Arts

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Entry Category: Arts

Dunn, Ronnie Gene

With a slew of chart-topping singles to his credit as half of the duo Brooks & Dunn, Ronnie Gene Dunn established himself as a member of the most award-winning duo in country music. Though Arkansas is not considered his home state, he has earned a spot in its musical history. Ronnie Dunn was born on June 1, 1953, in Coleman, Texas, to Jesse Eugene Dunn and Gladys Inez Thurmon Dunn. His father was a musician who also worked in the oil fields and drove trucks; his mother was a devout Baptist who, in the 1960s, lived in El Dorado (Union County) and worked as a bookkeeper at the First National Bank and then as a telephone operator at Warner Brown …

Dusenbury, Emma Hays

Emma Hays Dusenbury was an outstanding traditional singer; her work is represented by some 116 songs in the nation’s leading folksong archive at the Library of Congress. Emma Hays was born on January 9, 1862, probably in Habersham County or Rabun County, Georgia, to William Jasper Hays and Mary Jane Pitts. She came to Arkansas with her parents and four siblings in 1872, staying first in Crittenden County but eventually settling in Baxter County, near Gassville. Sometime after 1880, she married Ernest Dusenbury, who was from Illinois. Two years later, they had a daughter. In about 1894 or 1895, she suffered a serious illness that left her blind. Before settling near Mena (Polk County) in about 1907, Dusenbury lived an itinerant life; …

E. Fay and Gus Jones House

The E. Fay and Gus Jones house, located at 1330 N. Hillcrest Avenue in Fayetteville (Washington County), has been the residence of architect Fay Jones (1921–2004) and his wife, Mary Elizabeth “Gus” Jones (1921–2014), as well as their two daughters. Completed in May 1956, it was designed by Jones upon his return to Fayetteville after a short period of employment in the office of Frank Lloyd Wright. A skillful composition of stone, wood, and glass, sheltered by a deeply overhanging roof, the Jones house is emblematic of the organic principles Jones sought in his work and shows the influence of his experiences with Wright. Jones selected a lot adjacent to a wooded area at the northern edge of town, situating …

E&M Recording Company and My Records

aka: My Records
In the 1960s, Little Rock (Pulaski County) was home to E&M Recording Company, a studio owned by Earl Fox. The initials in the company name stood for “Earl” and “Myrna,” Fox’s wife. Through his two independent record labels, E&M Recording Company and My Records, which he established later, Fox provided a creative outlet and commercial venue for local singers and musical groups. My Records, in particular, played an important role in nourishing the creative energy released in the late 1960s profusion of central Arkansas rock and roll groups. In 1959, Fox built a sound studio behind his house at 1612 South Buchanan Street in Little Rock; this was an avocational enterprise, which he undertook for his love of music and …

Ed Knight House

The Ed Knight House is an enclosed double-pen dog-trot-style home near the Pine Grove (Dallas County) community. Located on a county road near Arkansas Highway 128 about four miles southeast of Sparkman (Dallas County), the home is a good example of small farm house architecture in southern Arkansas. Likely constructed in the 1880s, the house was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 28, 1983. While the Knight family was prominent in the Pine Grove and Sparkman communities in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, little information is available on Ed Knight. He was born in 1866 in Arkansas and worked as a farmer in various locations in western Dallas County. He was married to Annie …

Eddie Mae Herron Center & Museum

aka: St. Mary’s AME Church (Pocahontas)
aka: Pocahontas Colored School
The Eddie Mae Herron Center & Museum in Pocahontas (Randolph County) preserves and displays the history of slavery, civil rights, and African Americans. The building and associated grounds are located at the corner of Archer and Pratt streets. The building housing the museum was originally St. Mary’s African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church and also the Pocahontas Colored School. The first evidence of St. Mary’s AME Church is ascribed to a building in the northern part of Pocahontas, around Bland and Schoonover streets. The building was purportedly erected sometime in 1865. The congregation subsequently moved the building to its current location between 1918 and 1919. The one-room wood-frame building served as both a school and as a house of worship, with …

Eichenbaum, Howard Samuel

Howard Samuel Eichenbaum Sr. was a practicing architect in Little Rock (Pulaski County) until his death. Eichenbaum’s importance to Arkansas may be found in his eclectic experimentation with architecture to express modernity fused with regional tradition, and in his advancement of—and advocacy for—architects in Arkansas. Howard S. Eichenbaum was born in Little Rock on April 26, 1904, the son of Ephraim Eichenbaum and Sadie Cohn Eichenbaum. He was educated in Little Rock’s public schools and earned his degree in architecture at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1924 (there was no professional program in architecture in Arkansas until 1946). He married Helen Marion Levin; they had three sons. In 1930, Eichenbaum partnered with Frank Erhart to found Erhart and …

El Dorado High School Gym

The El Dorado High School Gym, located at 300 South West Avenue on the South Arkansas Community College’s West Campus at El Dorado (Union County), is an Art Deco–style recreational building designed by architect John B. Abbot and constructed in 1940 with assistance from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a Depression-era federal relief agency. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on November 26, 2002. The El Dorado High School campus contained a high school building and what was then the El Dorado Junior College Building when El Dorado Special School District No. 15 began seeking funds to build a gymnasium through President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal agencies during the Great Depression. After a five-year effort, the …

