Photos of the Day - Starting with S

When former U.S. congressman Thomas McRae was elected governor in 1920, one aspect of the Civil War came to an end in Arkansas, as he was the last former Confederate to hold the office of governor. For a brief period near the end of the war, the young McRae served as a courier for the Confederacy. McRae served two terms as governor and is credited by historians as having moderate success in the reorganization of funding in both education and the state’s highway system.

The World’s Championship Duck Calling Contest determines the World Champion Duck Caller each Thanksgiving in Stuttgart (Arkansas County). Seventeen contestants participated in the first contest in 1936. Shown here is a young participant calling the ducks in the 1946 competition. Among the many levels of the competition today is the Junior World Championship.

About the time this 1958 photo of downtown Perryville (Perry County) was taken, the city had just won third place in the state’s Community Accomplishment Contest, having achieved significant improvement in industrial development, better business, improved living, and better planning. Each of these areas was a part of the four-pronged initiative laid out in the contest guidelines. One year later, the town of almost 700 citizens was designated first in the state.

In 1929, the 365-seat Lyric Theater opened for business in downtown Harrison (Boone County). The theater remained in operation for approximately forty-eight years before closing in 1977. For the next two decades, the building remained empty and began a slow process of deterioration. In 1999, the rundown theater was purchased by the Ozark Arts Council for $150,000. After much renovation, the theater began hosting plays, concerts, and screenings of movie classics.

The Museum of Discovery, founded in 1927 as the Museum of Natural History and Antiquities, is the oldest museum in Little Rock (Pulaski County). The museum, first housed in a downtown storefront, was founded by local author Bernie Babcock in response to the commonly held belief outside the state that Arkansas had no cultural centers. The museum was later moved to City Hall then MacArthur Park, where it remained until 1997. In 1998, the museum reopened in the Terminal Warehouse Building, located in the River Market District of downtown Little Rock. In December 2010, the museum closed for renovations. Reopened in January 2012 as a Donald W. Reynolds Science Center, its focus is on earth, physical, and life sciences.

Advertisements have been a major part of newspapers since their origin. By the early 1800s, large portions of the front page of America’s newspapers consisted of advertisements, only being moved to the later pages by the middle of the century. In the days before the abolition of slavery, many of these ads in Southern papers offered rewards for runaway slaves or offered slaves for sale. Shown in this 1851 issue of the Arkansas State Gazette and Democrat is an ad offering a reward for two runaway slaves.

Shown here is the larva of one of the most spectacular of the 132 resident butterflies found in Arkansas, the Diana fritillary. Arkansas, with Act 156 of 2007, designated this butterfly as its Official State Butterfly, the only state to do so. It has been sighted in twenty-four of the state’s seventy-five counties.

In 1928, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission built a fish hatchery on the south edge of the town of Lonoke (Lonoke County). At the time, the hatchery was the largest in the world. Today, the Joe Hogan Fish Hatchery contains a total of fifty-six ponds. The hatchery, the largest owned by the state, has also been credited with having helped spark the local baitfish industry.

In 1835, on his journey to Texas, former Tennessee congressman and famous frontiersman Davy Crockett made a stop at Little Rock (Pulaski County). Wined and dined by the locals, Crockett delivered a speech at a banquet in his honor in which he referred to Arkansas men as the “real half-horse, half-alligator breed as grown nowhere else.” After leaving Little Rock, he passed through Washington (Hempstead County), where he once again was honored. Crockett is shown here in this somewhat stylized engraving produced in the late 1830s.

In the early 1980s, architect Ed Cromwell, with a group of other investors, began the work of restoring the Capital Hotel in Little Rock (Pulaski County) to its former glory. After considerable work, the doors opened once again just before Christmas of 1983. Another restoration project closed the hotel for two years, but it opened for business again in November 2007. The building, which is shown here in 2008, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.

