Scrapbook...

For those of you who enjoy looking through photo albums and scrapbooks, you are invited to visit Newton County, Arkansas Scrapbook® The scrapbook went online February 21, 2000 and contains over six hundred photographs and documents. Many more items will be added as time allows. You will find pictures of families, individuals, and landmarks. As well as scanned images of various documents and paper work. To view, click here:

The following picture appears in the scrapbook, it was submitted by

Dale Ramsey
Thank you Dale!

The three sons of LaSalle Ramsey and Leona Bean, 1917

Lester holding Clarence, Audie is standing

To share photographs and to have them appear in Newcoa Newsletter, send via email to: Newcoa

Calendar...

The following events take place each year in Newton County

Spring Dogwood Tour
3rd Weekend in April
$5 per person
Sponsored by:
Buffalo Ranger District,
Beautification Comm.,
Jasper School, and
U. S. Forest Service
Bus Tour Reservations:
Forest Service
807-446-5122
OR
County Extension
870-446-2240

Town Square Music
Every Saturday,
May thru June
Jasper Town Square

Elk Festival
Last Weekend in June
2 day event
Hosted by:
Jasper Chamber
of Commerce,
Rocky Mountain
Elk Foundation, and
Arkansas Game &
Fish Commission
For additional info:
870-446-2693

4th of July
at Deer School Grounds
Hosted by:
Deer's Volunteer Fire
Department
Deer is located two
miles off Scenic 7
on Highway 16
For additional info:
870-428-5906

County Fair & Rodeo
Last Week in August
County Fair Grounds
in Jasper
For additional info:
870-434-5376
OR
870-446-2270

Ponca Days
2nd Weekend September
Sponsored by:
Ponca Fire Dept.
Parade, flea market,
and craft booths
For additional info:
870-861-5578

Forest Fest
4th Weekend September
at Ponca
BBQ, music, & raffle

Heritage Days
1st Weekend in October
at Jasper
Parade, games, mule
show, Civil War
Re-enactments

Foliage Tour
3rd Weekend in October
Bus Tour Reservations:
Forest Service
807-446-5122
OR
County Extension
870-446-2240

Library Dinner
Coincides w/foliage
tour in October
Includes dinner,
auction, and tour
of Beckham Cave
For Reservations:
870-446-2258
OR
870-446-2983

Trail of Lights
In December
Jasper Town Square

Christmas Festival
1st Weekend in December
Jasper Town Square
Parade, music, tree
lighting, nativity
For additional info:
870-446-5080
OR
870-446-2258

Park Service Events
Held throughout the year
National Park Services
870-446-5122

Camping...

Camp Sites:

Lost Valley

Erbie

Kyles Landing

Mt. Hersey

Carver

Steele Creek

Rush

Tyler Bend

Woolum

Buffalo Point

For additional info:
Buffalo National River
PO Box 1173
Harrison, AR. 72602
Park Headquarters
870-741-5443
Pruitt
870-446-5373
Tyler Bend
870-439-2502
Buffalo Point
870-449-4311
Hearing Impaired
TDD 870-741-2884

Hiking...

Great Trails:

Buffalo River Trail
approx. 37 miles

Lost Valley Trail
approx. 2.1 miles

Ozark/Pruitt Trail
approx. 2 miles

Mill Creek Trail
approx. 1.3 miles

River Trail
approx. 1.2 miles

Tyler Bend Trail
approx. 6.5 miles

Buffalo Point Trail
approx. 6 miles

Overlook Trail
approx. 0.7 miles

Indian Rockhouse
approx. 3.5 miles

Forest Trail
approx. 0.7 miles

Campground Trail
approx. 1.4 miles

Morning Star Loop
approx. 0.3 miles

Cecil Cove Loop
approx. 7.4 miles

Rush Hiking Trail
approx. 2.2 miles

Farmer Trail
approx. 1.3 miles

Parker/Hickman
approx. 0.4 miles

Old Erbie Trail
approx. 1.8 miles

Alum Cove Trail
approx. 1.1 miles

Hemmed In Hollow
approx. 18.3 miles

Pedestal Rock Loop
approx. 2.5 miles

King's Bluff Loop
approx. 2.0 miles

Judy Tate
3129 Carlock
Wichita, Kansas 67204

Hello Everybody...This is Colleen Haynes Rongey. I now live in New Orleans, but my heart still lives in Newton County.

