Entries - Entry Type: Place

Buckner (Lafayette County)

Buckner is a town in northern Lafayette County, a few miles east of Stamps (Lafayette County) on U.S. Highway 82. Established by the Cotton Belt Railroad, Buckner was a lumber center early in its history, but the economy of the town in the twenty-first century is shaped more by its proximity to oil and gas fields and to poultry farms. What would become northern Lafayette County was heavily forested when Arkansas became a state in 1836. Caddo, who lived along the Red River valley, moved through the area regularly. Gradually, white settlers began to claim and clear land in the region. Because the area remained sparsely populated, the Civil War had little effect upon the area. John Colvin was farming …

Buckville (Garland County)

The community of Buckville, located on the upper Ouachita River in Garland County, emerged as a small town amidst the sparsely settled Ouachita Mountains after the Civil War. The town typified rural upland Arkansas with its small farms and reliance on agriculture. Following the construction of Blakely Mountain Dam in the 1950s, the waters of Lake Ouachita covered the site of Buckville. The lake’s completion necessitated a total, permanent evacuation of the town. Extensive archaeological remains exist in the upper Ouachita River valley; many fields bordering on the river contain evidence of Native American presence in the area. Caddo occupied the Ouachita Mountains in relatively small, widely dispersed settlements in the northern part of the region. By 1700, no European or Indian resident …

Buckville Cemetery

The community of Buckville (Garland County) was inundated by the waters of Lake Ouachita in the 1950s; the remains lie under the lake’s surface. The Buckville Cemetery is the only reminder of the town that occupies its original location. The cemetery, which is located in northern Garland County off Buckville Road about two miles south of Avant (Garland County), was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 27, 2007. The town of Buckville developed in the years following the Civil War. A post office was established in 1884, and a thriving community existed by the 1900s. A decline began by the 1920s when Arkansas Power and Light (AP&L) embarked on the construction of three dams on the …

Buena Vista (Ouachita County)

Buena Vista (Ouachita County) is an unincorporated community located about nine miles southwest of Camden (Ouachita County) and eight miles northeast of Stephens (Ouachita County). The name of the community is likely a reference to the Battle of Buena Vista fought near Monterrey, Mexico, in February 1847, during the Mexican War. Former Arkansas governor and U.S. representative Archibald Yell was killed in the battle while leading the Arkansas Regiment of Mounted Volunteers. It is also possibly in reference to a nearby hill that is the highest point in Ouachita County, leading to the adoption of the Spanish translation of the phrase “good view.” The area surrounding Buena Vista belonged to Union County when Arkansas joined the union in 1836. With …

Buffalo (Scott County)

Buffalo is a historical community in southern Scott County located along U.S. Highway 71. The community was established along Buffalo Creek. The agriculture and timber industries have contributed to the economy and way of life in Buffalo. Prior to European exploration, the area surrounding Buffalo was a wilderness. Several species of wildlife that no longer inhabit the area, such as elk and buffalo, were present throughout the region. Numerous archaeological sites and burial mounds can be found along the banks of prominent waterways such as the Fourche La Fave River. Archaeological findings have provided evidence of early inhabitants dating to the Archaic, Woodland, and Mississippian periods. Further archaeological evidence has indicated that the people of the Caddo tribe later inhabited the area. During the late …

Buffalo Island

Buffalo Island is a local name given to western Mississippi County and eastern Craighead County. It consists of the land south of Big Lake between the Little River (not to be confused with a stream of the same name in southwestern Arkansas) and the St. Francis River, containing the communities of Manila (Mississippi County), Monette (Craighead County), Leachville (Mississippi County), Black Oak (Craighead County), and Caraway (Craighead County). The first written mention of the area was by Hernando de Soto, who passed through the area in 1541. De Soto’s party described Big Lake as existing on a high, dry area near the Mississippi River and feeding a moat around a large village believed to be in the area of contemporary Gosnell (Mississippi …