Mississippi County native Robert “Say” McIntosh became one of the most outspoken community activists in Little Rock (Pulaski County) by the 1980s. A restaurant owner known for his sweet potato pies, McIntosh has been especially involved in programs for underprivileged youth, with his gift program garnering him the nickname the “Black Santa.” In recent years, McIntosh has been a leader in the Stop the Violence campaign in the capital city, and in early 2007, a city resource center was named in his honor.

Lloyd “Arkansas Slim” Andrews, a native of Benton County, appeared in many Western films of the 1940s and 1950s as a comic sidekick to such major stars as Tex Ritter and Gene Autry. In 1950, as the popularity of the B-Western declined, Andrews accepted a role on a children’s television program in California; he performed in the show for the next thirty-four years. He returned to Arkansas in 1970 and died in Gravette (Benton County) in 1992.

The first national lumberman’s association, the International Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo, was formed in Gurdon (Clark County) in 1882 by six stranded men returning home from the Southern Lumber Manufacturing convention in nearby Camden (Ouachita County). The name “Hoo-Hoo” originally came from founding member Bolling Johnson, who was describing a strange tuft of hair growing on the head of a nearly bald friend. Many odd names such as “Snark of the Universe” and “Jabberwock” are associated with the order. The twenty-first-century order has approximately 3,500 members.

One of the early triumphs of Arkansas’s thirty-second governor, Homer Adkins, was the passage of the Highway Debt Re-funding Bill shortly after his election in 1940. Adkins was able to convince the federal government through its Reconstruction Finance Corporation to purchase $137 million in state bonds to re-fund the state’s highways. He is shown in this photo signing the 1941 bill.

The Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, more commonly known as the Shriners, is a fraternal organization that has been referred to as a “playground for Masons.” Arkansas has two chapters of the Shriners: Sahara Temple in Pine Bluff (Jefferson County), founded in 1889; and Scimitar Temple in Little Rock (Pulaski County), founded in 1904. In 1925, the Scimitar Shrine purchased about 400 acres south of Little Rock, near East End, fencing 300 acres and Pine Lake. With rock taken from Pinnacle Mountain, they built a new country club featuring an eighteen-hole golf course. The Shrine Country Club, pictured here, served as one of Little Rock’s favorite entertainment destinations through 1937.

The explorer Henri de Tonti first came to Arkansas as a member of the expedition of René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle in 1682. Four years later, he founded the first permanent European settlement in the lower Mississippi River Valley, Arkansas Post, thus earning the moniker “Father of Arkansas.” De Tonti left Arkansas in 1687 but returned on several occasions in the 1690s. In the early 1700s, he was chosen to negotiate a peace between the Choctaw and Chickasaw.

Before the legislature approved the state flag designed by Willie K. Hocker in 1913, the layout of the blue stars was slightly modified, and the word “Arkansas” was added. In 1923, a fourth blue star, representing the state’s membership in the Confederacy, was added, and the blue stars on the white field were rearranged to the layout seen here. In 1924, the stars were once again rearranged to the modern design.

In 1932, Joseph Hull, an accomplished vocational agriculture teacher, became president of what is today Arkansas Tech University in Russellville (Pope County). Hull took over at a time when the state legislature was considering closing the school due to declining enrollment. During his thirty-five-year tenure, the school increased from seventeen major buildings to forty-six, and enrollment increased from 447 to 2,466.

Dexter Harding moved near Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) in the early 1850s to occupy a land grant that he received for his service in the War of 1812. Harding built a three-room house for his family, as well as the town’s first saw mill. He soon became a prominent businessman of the area. In the early 1970s, his home, the oldest in the town, was moved and restored. It opened in 1985 as the Dexter Harding Tourist Information Center.

In 1928, Walter J. Lemke was hired to direct the news bureau of the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County). That same year, he established the university’s Department of Journalism, serving as its head until his retirement in 1959. Lemke was also a noted author, publishing many works on local history, and he also helped found the Washington County Historical Society. He died in 1968. In 1988, the UA journalism department was named the Walter J. Lemke Department of Journalism.

