Mountain View

Mountain View is the Folk Music Capitol of the World.  You can go down to the town square any weekend night and find musicians at the pickin' porch, and at the three gazebo's in the park, and sometimes on the courthouse lawn, playing their music.

Many of the RV parks also have their own pickin' rooms.

This night was a group of dulcimer players.

There were more of our group there to listen, than the locals.

Barb is a good clogger, or as the locals call it, mountain jigging.

The White River is much wider and slower than the Buffalo River.  It once was an important commercial waterway and still has a fair number of motorboats plying its waters.

No need to explain this picture.

John, the owner of Sylamore Creek Camp, where we were staying, always BBQs something for us while we are there.  This year is was both a smoked pork roast and beef brisket.  Yum.....

Everyone else brings a dish to share.  How much better could it be.

We had a friendly game of horseshoes going on, too.

And after dinner, a campfire.

I'm a John Grisham fan, you know, the author.  He's most famous for his books involving lawyers, trials, etc., but he has written books on other subjects as well.  I had been reading Calico Joe, a book about baseball and baseball players, and one of the characters was from the small town of Calico Rock, AR.

This is the ballfield referenced in the book.  Calico Rock is just 17 miles north of Mountain View.

Not much is going on in Calico Rock now, in fact, the current population is under 1,000.  But it wasn't always that way.  Before trains took over the transportation of goods, steam boats plied the White River from the gulf, all the way to Calico Rock.  The old part of town, now called East Calico Rock, is a ghost town, the only place in America where a living community has surrounded and preserved a ghost town.

Looking at one of the old train bridges crossing the Calico Rock Creek.

This feed and general store was one of the last of the businesses in East Calico Rock to close.  It was still operating until the flood of 1982, when the water reached up to nine feet high inside the building.

This building dates back to 1910 and has housed numerous businesses, including  Calico Rock Commercial College classes which were conducted upstairs.  It was purchased by the Widow Sanders' in the 1920s, where she lived upstairs.  Mrs. Sanders' refused to leave during the flood of 1944 and was eventually rescued by boat from the 2nd floor.

The jail was used from the 1920s until the 1950s.  The front wall wasn't always there and the prisoners could look through the bars to the passersby on the street.

You can still read the sign, painted on the wall, which warned passersby not to talk to the prisoners.

Before Norfolk Dam was constructed in 1944, Calico Creek flooded every spring, and on a bad year, the Walnut Street bridge washed away.  This remnant of the one lane bridge was rebuilt to safety standards and opened in 2000.

This planing mill and flooring factory operated from 1903 until the 1960s and was one of the towns most successful operations.

There are still stacks of lumber strewn around inside.

And parts of the building still have the machinery.

This was once the site of the Calico Rock Electric Power and Ice Company, operating from 1931 to 1948.

Peppersauce was the local name for home brew.

Back in the 1890s, this street was lined with shanty's, all selling 'peppersauce' to the thieves and troublemakers and occasional visitors who arrived at the White River steamboat landing.

Built in 1925, it replaced the Shaver Hotel which was destroyed in the fire of 1923.  It now operates as a Bed and Breakfast.

Named for the calico colored bluffs on which the town was built.  The bridge downstream, which crosses the White River, was built in 1965.  Prior to 1965, people crossed the river by ferry.

Just a snake on the side of the road.  He didn't seem happy that he had to wait for us to drive by.