Buffalo National River

aka: Buffalo River

The Buffalo National River, which runs through Newton, Searcy, Marion, and Baxter counties, became the first national river in the United States on March 1, 1972. It is one of the few remaining free-flowing rivers in the lower forty-eight states. The Buffalo National River, administered by the National Park Service, encompasses 135 miles of the 150-mile long river. President Richard M. Nixon signed Public Law 92-237 to put the river under the protection of the National Park Service 100 years after the establishment of Yellowstone National Park, the first national park. The law begins, “That for the purposes of conserving and interpreting an area containing unique scenic and scientific features, and preserving as a free-flowing stream an important segment of …

Bull Shoals (Marion County)

Bull Shoals is located in Marion County about ten miles south of the Missouri state line. The origin of the town of Bull Shoals is related to the building of Bull Shoals Dam and the formation of Bull Shoals Lake. Bordered on three sides by Bull Shoals Lake, modern-day Bull Shoals is primarily a vacation and retirement community. The town was the creation of Charles S. Woods Sr. A real estate developer, Woods had founded communities in Texas and Georgia. Bull Shoals was to be his fifteenth and final development. With the planned construction of Bull Shoals Dam and the forming of a nearby lake, Woods saw great potential for the area. With the backing of local investors, Woods formed …

Bull Shoals Dam and Lake

Bull Shoals Dam site is located on the White River about ten miles west of Mountain Home (Baxter County), where the river divides Baxter and Marion counties. The site is named after its location at a shoal (a shallow and swift reach of river), borrowing from the French “Boill,” meaning a large spring. Private power companies had explored the possibility of building a dam at Wildcat Shoals above Cotter (Baxter County) as early as 1902 but never began any work toward it. Congress approved the construction of six reservoirs in the White River Basin in the Flood Control Act of 1938. A U.S. Army Corps of Engineers report in 1930 had recommended the Wildcat Shoals site along with seven others …

Bull Shoals-White River State Park

Arkansas’s seventh state park, Bull Shoals-White River State Park, is near Mountain Home (Baxter County) in northeast Arkansas on the White River, one of the nation’s premier trout-fishing streams, and Bull Shoals Lake, one of the region’s major man-made lakes. The site was adopted into the state park system in 1955 after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers created the lake by constructing Bull Shoals Dam on the White River. Bull Shoals was named by early French hunters and trappers who used the word “Boill,” meaning a large spring, to describe the area. Edmund Jennings, the first English-speaking person to visit the “Six Bulls” country, lived among the Indians for fifteen years before returning to his home state of Tennessee. …

Burdette (Mississippi County)

Burdette (Mississippi County) is located nine miles south of Blytheville (Mississippi County) on State Highway 148 just off U.S. Highway 61, known as the Great River Road. Burdette is named after Alfred Burdette Wolverton, who in the early 1900s was one of the first lumbermen to settle in the area. It was incorporated as a company town by workers of the Three States Lumber Company of Wisconsin in May 1905. Prior to Three States Lumber Company’s arrival, the area had been swampland and uninhabitable. Burdette Township split from Fletcher Township in 1908 to create the community of Burdette. Burdette proper is located within the larger Burdette Township (a township being a division of a county), which includes farming and lumber …

Burdette School Complex Historic District

The Burdette School Complex Historic District is a group of six buildings located in Burdette (Mississippi County), with historic buildings constructed between 1922 and the late 1940s. Classes at the complex ceased at the end of the 2001–2002 academic year, and the complex was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 28, 2001. The earliest school in Burdette operated in a building owned by the Three States Lumber Company. Although the dates of operation are unknown, the building burned, and the company replaced it before a third building was constructed directly across from future location of the school complex. The residents of Burdette approved a twelve-mill school tax in 1917, leading to the creation of the Burdette …