Elijah Pitts was a football player who grew up in Mayflower (Faulkner County), played at Philander Smith College, and played for the Green Bay Packers in the first Super Bowl. He was one of the early black stars of the National Football League (NFL) from the segregated South and had a long career as a player and a professional coach. He died in 1998.

Approximately ten years after Jefferson County was formed in 1829, the local government financed the construction of a substantial brick courthouse. Much of the 1863 Action at Pine Bluff was fought near the structure. In 1908, when the Arkansas River left its banks in a major flood, many of the offices were purposely torn off the building and thrown into the river to prevent its complete collapse. After the waters subsided, the river was channeled away from the building, removing the danger. Unfortunately, the building, as shown in this early 1900s photograph, was destroyed by fire in 1976.

Conway County journalist Gene Wirges is noted for his crusade against the influence over Arkansas politics exerted in the early 1960s by Governor Orval Faubus and his political ally county sheriff Marlin Hawkins. As editor and owner of the Morrilton Democrat, as well as other local papers, Wirges led a campaign for better government and honest elections. His actions resulted in lawsuits, criminal prosecution, physical altercations, and–allegedly–a contract on his life. He retired in 1988 but continued his journalistic efforts until his death in 2014.

Pope County native Lawrence Brooks Hays was one of the most influential congressmen in the post–World War II years. Beginning in 1942, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives eight times. The turning point in his career came during the Central High School desegregation crisis in Little Rock (Pulaski County), when he attempted to mediate between federal and state officials. Due to these efforts, he was defeated in 1958 in a questionable write-in campaign by segregationist Dale Alford.

The cultivation of cotton in the mid-twentieth century was a labor-intensive operation requiring a large number of workers. Many children, both black and white, were sent to the fields at an early age to “chop” the cotton. Children such as the Marked Tree (Poinsett County) trio shown here would start at the end of a row and use a hoe to chop the cotton, removing the weeds from the cotton rows. The back-breaking work required long hours and many cotton choppers to finish a field.

Four libraries built in Arkansas between 1906 and 1915 using grants from philanthropist Andrew Carnegie carry the classification “Carnegie Libraries.” The library in Morrilton (Conway County), known as the Conway County Library, received a grant of $10,000 on September 29, 1915, with construction being completed in October 1916. At the time of the library’s opening, it had the distinction of being located in the smallest town in America to have a Carnegie library. The building is still in use as a library in the twenty-first century.

This mid-1900s aerial view of the Pea Ridge (Benton County) battlefield shows the field much as it looked at the time the battle was fought in early March 1862. One of the largest and most important battles fought west of the Mississippi River, it ended in a Confederate defeat. At war’s end, the land was returned to cultivation until the early 1960s, when the area was designated as the Pea Ridge National Military Park.

Hallelujah (1929), one of the first major studio motion pictures to feature an all-black cast, was filmed primarily in eastern Arkansas. The film was the first attempt by popular director King Vidor to produce a talking movie, using an early form of sound dubbing. For his efforts, he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Director. Shown here is a postage stamp issued in 2008 depicting a poster from the movie. The stamp was one of five issued in a set honoring classic black cinema.

The Titan II Missile program was a Cold War weapons system featuring fifty-four launch complexes located in three states and capable of delivering a nine-megaton nuclear warhead 5,500 miles away. Construction began in 1961 on the first of eighteen complexes located in five Arkansas counties (Faulkner, Conway, White, Van Buren, and Cleburne). Two of the most noteworthy disasters that occurred in the program took place in Arkansas. The first happened on August 9, 1965, when fifty-three civilian workers perished in an accidental fire while they were modifying Launch Complex 373-4. The second occurred on September 19, 1980, when an explosion destroyed the missile at Launch Complex 374-7 near Southside in Van Buren County.