The Hotel at Lurton Remembered

Now 2001...It stands alone there at Lurton and someone knocked it's porch posts down this year so is sort of collapsed...but the only sign of life right where the hustle and bustle of Lurton once blared out the old Bob Wills tunes 'Milk Cow Blues' and 'Take me Back to Tulsa' on the jukebox next door at the Smith Garage...Your toes started tapping when you rounded the curve at Lurton as the gathering began in there of a Saturday night...Men hid their jug down in the big dug well and it was honor system that you drank only out of your own...as the night wore on and music got louder, the voices still louder...the constable or deputy (Ted Tatro's father was a deputy) had to keep order with his presence and his billy club...so Lurton had the reputation of being a wild town. We did not think it wild, just a fun place.

I replied back: Hello Ted & Letha...Another miracle in my life... A picture from our childhood...In front of the Lurton Hotel on one of your trips back home.

A great thing to happen in the life of a 70 year old...To see yourself at age 15...

Look at the jeans, rolled up just like in the movies up at the schoolhouse. This must have been the year Ted came home to visit his cousins and I seem to remember some of the adults with a camera came out in the road and made pictures of all of us there that day. Seems Helen Heffley may have been there, and maybe Kenneth or Stanley. Ted, do you remember the year? I think either 1942 or 1943?

I went to California myself in summer of 1944 but never did see any of the Arkansas people except those that lived in the boarding house of Anna Mae and Eldrich Davis...Daddy lived there and I never got any farther as I went to work and met some new friends, danced with a few sailors, slept on a cot in a corner of Anna Mae and Eldrich's bedroom and worked at the Pabco aluminum box company, tied up my hair and told them I was 18...they didn’t look very close as it was war time...

I spent two months that summer there and rode the back of Berry Heffleys truck home in September to go back to Deer and finish high school...I was barely 16 when I finished.

Never did get back to Oakland, but did spend the next summer in Los Angeles with Arkansas friends...got homesick for the mountain...came home and worked for IC in his office a few months...went to Ft Smith to work...met Paul Rongey...(a country boy recently home from the Navy in the South Pacific in WW2)...we married in 1949... now celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary...Been fun but sooo fast in passing...We are blessed with four sons and now, seven Grandsons and one granddaughter...So...Thank you, Ted for finding this old picture and Letha, you for sending it to me. We were cute then, weren't we Ted? Wonder who took the picture and how you got one of the pictures and I didn't. Did you have your own camera by any chance?

You know we lost Bobby Sutton in 1999, my sister Pat in 1998... losing our little childhood friends one by one to one thing or another...this is another reason I cherish this old picture.

Thanks to this new email gadget... we are connecting again with some of our early friends from fifty years ago. Lloyd Sutton has had a big hand in getting all of us back together again to share some of these Lurton memories...He is related to almost everyone on the mountain, in one way or another...being half Smith and half Sutton took care of that. Harry Sutton is another of our treasures we need to visit with more, and Arvil (Pete) Bristow another, also Labrisha and the rest of your Smith cousins that are left here.. Helen and Doyne Heffley...

You know, Nora Bristow is still living and I write to her sometimes. She has a sharp memory and is the oldest one we have left that remembers my mother Iva and your mother, Josie the way she does...She says they were her best friends. Lillie Hefley Vanderpool remembers more about the Hotel and your mother than you can imagine. You need to call her sometime and just visit. She has told me stories about the days she helped your mother and Christine cook and clean for the boarders and has some great hotel stories. We need to have Lloyd there on a three way call and record that. I'll bet he could do that, too.
Let me hear from you two again...How was your trip? You say, which one? I say, any one... Again, thanks so much. Colleen.

Lloyd Sutton transcribed the below from a tape made by Ted Tatro

Growing up in the hotel at Lurton was quite an experience. One of the most interesting things was all the many people that was always around. One of the most memorable experiences was a man coming through the country with a dummy that could talk. It’s name was midnight. And yes, it was black. There was always traveling shows, churches and movies traveling through the country. All of the shows or entertainment took place at the school house. We usually got to go to the various shows because mom and dad traded a nights stay at the hotel for passes to the shows. That night was especially great. I had never seen a ventriloquist or heard of them before. I never even seen a black person, especially a black dummy that could talk. He spent the night with us. The next morning, the most memorable thing I can remember about this was, I woke up and something or someone was laying next to me, and to my horror or surprise the little black dummy was laying next to me. I really flipped. Imagine, I could not remember ever seeing a black person, especially a back dummy that could talk. That dummy was real to me. It seemed to talk, move it’s head, body, it’s mouth opened…it was real.

