Entries - Time Period: Divergent Prosperity and the Arc of Reform (1968-2022) - Starting with T

Entrepreneur Richard Thalheimer is the founder and former CEO of the Sharper Image Corporation. The company, which Thalheimer launched in 1979, became iconic for its unique high-tech consumer items that were often called “toys for adults.” At the height of the company’s success, Thalheimer employed 4,000 people and led Sharper Image to annual revenues of $750 million through mail-order catalogs, online sales, and almost 200 retail stores nationwide. Richard Jay Thalheimer was born on July 19, 1948, in Little Rock (Pulaski County) to Alan Thalheimer and Gladys Miriam Thalheimer. His family had founded Little Rock’s Blass Department Store, which traced its roots to 1871 under Gus Blass and, at one point, became the largest such store in Arkansas. As a …

In Thurairajah v. City of Fort Smith, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit found that police lacked probable cause to arrest Eric Roshaun Thurairajah for disorderly conduct after he drove by a traffic stop and yelled, “F**k you!” to an officer on the side of the road, because the shout constituted protected political speech. Thurairajah was one of a line of cases in federal and state appellate courts in Arkansas and elsewhere in which the judiciary used a minor incident, such as uttering offensive words or brushing the American flag during a protest, to hold that an arrest merely for offensive conduct violated a person’s First Amendment rights. In 2015, Arkansas State Trooper Lagarian Cross was performing …

Arkansas is home to a number of trails commemorating different aspects of the state’s history and culture. In 2019, the Arkansas General Assembly established the True Grit Trail, highlighting events and places in western Arkansas that were part of the storyline in the 1968 Charles Portis novel True Grit. In 1968, a serial written by El Dorado (Union County) native Charles Portis was published in the Saturday Evening Post. The series told the story of a young girl named Mattie Ross who, in the late 1800s, attempted to bring her father’s murderer to justice. From her home in Dardanelle (Yell County), she traveled to Fort Smith (Sebastian County), where she received the assistance of U.S. marshal Rooster Cogburn. The serial …

Turner v. Arkansas, 784 F. Supp. 585 (E.D. Ark. 1991), a 1991 decision by the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the Eastern District of Arkansas, was the culmination of a battle over the drawing of congressional districts within the state, one that reflected the growing challenges states faced in the reapportionment process required after each decennial census. The dispute stemmed from challenges to the redistricting effort that had been undertaken by the Arkansas General Assembly in Act 1220 of 1991. The plaintiffs Jessie Turner, Christine Brownlee, Jack Foster, Alan Smith, and Freddie Lyon argued that the plan violated the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution as well as the federal Voting Rights Act—and most importantly ran afoul …

The Tuskegee Airmen was a 1995 movie dramatization of the wartime actions of the Tuskegee Airmen, a group of African American military pilots and air support crew who fought in World War II. They were the first Black flying squadron, as well as the first such squadron to deploy overseas. While the film had a brief theatrical release, it was originally made for HBO and was intended for cable television. Location shooting for the movie took place at Fort Chaffee, right outside of Fort Smith (Sebastian County). In addition, the Fort Smith Frisco Railroad Station was also utilized in filming. The barracks at Fort Chaffee had been used previously in the 1988 wartime film Biloxi Blues. Arkansas actress Natalie Canerday …