gannett Company in 2021. Hot Springs Village is the largest gated community in the United States. By the 2020 census, its population was 15,861, reflecting a growth from 12,807 in 2010. In the …

Hotchkiss, Sylvester C.

Sylvester C. (S. C.) Hotchkiss was a northern architect turned Monticello (Drew County) resident who designed a number of houses and buildings in southern Arkansas. Hotchkiss’s relocation to Monticello distinguished the community from other small towns of the period for having a resident architect. Many of his structures are still standing in the twenty-first century, and two are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. S. C. Hotchkiss (whose middle name was likely Clifford) was born on January 29, 1842, in Homer, Michigan, to Sylvester Wolcott Hotchkiss and Mary Hotchkiss. Hotchkiss spent his childhood in Michigan and New York before the family moved to Chicago around 1854. He graduated in 1857 from Sloan Commercial College and began working with …

Hotel Frederica

aka: Hotel Freiderica
aka: Hotel Sam Peck
aka: Legacy Hotel

What was originally called the Hotel Freiderica and known for many years as the Hotel Sam Peck in Little Rock (Pulaski County) at 625 W. Capitol Ave. was developed by Fred W. Allsopp, a prominent businessman who at the time was business manager and part owner the Arkansas Gazette. The hotel, which opened in 1914, was named for his wife, Mary Freiderica Chapple. Since its opening, the hotel has been operated under several names (most recently Hotel Frederica) and has had several different owners. It has enjoyed successes including national fame but has also endured failures and foreclosure. Both the exterior and interior have been remodeled several times. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September …

Hotel Pines

The Hotel Pines, located at the northwest corner of Main Street and West 5th Avenue in downtown Pine Bluff (Jefferson County), was conceived and built to attract more business to the section of Main Street that lies to the south of the city’s railroad tracks. As such, it provides a glimpse at one effort to alter a city’s main business and shopping area in the early twentieth century. This classically designed hotel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on August 10, 1979. Since the area north of the tracks was a thriving commercial area, the city’s Main Street property owners believed that the presence of a modern hotel would lure business south of the tracks. Many of …

Hotze House

At the beginning of the twentieth century, prominent cotton broker and financier Peter Hotze commissioned Little Rock (Pulaski County) architect Charles L. Thompson to erect a stately residence for his family at 1619 Louisiana Street. Born in Innsbruck, Austria, on October 12, 1836, to Wolfgang Reinart Hotze and Mary Sophia Hotze, Peter Hotze was primarily raised by his mother after his father’s death. Upon his mother’s death in 1856, Peter and his brother Conrad immigrated to America, moving to Little Rock in 1857. Hotze then enlisted in the Capital Guards, which later became Company A of the Sixth Arkansas Infantry Regiment, a Confederate force. In 1864, Hotze was captured and became a prisoner of war at an Ohio camp, where …

House at 712 North Mill Street

Sometime between 1900 and 1904, Tennessee-born Gustavus (Gus) Rugel; his wife, Effie; and their five children moved from Mesquite, Texas, to Springdale (Washington and Benton counties), where they purchased forty-eight acres of farmland along Mill Street on the north side of town. Rugel had been a hardware dealer in Texas; in Springdale, he made his living as a fruit grower. In May 1913, Gus and Effie Rugel subdivided part of their farm to create the Rugel Addition, ten residential lots fronting Mill Street. In May 1914, Leroy Davis and Fanny Mae Davis bought Lot 6 in the Rugel Addition for $350. Within two months, the Davises sold Lot 6 for $2,000, evidence of a major improvement to the property—a Craftsman-style …

Houser, Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon Bonaparte Houser was a prominent African American physician, owner of the Black Diamond Drug Store, and investor in Helena (Phillips County) from 1901 to 1920. He came to Helena from Charlotte, North Carolina, as the Arkansas Delta’s population and opportunities grew, but returned to the place of his birth following the Elaine Massacre. N. B. Houser was born near Gastonia, in Gaston County, North Carolina, on February 14, 1869. He was the son of William H. Houser, a well-to-do brick mason and contractor, and Fannie Houser, a housekeeper and mother. The youngest of six siblings, Houser attended public schools in Charlotte and worked as a farm hand on his father’s farm until the age of fourteen, when he began …