One time there was several men staying with us. These workers for the geological surveys service. This was the men that went around the country surveying the entire USA. These men told some stories that is just unbelievable…the most outrageous stories you ever heard. They came in, in the evening one time, from work and they saw me and a bunch of kids around and they told us that these round leather circles that they had…we could take those down to the store and we could buy anything we wanted to. So I took as many as they would give me. They offered the other kids some and they said no, they didn’t want any of those. I took mine and went down to the store, they didn’t want to be made fools of, but I being very young, I took these and believed these guys. I went to the store and I said, 'how much candy can I get for these'? Mr. Thompson said, 'anything you want'. 'I want everything I can get', I said. I came back with a sack full of candy. When all of the other kids saw what I had, they said, 'We want some of those too.' But, the guys said, 'no way, you should have took them when you were offered.' 'This is a one time offer.' So, I was the one that made out and wasn’t the fool. I learned later that the men made arrangements with Mr. Thompson to cash in the leather disks for what ever I wanted.

One of the big things that made an impression on my life from the stand point of time and history…In 1936 or ’37, I don’t remember which, was that the CCC camp came in to Lurton. There was one on each side of Lurton. The men in charge of the camps were officers in the U.S. army. These men’s wives wanted to be with their husbands and there was no place on the base for them to live. So, they stayed with us at the hotel. I remember meeting the officers and their wives and they were interesting and very nice people. The officers were academy graduates in civil engineering. One of the real advantage was that they had movies at the base and I would go with the wives to the movies on the base.

The men from the CC camp would come in to town on Saturdays to spend what little money they had. And my uncle that lived next door had a garage and he sold beer and they had dances there. Uncle Mitchell and aunt Lucy had a big hall that they had dances in and the boys from the base, the CC camp, would come and Uncle Mitchell would have someone go out into the country side and bring in the young girls to dance with the…he would have someone to drive his flat bed truck to the outlying areas, bring in the girls from far and near to dance with the boys from the CC camp. One thing we had plenty good music. ‘Ole A. Hefley and Ox head would play their fiddles and someone would sing, there would be plenty dancing, plenty beer… and fights.

And my dad, being the constable in Lurton, he was in charge of the law enforcement. One night there was a disturbance or fight at the garage. You can’t mix girls, beer and dancing without somebody getting upset. My dad was called and he got his Billy club and then he got his gun and it accidentally discharged. The bullet went through the floor and the ceiling in the lower part…we had an apartment in the basement. Uncle Ace and aunt Nancy lived down there at that time. the bullet went right between uncle Ace and Aunt Nancy, and hit the floor. I imagine everybody was quite shook up. Anyway the disturb ance got taken care of and everything went back to order. The boys from the CC camp was a quite impressive part of Lurton during these times.

There was other people that lived in the apartment underneath the hotel. I can’t remember the last name of the People, but they had two boys. One of the boys was named Billy and one was Jack. These boys was always hunting. They had a trap line and they killed as many Rattle snakes as they could. They would clean them out and they would tan them and they ate the meat. I ate some of the meat one time and it tasted to me, like chicken.

There was many other people that lived in the apartment down stairs, I can remember Juanita and George Bickner lived there. And I think there was several others, but I can’t remember. Note from Colleen... Thelma Awbrey Gregoire lived in their downstairs apartment at one time with her parents and I spent the night with her when we were about twelve.

My folks had to hire some of the work…their help. My mom always had a hard time with the rest of the family doing as much as they could…their share. But, anyway sometimes we had to hire extra people. I know that one time mom hired Gladys Ricketts to help. And, she was going to school with Enos at Deer. Every morning she was so very hard to wake up. There was a wood stove in the kitchen, a wood box next to it. one morning after mom had heated the stove, she removed one of the stove caps and sat it next to the stove on the wood pile. Sometime later, Gladys came in, half asleep and sat down on the hot stove cap. She was more awake after that than when she sat down. continued in Newcoa Newsletter, July 2001

Please Visit:
Colleen's Place
Colleen's Frame & Art - New Orleans

Memories of Newton County

"Poor people had poor ways, but it worked..."

"After we finished the washing we would always scrub the floor with lye soap and the ashes from the fire. We would sprinkle the ashes on the floor then mop and scrub the ashes up and it would make a really clean floor."

"Many times the table would be filled three times before everyone got to eat, but our food never ran out. We always had plenty of beans, potatoes, corn bread, and milk."