Burns Park

Burns Park in North Little Rock (Pulaski County) is one of the largest city-owned parks in the nation. The park acreage has a history of private ownership and subsequently of federal, state, and municipal government ownership. The land has been used over the years for farming, timber, military operations, and a public park. In 1893, the citizens of Little Rock (Pulaski County) gave a 1,100-acre tract of land north of the Arkansas River to the federal government. In exchange, the thirty-six-acre U.S. Army Arsenal grounds in Little Rock were deeded to the city for use as a public park. The Little Rock Arsenal property at East 9th and Commerce Streets became City Park and was later renamed MacArthur Park in …

Burtsell (Clark County)

Burtsell is a community in Clark County located about five miles southeast of Okolona (Clark County). An alternate spelling of the community’s name is Burtsel. The first settlers to the area arrived in the mid-nineteenth century, attracted by the virgin timber and prime farming land near the Little Missouri River. The population of the area was never very large, and only a few families called Burtsell home at any one time. Robert Welch obtained eighty acres of land in the area in 1837, and Elijah Franklin purchased forty acres nearby in 1848. A Federal army under the command of Major General Frederick Steele passed through the area during the Camden Expedition of 1864. Burtsell was linked with Smithton (Clark County) …

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 …

Cabot (Lonoke County)

In 2009, BusinessWeek designated the northern Lonoke County city of Cabot as an “Arkansas boomtown” and listed it as the state’s third-fastest-growing city per capita. Incorporated on November 9, 1891, the city—best known for its school system—is home to 23,776 people (as of the 2010 census), making it the largest community in the county. Post Reconstruction through the Gilded Age The development of the area began in the early 1800s about three miles east of the present city at a small town called Austin (Lonoke County). A stretch of the Butterfield Overland Mail Company stage route passed through the area, and, during the Civil War, a large Confederate camp named Camp Nelson was established nearby. Troops moved in and out …

Cache River National Wildlife Refuge

The 62,000-acre Cache River National Wildlife Refuge is the most important wintering area for ducks and the largest remaining tract of contiguous bottomland hardwood forest in North America. It runs along the floodplain of the Cache River and Bayou DeView for seventy air miles from the mouth of the Cache River at Clarendon (Monroe County) to Grubbs (Jackson County), encompassing Jackson, Monroe, Prairie, and Woodruff counties. In February 2004, the ivory-billed woodpecker, once thought extinct, was rediscovered on the refuge. The refuge was established in 1986 as one of 540 national wildlife refuges administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The refuge’s primary objective is to provide habitat for migratory waterfowl and other birds, to protect and restore the …

Caddo Gap (Montgomery County)

Caddo Gap is an unincorporated community located along the Caddo River in Montgomery County approximately fifteen miles south of the county seat, Mount Ida. In the twenty-first century, Caddo Gap is a very small community of fewer than 100 people, although it has a long history of Native American habitation, Spanish exploration, and white settlement. According to Arkansas Archeological Survey findings, Native Americans inhabited areas near Caddo Gap dating back to the Dalton culture. In the thirteen, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, Caddo Indians lived and farmed in Caddo Gap. For many years, historians believed that Hernando de Soto’s expedition in 1541 encountered and fought the Tula tribe near present-day Caddo Gap. The Arkansas History Commission erected a monument in 1936 …

Caddo Indian Memorial

The Caddo Indian Memorial is located on the site of a Native American burial ground on the outskirts of Norman (Montgomery County) on Arkansas Highway 8 East. Open year-round and free to the public, it contains the Elmo Clark Honor Path, which runs a quarter of a mile along the perimeter. This allows visitors easy access to the twenty-one signs that explain the culture and history of the Caddo Indians. The path runs parallel to the Caddo River and its tributary, Huddleston Creek, which form the southwestern and northwestern boundaries. In October 1988, the city of Norman had begun excavation at this site for construction of a sewage treatment plant, but digging was stopped abruptly when bones and artifacts were …

Caddo Valley (Clark County)

