The violent tornado of April 27, 2014, demolished much of Vilonia, including many buildings along U.S. 64, also known as Main Street. Visitors to Vilonia, and even some of its residents, found it hard to recall just what building stood on just what spot.
Thanks to the efforts of two local artists, memories of Main Street have come to life on canvas.
Jan Crummer and Carol Wharton Stroud have re-created many of Vilonia’s buildings in a collection of 25 paintings they call A Walk Down Main Street, and More. They have donated the collection to the city, and the paintings will hang in City Hall for all to see.
The public is invited to view the exhibit and meet the artists at a reception from 2-4 p.m. Sunday at Vilonia City Hall.
Stroud met Crummer, who received her art training through the California State College System, and her husband, Marvin Crummer, who is also an artist from California, through a mutual friend. Stroud has always had an interest in art, and with the Crummers’ help, she began to paint and draw in earnest in 2014.
Marvin Crummer said he was the chief financial officer for the Vilonia project, providing canvases and other materials and helping with research. He also framed the paintings.
Stroud, the daughter of the late Raymond and Luciel Frazier Wharton, graduated from Vilonia High School in 1967. Stroud said she can remember many of the town’s buildings, even those that existed and were torn down before the tornado came to town.
The Crummers moved to Arkansas in 1983, and they, too, have memories of the town.
“After the tornado hit and we began the cleanup, Carol and I began talking about the old buildings and how we missed them,” Jan Crummer said. “We each made a list of the buildings we missed, consolidated the lists and began to re-create the buildings, partly through memory and partly through the help of different people around town.”
They began the project in August 2014.
“Carol is the best researcher ever. She grew up here and is not afraid to call people and ask them for help,” Crummer said.
“Even though I have lived here for a long time, when people hear me talk, they know I am not from here,” Crummer said with a laugh. “Many think I ‘talk funny.’”
Stroud went to the local school and found old yearbooks, which often featured photos of businesses in their advertisements printed in the back of the yearbooks. She also found people with old photographs who were willing to share them with the artists.
“We even found a map on Google Earth from 2009 that showed Main Street,” Crummer said.
So the two artists took these bits and pieces and re-created the buildings “as best we could,” Crummer said.
One of the first paintings they did was of the old T.V. Hill gas station that was built in 1930 and torn down in 2003. Through their research, the artists learned that T.V. Hill was the first mayor of Vilonia.
Another service station that has played a role in Vilonia’s history is Kieth’s Service Center, which is being rebuilt on the same spot on Main Street where it stood when it was hit by the 2014 tornado. The artists re-created an older version of the service station, as well as the one that was destroyed by the tornado, placing owner Kieth McCord in the first version.
“We gave that painting to Kieth,” Crummer said.
Visitors at City Hall will be able to see paintings of the Vilonia United Methodist Church — both old and new buildings; an old cotton gin; the dairy bar once known as Eagles Drive-In; the Vilonia School District’s old home-economics building that was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps; Sue Shock’s insurance agency with the clock on the street sign; DeBoard’s Store; the old shopping center before it was hit by the tornado; and more.
Crummer said she and Stroud have taken “artistic license” with the paintings by including the name of the building and the artist’s name on each one.
“You don’t normally put inscriptions on paintings,” Crummer said, explaining that a plaque noting the name of the painting and the painter normally is hung under the painting or to the side.
“We were afraid if the paintings were ever moved, the descriptions might get lost, so we put the inscriptions on the paintings,” she said.
“If both of us worked on the painting, then both of our names are on it,” Crummer said. “If just one of us did, then it just has one name on it.”
Crummer said Stroud underpainted with acrylics, and Crummer often finished the paintings with oils on top.
“After we finished painting all of them, we wondered what we should do with them,” Crummer said.
She said Stroud approached Vilonia Mayor James Firestone and asked permission to appear before the City Council and tell the council members that they wished to donate the paintings to the city.
“They liked the idea,” Crummer said.
“These paintings are not for sale,” she said. “These paintings are a way to get people together and relive happy memories.”