"...and let me tell you, there was nothing in life that compared to the taste of those fried potatoes, fish and squirrel on the river bank. Talk about a cookout, now we had one..."

"...Riley loved George Jones songs and could sing everyone of George's songs and sound just like him. People still think he sounds like him."

"We had plenty of food and plenty of love for each other. We looked after each other and today we are still a close family."

The above are but a few of the recollections of how things were done and of times 'back when' for the Tom and Pallie Harris family of Murray and Hog Head Creek in Newton County. Enjoy reading this great story, filled with many PRECIOUS MEMORIES.

People Read Newcoa Newsletter

This April 2001 issue marks the 1st year anniversary for Newcoa!

Currently there are 2,907 individuals, 5 historical and genealogical societies, and 3 public schools who have requested and who receive notification when a new issue goes online.

An article submitted by Phyllis Tuttle, "Memories of Newton County by Susie Champlin" appeared in the July 2000 Issue of Newcoa Newsletter. Phyllis was contacted by the Newton County Historical Society, asking for permission to print the story in their quarterly.

The article appeared in the Society's fourth quarter of 2000 issue. And all of you had the opportunity to read it here first, for free!

Mary Lea Burlison, editor of the Casey Family Association wrote:

Judy, THANKS! AGAIN,
On behalf of myself and the CFA for all the good exposure you have provided us! I'm getting all kinds of e-mail research queries as a result.

It is evident that people do read Newcoa Newsletter...and emails let us know that they enjoy! It is also evident that some folks look forward to, or know when to expect issues of Newcoa, as I have received several emails asking why the April issue wasn't yet available. I have been behind in getting this issue online...am a strong believer in the fact, or theory, that all things happen for a reason. If this issue would have been posted on the scheduled date, I would not have had the opportunity to make the following, timely statement:

Due to the many, many prayers and determined efforts of hundreds of individuals, volunteers, and participants from several agencies, a missing child was found and returned safe and sound to the arms of her family.

Six year old Haley Zega was reported missing Sunday, April 29th after apparently straying from family, who were in Newton County hiking on Cave Mountain, in the Buffalo Widerness Area near Boxley. Two nights and part of a day later, two Mt. Sherman men found her.

Thank you God for her safe return. The search for Haley was one of the largest, if not the largest search and rescue operations ever held in the state of Arkansas. To all of those involved, thank you!

Hello! My name is Kelly Bialk, and I invite you to join my website, Kelly's Kin.

This website is dedicated to the memory of my Great Grandparents, William Henry Gregory and Pearl Chaffin, and William Thomas Garner, and Sarah Elizabeth Bolin. They were all from Newton County. My website contains my GEDCOM, descendant reports, photos, and biographies on the following Newton County surnames: Bolin, Chaffin, Garner, Gregory, Hale, Henderson, Jones, Nichols, and Smith.

This is my Great Grandparents, William Thomas Garner and Sarah Elizabeth Bolin.

Will and Sarah Garner migrated to Michigan during World War II so they could work in the factories.

My Grandmother (their daughter), Lois, and her husband, Eldon Gregory and their family also came to Michigan (where I was born, and currently reside). Although they spent their remaining years living in Michigan, they never forgot their beloved Hasty, Arkansas and all their loved ones down there. Summers were frequently spent on visits to Arkansas and I often got to go along in the late 60’s and early 70’s.

William Henry Gregory and Pearl Chaffin on their farm in Hasty, Arkansas. L to R: Opal, Fern, Wilma, Estelle, Hugh and Eldon. Pearl has Benjamin Franklin (Frank)between her knees, and Will has Devoe between his!

My most recent visit to Newton County was in the summer of 1999, when I returned with my mother to do genealogy research and visit with kin. We had a wonderful time, and my mother loved reconnecting with her roots. We enjoyed visiting with Betty Kay Doan, Buster Waters, Devoe and Wanda Gregory and their daughter, Patty Bell, and Joe and Lois Garner and many others. I spent many hours visiting the Newton County Courthouse, cemeteries, and my favorite spot, the old Chaffin place. I can’t wait to return when my kids are a little older so that they can appreciate the beauty and quaintness of Newton County.

I also maintain a website on MyFamily.com dedicated to Newton County Genealogy Researchers. If you are interested in being added to this website, please contact me, Kelly Bialk. Special thanks to Judy, for sharing her love of genealogy with us….keep up the good work!