Located near the junction of the Caddo and Ouachita rivers, the city of Caddo Valley is a relatively new but economically important town in Clark County. With an economy based on service industries and a prime location on three highways and near DeGray Lake Resort State Park, Caddo Valley quickly became an important stop between Little Rock (Pulaski County) and Texarkana (Miller County). Settlement in the area began in the early 1800s with the arrival of the first white farmers. The area had previously been occupied by members of the Caddo tribe. Jacob Barkman, an 1811 arrival to the area, constructed a house on the south bank of the Caddo River. The Caddo Valley area proved to be a prime …

Caddo Valley Academy

Caddo Valley Academy (CVA) was founded in Womble (Montgomery County) in 1921. Though the private school was open for a relatively short amount of time, it had a lasting impact on the residents of Womble, which was later known as Norman. Through a blended curriculum of standard academics and biblical teachings, CVA provided a strong educational foundation for its students. Dr. John Tilman Barr Jr. established CVA. Barr was born in 1886 and devoted much of his life to working with children. Though he was frequently ill, Barr originally aspired to be a lawyer and politician. However, he came to believe that God had instructed him to become a minister and so devoted his life to the Presbyterian Church. Barr’s …

Cadron Settlement

aka: Cadron (Faulkner County)

The first permanent white settlement in central Arkansas was near the confluence of Cadron Creek and the Arkansas River, about five miles west of Conway in Faulkner County. In the early 1800s, the term “Cadron Settlement” was used loosely in reference to thirty to forty white families that were scattered along the Arkansas River in the vicinity of Cadron Creek. In 1818, an early settler and trader, John McElmurry, who had arrived before 1818, and three other investors laid out a town, Cadron, on about sixty-four acres at the mouth of the Cadron Creek. Although the original plat map of the town has not been found, historical evidence suggests that as many as fourteen blocks, each with six half-acre lots, surrounded …

Calamine (Sharp County)

Calamine, home to some of the earliest settlers in what is now Sharp County, was the site of the state’s first commercial zinc mining operation. The boomtown experienced periods of rapid growth in the 1850s and 1870s but today consists only of a few homes. The town is most likely named after the pink mineral calamine; however, a local tradition claims that the name originated from a female mine owner named Callie, thus “Callie mine.” Long before white settlers moved to the area, the Osage used the region for hunting. The first white settlers entered by the early 1830s, many by way of the recently completed military road connecting the area to the Black River. A small settlement began to …

Caldwell (St. Francis County)

Caldwell is a city on Crowley’s Ridge, a few miles north of Forrest City (St. Francis County). Located on the Union Pacific Railroad and on State Highway 1, Caldwell has long been an agricultural center for the region but is now predominately a bedroom community for Forrest City. Many early settlers of Arkansas gravitated to Crowley’s Ridge, especially with the improvement of the Military Road in 1830s. St. Francis County had already been established in 1827, populated with settlers who had moved west from Tennessee and Kentucky. The settlement of Caldwell did not appear on maps until after the Civil War, when railroad construction increased in Arkansas. The St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railway was incorporated in June 1874 with plans to …

Cale (Nevada County)

Cale is a town on Highway 200 near the center of Nevada County. Created as a lumber community around the beginning of the twentieth century, Cale did not incorporate until 1971. Several landowners received land patents for the location where Cale would be built just before the Civil War. They include Jessee C. Capshaw in 1857; Charles Muirehead in 1859; and John Atkins, George Daniell, and Andrew Walker, all in 1860. Although many of the men of the area fought in the Civil War, leaving their farms to be tended by wives and children, the actual conflict did not come closer than the Camden Expedition of 1864, which was turned back some miles east of the area. Cale was built …

Calhoun County

Located in south-central Arkansas, with its southernmost border about twenty-five miles from the Louisiana state line, Calhoun County has the smallest population of Arkansas’s seventy-five counties. Hampton is the only town with more than 1,000 residents. Thornton, Harrell, and Tinsman are the only other incorporated communities. The economic base is timber, sand, and gravel. The majority of the workforce is employed in manufacturing. Pre-European Exploration There are about 350 archaeological sites known in Calhoun County, testifying to the habitation of Native Americans in the region for thousands of years. Two prehistoric mounds—Boone’s Mounds and the Keller Site—believed to be from the Coles Creek culture of the Late Woodland Period, are preserved near Calion (Union County) and are on the National Register of …