Elkhorn Tavern

Elkhorn Tavern is one of the most important historical buildings in Benton County. The tavern bore witness to many significant events in northwestern Arkansas in the mid-nineteenth century, such as the establishment and use of Telegraph Road, Indian Removal, the beginnings of the Butterfield Overland Mail and Stage Company, and the campaigning of Civil War armies. Elkhorn Tavern was built by William Ruddick in 1833. It was a two-story log structure and two-pen dogtrot house. One of the first post offices in Benton County was established in the tavern in 1837. A Baptist sect moved its meeting place at the tavern due to “noisy parties and dances now being held at the inn” by Union soldiers. The United States military …

Elliott House

Located in Fordyce (Dallas County), the Elliott House is a Craftsman-style home in a quiet residential neighborhood. Constructed around 1925, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on March 27, 1984. Born in Arkansas in 1887, Joe Scales Elliott was the son of William and Missouri Elliott. William owned a dry goods store in Fordyce, and the couple had six children. Joe was the fourth child and the first son in the family. While his name appears in records as Joe, Joseph, and Joel, his name is listed on his gravestone as Joe. By 1910, Joe held employment as a bookkeeper in a general merchandise store, probably the one owned by his father. William died in 1913, …

Ellis and Charlotte Williamson House

The Ellis and Charlotte Williamson House is located on the south side of the westernmost end of West Cloverdale Drive in Brinkley (Monroe County). Designed by architect Frank L. Doughty, the house was constructed in 1966–67. The house’s architecture reflects a local, mid-century interpretation of Frank Lloyd Wright’s “organic architecture.” It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on February 3, 2020. The Ellis and Charlotte Williamson House is a single-story residence with a walkout basement on the west side. It is arranged in a cruciform plan, which radiates out from a central brick chimney. The house is constructed on a continuous concrete slab foundation. The exterior walls are covered in either red brick or wood board-and-batten siding, …

Elton and Betty White

aka: Elton White
aka: Betty White
In the mid- to late 1980s, Elton and Betty White were highly visible Little Rock (Pulaski County) street musicians and eccentrics, recognized for their sexually explicit ukulele songs and their flamboyant wardrobe of sombreros and skimpy swimwear. Betty White was born Betty Crandall in 1927 in Mabelvale (Pulaski County), one of seven children of the town’s postmaster and his wife. In 1946, after graduating as valedictorian of Mabelvale High School, she married air force sergeant Scotty White, with whom she had a son, Sammy. Together, they traveled the nation and the world. After returning to Arkansas, she found secretarial work with the law firm of Wright, Lindsey & Jennings, for whom Bill Clinton was then practicing. Following a diagnosis of …

Endsley, Melvin

Melvin Endsley of Drasco (Cleburne County) was a musician and songwriter most noted for writing both the words and music of “Singing the Blues,” one of the biggest hits of the 1950s and one of the most recorded songs of the twentieth century. Nashville, Tennessee, recording star Marty Robbins, pop singer Guy Mitchell, and teen idol Tommy Steele in the United Kingdom all recorded versions of the song. Endsley composed more than 400 songs, many of them recorded by the top musical artists of the day, including Andy Williams, Johnny Cash, Paul McCartney, Ricky Skaggs, Stonewall Jackson, Black Oak Arkansas, Bill Haley and His Comets, and Don Gibson. Melvin Lorenzen Endsley was born on January 30, 1934, in Heber Springs …

Estes-Williams American Legion Hut 61

Estes-Williams American Legion Hut 61, located on Highway 62/412 in Yellville (Marion County), is a Rustic-style structure erected in 1933–1934 with assistance from the Civil Works Administration (CWA), a Depression-era federal relief program. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on February 16, 2001. Local veterans of World War I established an American Legion post at Yellville in December 1920. Not having a meeting hall, the Legionnaires met at the Morris Hotel on Yellville’s town square until 1933, when they received assistance from the CWA for construction of a legion hall, with the CWA providing materials and labor and local sources providing a site and transportation for construction materials. Yellville’s town council donated the western half of …

Eureka Springs Baby

aka: Eureka Baby
aka: Petrified Indian Baby
The 1880 discovery of a fossilized human child in Eureka Springs (Carroll County) was not revealed as a hoax until 1948. The find was exhibited locally and then around the state. Within a year, the carving—known variously as the “Eureka Baby,” the “Petrified Indian Baby,” or as a Hindu idol—had been exhibited in St. Louis, Missouri; Galveston, Texas; and New Orleans, Louisiana. It was also reportedly en route to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC at the time of its disappearance. This hoax was the brainchild of Henry Johnson, a Scottsville (Pope County) merchant who closely modeled his deception on the nationally famous Cardiff Giant. This massive stone man was “discovered” in 1869 in Cardiff, New York, and publicly acknowledged …