The presentation of a silver service to the crew of a newly commissioned ship is a time-honored tradition in the U.S. Navy. On April 23, 1919, Daisy Dalony presented the service shown here to the crew of the USS Arkansas on behalf of the people of Arkansas and Governor Charles Brough. It was loaned from the navy to the State of Arkansas and housed at the Governor’s Mansion in Little Rock (Pulaski County).

Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) native John Smith (Jimmie) Thach was one of the most influential naval aviators of the mid-twentieth century and is credited with the creation of the Thach Weave, one of the most significant tactical advances in the history of aerial combat. He was awarded the Navy Cross and Distinguished Service Medal for developing this tactical maneuver, which remains a standard of military aviation.

Artist James Fortenbury executed this painting of the so-called Battle of Palarm, a skirmish of the Reconstruction-era conflict known as the Brooks-Baxter War. In May 1874, a force of forty Brooks supporters was dispatched on board the boat Hallie to intercept a flatboat of weapons headed down the Arkansas River and intended for Baxter forces. When the captain of the Baxter boat refused to stop, the Brooks forces opened fire, killing several and damaging the boat so that it drifted aimlessly in the water. The captured vessel was towed to Little Rock (Pulaski County) and moored behind the state capitol.

In 1941, attorney Ham Moses became president of Arkansas Power and Light after the death of company founder Harvey Couch. In the mid-1940s, Moses and others sought to improve the state’s image by promoting economic development and stopping the trend of many of the state’s most productive citizens leaving Arkansas for better opportunities elsewhere.

On October 3, 1963, President John F. Kennedy mounted the speaker’s stand overlooking the recently completed Greers Ferry Dam near Heber Springs (Cleburne County) to dedicate the dam officially. Kennedy complimented the Arkansas congressional delegation in attendance and spoke of the prosperity that the dam and lake would bring to the area. Here, Kennedy is shown greeting Congressman Wilbur Mills.

Before the rediscovery of the ivory-billed woodpecker, the red-cockaded woodpecker was the rarest of Arkansas’s nesting woodpeckers. Designated an endangered species in 1970, its numbers have dwindled to less than 400 birds in the state. Normally measuring between seven to eight inches in length, it is clearly distinguished from other woodpeckers by a white cheek patch. The red “cockades” on the male are usually seen only when the bird is in hand.

On September 25, 2007, the fiftieth anniversary observation of the desegregation of Little Rock Central High School was held on the front steps of the now famous school. Among the many speakers was former president Bill Clinton. Clinton is shown here at the speaker’s platform with the Little Rock Nine, Senator Hillary Clinton, Governor Mike Beebe, and others.

In 1920, Floyd Brown, a Tuskegee Institute graduate, established Fargo Agricultural School near Brinkley (Monroe County). A private residential school for African-American students, the school offered “training for the head, hands and heart” and a high school education for hundreds of black students for almost thirty years. Students and friends are shown here gathered in front of the first building. Today, a small museum preserving the school’s history is located at the former site of the school.

Much of the low-lying Arkansas land along the Mississippi River remained flooded and unsuitable for farming until early twentieth-century drainage projects opened up the land. This early 1900s drainage survey crew is camped in Mississippi County, where some of the last swamp lands were reclaimed for use by farmers.

The Army-Navy Hospital in Hot Springs (Garland County) was the first combined general hospital for the U.S. Army and Navy in the United States. The hospital officially opened in 1887. The seven-story, fireproof, brick-and-steel facility shown here was built in the 1930s, replacing the original 1880s structure. The building was constructed at a cost of approximately $1.5 million and was later used as a rehabilitation center.

In November 1817, the first American troops arrived at Belle Point and began building the first structures that would become Fort Smith (Sebastian County). The principal purpose of the fort was to keep the peace between the Osage and Cherokee tribes that had entered the area. The army abandoned the fort in 1824 but by 1836, it had returned and begun building the second Fort Smith military post, which is depicted in this 1836 drawing.