Calico Rock (Izard County)

Calico Rock, located on the White River in Izard County, developed as a steamboat landing originally known as Calico Landing. Keelboats had worked the upper White River as early as 1820, followed by paddle wheelers carrying merchandise and passengers from as far away as New Orleans, Louisiana. It became a boomtown in 1902, when construction began on the railroad as tracks were laid along the north bank, beneath the bluffs. The settlement was the headquarters for railroad construction crews. In 1902, the St. Louis and Iron Mountain Railway opened rail service there. Calico Rock was the largest town in Izard County through the 1960s. European Exploration and Settlement through Early Statehood While the region’s early history is obscure, it was …

Calico Rock Historic District

The Calico Rock Historic District covers the first block of Calico Rock (Izard County) up from the White River plus the Riverview Hotel behind Main Street. These buildings, erected from 1903 to 1924, represent early twentieth-century architectural styles. The district is typical of downtown districts that emerged along railroad lines, though Calico Rock stands out for having been built on a hillside. The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on November 19, 1985. In 1901, Calico Rock was a steamboat landing with few businesses. That year, the Iron Mountain Railway began laying tracks for the White River Line along the north river bank from Batesville (Independence County) to Cotter (Baxter County). Freight and passenger service to Calico Rock …

Calion (Union County)

Calion is a second-class city in the northern part of Union County, on Highway 167 and on the south bank of the Ouachita River. The city is known principally as a timber industry center, although increasing emphasis is being placed on tourism opportunities associated with Lake Calion. The African-American neighborhood of Jelly Roll in Calion was the subject of an anthropological study published in 1986. Native American artifacts of the prehistoric era—including Koroa and prehistoric Caddo—have been discovered across the river from Calion in southern Calhoun County. Some historians have attempted to demonstrate that Hernando de Soto’s expedition wintered in that region, since it is known that the expedition did travel along the Ouachita River. In the nineteenth century, the …

Camden (Ouachita County)

Camden is the county seat of Ouachita County and is located in south-central Arkansas on the Gulf Coastal Plain, about fifty miles north of Louisiana. Since it began life as Ecore a Fabre, a French trading post, its history has been closely tied to the Ouachita River. At the head of practical navigation, Camden was the “Queen City” of the Ouachita during the steamboat era. In 1864, it became the unintended focus of a major Civil War effort called the Red River Campaign, resulting in several significant battles. With the development of railroads, Camden was able to exploit its rich timberlands and remain an important transportation hub. Camden has also been important in both industry and education. Politically, Camden has …

Camden Army Air Field

aka: Harrell Field

Camden Army Air Field (a.k.a. Harrell Field) was one of three contract primary flying schools located in Arkansas during World War II. The other two were at Grider Field in Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) and Thompson-Robbins Field in West Helena (Phillips County). The Arkansas communities where the schools were located gained much-needed jobs not only for the construction phase but also from operation of the schools. The need for these contract flying schools arose because Kelly Field in Texas could only graduate 500 pilots a year, and most of the current Army Air Force (AAF) pilots did not have enough flying hours to be instructors. AAF’s commanding general, Henry Arnold, devised a plan for contract primary flying schools located in …

Camden Expedition Sites National Historic Landmark

The Camden Expedition Sites National Historic Landmark (NHL) consists of nine battlefields, fortifications, and buildings that collectively embody a significant moment in American history. They were designated as NHLs on April 19, 1994—the first time an entire military campaign was so recognized. Following an expensive purchase of property to forestall private development of a portion of the Second Manassas battlefield in Virginia, U.S. Senator Dale Bumpers led an effort through which Congress created the Civil War Sites Advisory Commission in 1990 with a goal of identifying and assessing the conditions of 384 battlefields around the country. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program (AHPP) conducted the fieldwork in Arkansas, examining a total of seventeen battlefields, including five that were associated with the …

