Little Rock, AR

Arkansas State Capitol

After a quick layover in Atlanta, we flew into Little Rock and drove to the State Capitol to see the monuments.

Since our first stop, the back door of the State Capitol, was locked, we toured the grounds first. In the humid 95-degree weather, we drove from monument to monument instead of taking the usual walking tour. We stopped by:

• a replica of the American Revolution Bicentennial bell, one of 50 distributed to the States in 1950 after a Liberty Fund drive;
• the Justice Building;
• the Law Enforcement Officers' memorial, a shrine to men & women who have lost their lives in the line of duty (below);
• the Vietnam Veterans memorial, which bears the names of 400+ fallen Arkansans (below),
• the Medal of Honor memorial, honoring 25 Arkansans who received congressional medals for serving in conflicts from the Civil War to Vietnam;
  
• the War of 1812 memorial fountain;
• the Eternal Flame, which remembers the founders of the American Legion;
  
• the monument to Confederate Women;
  
• the monument to Confederate Soldiers; and
• "Testament," statues of the Little Rock Nine, who face the Governor's office as if in perpetual appeal to former Governor Orval Faubus where he signed the order that sent the National Guard to bar them entry and oppose federally-mandated integration. (See Little Rock Central High School below for more info.)
  

The bronze front doors of the Capitol building - purchased in 1910 from Tiffany's in New York for $10,000 - being permanently closed to public entry, we at last entered the Arkansas State Capitol (above) through the front tunnel entrance. Outside, the top of the capitol building dome is covered with gold leaf. Inside, it's brilliantly painted, while a rotunda chandelier from the Mitchell-Vance Company of New York - 18 feet high and measuring 24 feet in diameter - hangs in all its brass, copper, zinc, iron and glass glory.

In the rotunda to which the front doors would allow entry, are portraits of governors past, including one of a young Bill Clinton. In the north side of the building is the House Chamber; in the south, the Senate Chamber. Each are flanked by potraits of the current legislative bodies, as well as those back to the early 1900's.

Clinton Presidential Library
(More to come.)

Little Rock Central HS

While the high school is still in operation today, the Visitor Center across the street is accessible to visitors without appointments. The building which formerly housed the Center, an old Mobil gas station is currently being fitted for an education center. The newly fitted Visitor's Center is a font of information, telling the story of the federally-mandated & enforced integration of Central High School through exhibits & multimedia interviews with politicians, news reporters, the general citizenry of Little Rock, and, of course, the Little Rock Nine themselves.



Some background on the integration crisis...

After the 1954 Supreme Court decision that outlawed segregation in public education (Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka), the Little Rock School District planned "gradual integration that would begin at Central HS in 1957." Volunteers were recruited from Horace Mann HS, and - even though they would be attending top-ranking Central HS, which "had so many more courses, and dramatics and speech and tennis courts and a big, beautiful stadium" (Minnijean Brown, one of the Little Rock Nine) - they were warned:

"...you're not going to be able to go to football games or basketball games.. You're not going to be able to participate in the choir or drama club, or be on the track team. You can't go to the prom." (Carlotta Walls LaNier)

Their parents were threatened with job loss and harrassment. And on September 3, 1957, the first day of school for Central HS, after then-governor Orval Faubus promised to call out the Arkansas National Guard to "maintain and restore order," the Little Rock Nine were barred from the school by the Guard.

"I thought [Faubus] was there to protect me. How wrong I was." (Thelma Mothershed Wair)

The Nine had planned to meet at the school to enter together, but when Elizabeth Eckford arrived alone on another corner, she was surrounded by newspaper reporters & an angry, screaming white mob.

For more history & context, National Parks Service has a great resource page.

River Market

We headed over to the River Market, next to Riverfront Park and adjacent to the Arkansas River. Here, we were able to cross a pedestrian bridge, and discovered skateboarders and a handful of restaurants and shops that created a lovely - if deliberate - "Main Street" vibe. Another sign of gentrification: the pavillions & plazas in the park are currently all available for rent for a song!

After walking around, we were delighted to find a restaurant called Flying Fish, where could gorge ourselves on crab legs, catfish, shrimp, calamari and all the usual trimmings amidst a wall of adopted singing fish. It was truly a you-had-to-be-there moment.

Crater of Diamonds State Park

The next day, we drove 2.5 hours to Murfreesboro, home of Crater of Diamonds State Park, the ONLY public diamond mine in the world. 37.5 acres of plowed field, the Crater of Diamonds is home to rocks and minerals, such as amethyst, jasper (I know I found some!), peridot, garnet, quartz, and, of course, diamonds. Buying trowels & renting (with a deposit) screens to sift through the soil, we spent about 5 hours in the sun, by turns admiring the motivational mini-monuments where miners before us found 40-carat diamonds and the like.

The on-site restaurant, the Kimberlite Cafe, is only open during the summer season, and was manned by a handful of local teenage girls who were pretty polite. The lunch specials were well-priced, even though they clearly had a monopoly on food in the general area.

Hot Springs, AR

On the way back to Little Rock, we decided to drive through Hot Springs to try out McClard's BBQ. Little did we know that the much-lauded restaurant is actually closed on Mondays. Our consolation prize? We got back to our hotel and ordered bottles of McClard's famous BBQ sauce to be delivered to our homes. As diner legend has it, in the late 1920's, a traveler who was unable to pay $10 for his 2-month stay in the former hotel instead offered the proprietors "the world's greatest barbeque sauce" recipe.

With a menu touted by the Food Network, the Travel Channel, Travelocity, Southern Living, and Playboy, McClard's is also on the list of "1,000 Places to See Before You Die" and "1,000 Things to Eat Before You Die." So if may add my two cents, even though we missed the dining experience, their sauce is truly delish on babyback ribs.