In 1993, the once-popular theme park, Dogpatch USA, located near Jasper (Newton County), was closed to the public. The amusement park was based on characters and locations in Al Capp’s popular “Li’l Abner” comic strip. The town of Marble Falls (Newton County) between Jasper and Harrison (Boone County) had changed its name officially to Dogpatch to help promote the park. The name was changed back in 1997.

In 1891, the fourth building to house the Fulton County government was erected in the town of Salem. The two-story brick building, which still houses the county offices, was remodeled in 1974, greatly altering the nineteenth-century appearance of the building. This photo shows the building in 2008.

The Scottish Tartans World Register recognizes two tartans with Arkansas connections, the Natural State Tartan and the Arkansas Traveler Tartan. Shown here is the Natural State Tartan as presented to Governor Mike Huckabee for the state’s first Tartan Day on April 6, 1999. The colors are representative of different aspects of the state. The green represents nature, red recognizes the original settlers, white represents diamonds, and black represents oil. The tartan, woven in Scotland, is of pure silk.

Farrar C. Newberry, a native of Clark County, was a noted author of local history and played a leading role in the placement of historic markers throughout his home county. He served in the state House of Representatives (1915–1916), where he introduced legislation that became known as the Newberry Act, passage of which banned the manufacture and sale of alcohol in the state almost three years before national prohibition. Active in many civic organizations, Newberry also served as president of the Arkansas Historical Association.

Construction began in 1947 on Bull Shoals Dam, located on the White River about ten miles west of Mountain Home (Baxter County), where the river divides Baxter and Marion counties. On July 2, 1952, when the massive project was near completion, President Harry S. Truman delivered a speech during the project’s dedication.

In 1900, as a result of a malaria outbreak in Jonesboro (Craighead County), the Benedictine sisters at Holy Angels Convent founded what is today known as St. Bernards Medical Center. Money for the hospital came from several sources, including a form of medical insurance called “hospital tickets.” A person would be guaranteed admission to the hospital for one year upon purchasing a ticket, such as the one shown here, for the sum of nine dollars. From these humble beginnings, the hospital has become a major part of medical care in northeast Arkansas.

In 1968, Jefferson County native Eldridge Cleaver, the minister of information for the Black Panther Party, appeared on the ballot of some twenty states for the office of the president of the United States. As the candidate of the Peace and Freedom Party, the young black militant received approximately 36,000 votes nationwide. Shown here is a campaign button from his unsuccessful bid.

The tent city, located in City Park in Little Rock (Pulaski County) during the 1911 national United Confederate Veterans Reunion, was home to many of the 12,000 veterans who attended the reunion. The camp was named in honor of Colonel Robert Shaver of Mena (Polk County), commander of the Seventh Arkansas Infantry. In an attempt to make it easier for the aging soldiers to locate friends, the military style camp was organized by state, division, and corps. All of the amenities necessary for the comfort of the former soldiers were available for the duration of the reunion.

Jacob Barkman moved to the area near present-day Arkadelphia (Clark County) around 1811 and later built a substantial brick home near the Southwest Trail. Because there were no restaurants or hotels in the modern sense, frontier settlers who lived along the trail often provided travelers room, a meal, and livestock feed for a fee. He was visited by early traveler George Featherstonhaugh, who reported that Barkman’s wife “chewed tobacco, she smoked a pipe, she drank whiskey, and cursed and swore as heartily as any backwoodsman, all at the same time.”

After the Civil War, Union veteran Logan Holt Roots settled in Arkansas, engaging in planting and trading from a plantation he acquired near DeValls Bluff (Prairie County). He was actively involved in politics as a Republican and campaigned for the state constitution of 1868. In 1868, he was elected to the U.S. Congress for the First Congressional District. After leaving Congress in 1871, he served as president of the First National Bank of Little Rock (Pulaski County) until his death in 1893.