Cammack Village (Pulaski County)

The enclave of Cammack Village is a legally incorporated community surrounded entirely by the city of Little Rock (Pulaski County). Created as a site for federally subsidized housing in 1943, it has developed into an exclusive neighborhood renowned for a low crime rate and high property values. The land on which Cammack Village is located was owned by Wiley Dan Cammack, who had allowed it to be used for a Works Progress Administration roads project in the 1930s. In the 1940s, Cammack attempted to have the area annexed by Little Rock, the western edge of which abutted his land, but the city demurred. Cammack therefore turned the land over to a federally subsidized housing project designed to alleviate housing shortages …

Camp (Fulton County)

The unincorporated community of Camp, settled in the early 1800s, was home to some of Fulton County’s earliest settlers. Located near present-day State Highway 9, the somewhat isolated community became a typical rural gathering place for trade and commerce. Settlers were attracted to the area by available land and a plentiful water source provided by Camp Creek and several springs, which were said to never go dry. North Carolina brothers Joe and Nathan Benton, who arrived there in the early 1800s, were the first white settlers. Though more settlers moved to the area, a town did not begin to develop until the 1870s. In 1877, the man who was responsible for the development of the area’s commercial interests arrived. Within …

Camp Aldersgate

Camp Aldersgate in Little Rock (Pulaski County) is Arkansas’s only non-profit organization dedicated to serving children with disabilities, youths, and senior citizens in a camp environment. One of a few urban camps in the nation, Camp Aldersgate is situated on 120 wooded acres in the state’s largest city, Little Rock. Dedicated in the summer of 1947, the camp had as its original purpose to serve as a place for interracial fellowship, meetings, and Christian training. Seeing a need for social change and racial harmony, a group of women of the Little Rock Methodist Council requested a grant of $25,000 from the Women’s Division of the General Board of Global Ministries of the Methodist Church in 1946. The grant was used …

Camp Hot Springs

To alleviate overcrowding of German and Italian prisoners of war (POWs) in Great Britain and the rest of Europe, the United States assisted its Allies by transporting around 425,000 POWs to the United States. Approximately 500 POW camps were located across America, and Arkansas accepted its first POWs in 1943. Eventually, the state took in about 23,000 German and Italian prisoners, mainly from Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s Afrika Korps. In 1945, the U.S. Army designated a portion of Lake Catherine State Park as a prisoner-of-war camp and identified it as Camp Hot Springs. The compound seems to have been located on what later was known as Picnic Hill. It was one of thirty-three branch camps, or side camps, from the …

Camp Jesse Turner

Camp Jesse Turner, located on Pickett Hill on the east side of Van Buren (Crawford County), was a small, specialized railroad training camp for soldiers to learn to operate railroads captured in enemy territory, worldwide, during World War II. It was briefly named Camp Walter Johnson, but on September 24, 1943, the press reported a name change to honor Jesse Turner, a justice on the Arkansas Supreme Court from the area. The soldiers assigned to four Railroad Operating Battalions (ROBs)—the 759th, 748th, 733rd, and 734th—were trained in the Missouri Pacific Railroad yards and roundhouse in Van Buren. Their weapons of war were locomotives, cars, tracks, bridges, telephone and telegraph lines, and repair shops. In 1941, the federal government allocated funds …

Camp Joseph T. Robinson

aka: Camp Pike
aka: Camp Robinson

Camp Robinson in North Little Rock (Pulaski County) is home to the Arkansas National Guard and is the principal training area for the Arkansas Army National Guard. It is also used by a number of other military and civilian agencies. The forerunner to Camp Robinson was known as Camp Pike, named in honor of General Zebulon Montgomery Pike. The camp was awarded to the central Arkansas area due to the efforts of the Little Rock Board of Commerce. The board offered, at no cost to the U.S. government, the purchase and lease of the lands needed to establish the post. Little Rock (Pulaski County) was awarded the camp on June 11, 1917, and the money needed to fulfill the promises …

Camp Joyzelle

Camp Joyzelle was a summer camp for girls that operated for nearly three decades at Monte Ne (Benton County). Summer camps emerged in the late 1800s as a way to provide urban youngsters with wholesome, outdoor activities during the long summer vacation. Summer camping for girls became popular after World War I. Some camps were run by organizations such as the Girl Scouts, while others were similar to private schools and served mostly well-to-do families. Camp Joyzelle was a typical example of the latter. The camp was founded by Iris Armstrong, who at the time had a private dramatic academy in Little Rock (Pulaski County). Armstrong’s goal was to start a camp at which girls could be instructed in drama …

Camp Lee

Camp Lee was a small military instruction camp near Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) used by the Confederate States of America. Two camps in Arkansas reportedly shared the name, the other being near Lewisville (Lafayette County). The camp in Pine Bluff was established near Lee Springs Road, about three quarters of a mile west of Camp White Sulphur Springs, in August 1861. At first, Camp Lee was used to muster several Arkansan units. The camp was used in August to house the Ninth Arkansas Infantry Regiment (CS). The camp was established because Pine Bluff and the surrounding facilities could not house several regimental-sized units. Shortly after establishment, the Ninth Arkansas Infantry was brought to Pine Bluff; records show that the regiment’s …

Camp Magnolia

Camp Magnolia, also known as Civilian Public Service Camp No. 7, was the only World War II–era work camp in Arkansas established for religious conscientious objectors (COs). There, COs engaged in much the same work as the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and took part in government-controlled medical experiments. The Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 contained a provision that allowed those who objected to military service on grounds of religious or personal beliefs to render public service for the nation in alternative settings. This provision had been the result of intense lobbying by historic peace churches, such as the Society of Friends (Quakers), the Mennonites, and the Church of the Brethren. When conscription for the anticipated war began on …

Camp Monticello

Camp Monticello was a World War II prisoner-of-war (POW) camp south of Monticello (Drew County). The camp was built in the southeastern part of the state because that area offered the required rural, isolated location. Advocacy by local civic leaders like Congressman William F. Norrell and the need for labor in the agricultural and timber industries also influenced the site choice. The camp, which housed Italian POWs, was one of four main camps and thirty branch camps in Arkansas that interned Axis prisoners. The 1929 Geneva Convention regulated many of the conditions within POW camps. POWs were to be treated the same as the troops of the retaining power. Therefore, Camp Monticello was built to the standards of American military …

Camp Nelson Confederate Cemetery

Camp Nelson Confederate Cemetery, located approximately four miles southeast of Cabot (Lonoke County), is the site of a mass grave with as many as 1,500 soldiers who died of various diseases. It is one of a small number of all-Confederate cemeteries in Arkansas. In 1862, thousands of Confederate soldiers from Texas and Arkansas began to gather near the settlement of Austin (Lonoke County), about thirty miles northeast of Little Rock (Pulaski County). Perhaps as many as 20,000 soldiers camped in the area named Camp Hope. Life in camp was routine, with the exception of a mutiny in the summer of 1862 by a number of soldiers whose enlistment had expired. After the initial group deserted—disgruntled about the lack of pay—nine …

Camp Ouachita National Historic District

Camp Ouachita was the hearthstone for outdoor- and social-skills development and a path through adolescence for two generations of Arkansas Girl Scouts who seasonally camped there between 1937 and 1979. The Works Progress Administration (WPA), a federal New Deal agency, constructed Camp Ouachita from 1936 to 1940 for the Little Rock Area Girl Scout Council (LRGSC) in the Ouachita National Forest, twelve miles south of Perryville (Perry County) and some thirty-six miles west of Little Rock (Pulaski County). Camp Ouachita, the nation’s only surviving WPA-constructed Girl Scout camp complex, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The camp is currently undergoing renovation. Prior to Camp Ouachita, the LRGSC had only limited, seasonal use of the Boy Scouts’ Camp …

Camp White Sulphur Springs Confederate Cemetery

Camp White Sulphur Springs, located in the community of Sulphur Springs (Jefferson County) two miles southwest of present-day Pine Bluff (Jefferson County), served as a staging and training facility for the Confederate army during the early parts of the Civil War. Later in the war, the camp and surrounding area functioned as a Confederate military hospital following a smallpox outbreak. In the early stages of the war, Camp White Sulphur Springs served as a recruiting and staging area for volunteers who came from Pine Bluff and the surrounding towns to organize and assign troops to various units. Early in the war, the Ninth Arkansas Volunteer Infantry Regiment and Fagan’s Guard, which later became B Company of the Second Arkansas Infantry …

Campbell (Searcy County)

The historic community of Campbell in Campbell Township is located near County Road 68 (Gum Tree Lane) a short distance from where it intersects with Highway 66 about two miles north of Oxley (Searcy County) and about six miles east-northeast of Leslie (Searcy County). Campbell is located approximately eleven miles east-southeast of Marshall (Searcy County), the county seat. Campbell lies in a fertile valley of the foothills of the Boston Mountains. The caves and bluffs were utilized by Native Americans dating back to the Late Archaic Period. A Native American site, Cooper’s Bluff, northwest of Campbell near what is today Snowball (Searcy County), was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 4, 1982. The Cooper’s Bluff Site …

Campbell Cemetery

The Campbell Cemetery is located in Randolph County on the north side of the Spring River near Imboden (Lawrence County). It is the only surviving historic resource that is associated with Lawrence County’s first county judge, James Campbell. While it is not known exactly when the cemetery was established, it is believed to have existed by around 1835. Lawrence County, the second of five counties created out of land that would become the Arkansas Territory in 1819, was established in 1815. At the time, the area was part of the Missouri Territory. While the offices of clerk, sheriff, and coroner were created in 1819, the office of county judge was not created until 1829. By that time, the county government …

Campbell Station (Jackson County)

Campbell Station—originally known only as Campbell—is a city in Jackson County located along the Union Pacific Railroad tracks and U.S. Highway 367. It is adjacent to the city of Diaz (Jackson County) and is between Newport (Jackson County) and Tuckerman (Jackson County). Campbell Station claims a portion of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Highway 67. The earliest settlements in Jackson County, such as Jacksonport (Jackson County) and Newport, were stops along the transportation corridor of the White River between the Mississippi River and Batesville (Independence County). The rest of the county was dominated by hardwood forests and farmland. Jacksonport was significant as a crossroads, as well as a common White River stop, as the Southwest Trail connecting southeastern Missouri to northwestern Texas …

Cane Creek State Park

Cane Creek State Park in southeast Arkansas occupies an environmentally significant setting on the border of two of the state’s geographic regions, the flat Mississippi Alluvial Plain (the Delta) and the rolling West Gulf Coastal Plain. Located on the shore of Cane Creek Lake, the park provides for recreational activities that include camping, picnicking, fishing, kayaking, hiking, and wildlife watching. The park, a joint project of state and federal agencies, grew out of a 1973 proposal by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission (AGFC) to develop a lake and park near Star City (Lincoln County) to enhance recreational opportunities in southeast Arkansas, although legislation authorizing the creation of the park had passed two years earlier. The state parks department entered …

Cane Hill (Washington County)

Cane Hill, settled by Europeans in 1827, was the earliest settlement in Washington County. It was known as an educational center because the first college in Arkansas to admit women was in Cane Hill. In addition, it had the state’s first public school, library, and Sunday school. Several of the oldest houses in northwest Arkansas still stand in Cane Hill. It was also the site of an all-day skirmish in the days before the Battle of Prairie Grove (December 7, 1862). Most of the early settlers came from the Crystal Hill–Little Rock area (Pulaski County), attracted by the rich soil, plentiful freshwater springs, and the canebrakes in the temperate mountain climate. In addition, many Cherokee had recently been removed from …