OPINION

REX NELSON: Two-lane travel — what’s become of Highway 71?

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette travel illustration.
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette travel illustration.

My speaking engagement is at Drake Field on U.S. 71 in Fayetteville, and it brings back memories--lots of them.

For years, Drake Field was the place travelers landed if they flew commercially into northwest Arkansas. The airport was known for the thick fog that could form on a moment's notice and for small commuter airlines such as Skyways, which passengers would sardonically refer to as "Scareways." Many of the athletic teams coming north from Texas to play at the University of Arkansas in the Southwest Conference days would make sure their flights landed on the longer runway at Fort Smith. Those teams would then bus north on U.S. 71.

When President Richard M. Nixon decided to attend the Razorbacks' December 1969 football game against the University of Texas--a contest dubbed both the Big Shootout and the Game of the Century--Air Force One landed at Fort Smith rather than Fayetteville. Gov. Winthrop Rockefeller and almost 2,000 Arkansans were there on the cold rainy day to greet Nixon on his first visit to the state since becoming president. Members of both the Arkansas and Texas congressional delegations (including a future president, George H.W. Bush, then a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Texas) accompanied Nixon from Washington on Air Force One. After brief remarks, Nixon boarded the helicopter dubbed Marine One for the flight to Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville.

Realizing that Drake Field's short runway was hindering growth, northwest Arkansas business leaders such as Sam Walton began pushing in the 1980s for a new airport. In 1990, a nonprofit organization known as the Northwest Arkansas Council was formed with the goal of attracting an expanded airport and an interstate highway for the region. A grant was awarded by the Federal Aviation Administration in 1994 to purchase land for an airport at Highfill in Benton County. Ground was broken in August 1995, and President Bill Clinton dedicated Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport on Nov. 6, 1998, as a crowd of about 8,000 people looked on.

Meanwhile, there was Highway 71, which Reader's Digest once called "one of the most dangerous highways in America." The stretch from Alma to Fayetteville was especially perilous with large signs proclaiming how many people had died in traffic accidents along the route. Congress approved construction of an alternate route in 1987, and that road was completed in 1999 at a cost of almost $460 million. It became Interstate 540 and is now Interstate 49. The highlight of that drive is the state's only highway tunnel, named for the Springdale man who was the northwest Arkansas representative on the Arkansas Highway Commission at the time of construction, Bobby Hopper. The Bobby Hopper Tunnel is just north of the line that divides Crawford and Washington counties. The tunnel was completed in 1998 at a cost of $37.1 million.

Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport and what's now Interstate 49 became the shiny new things for travelers in the late 1990s. Arkansans forgot about Drake Field, though it still serves general aviation traffic. They also forgot about that Fayetteville-to-Alma stretch of Highway 71, though it still serves several Washington County and Crawford County communities.

Just as speaking at Drake Field brings back memories, I figure that staying on Highway 71 south to Alma will do the same. Arkansans of a certain age like to compare stories of their worst trips along that highway. Mine came following a Razorback basketball game late one winter night when a thick fog atop Mount Gayler made it almost impossible to see. Those of us in the car were scared to continue, but we also were scared to pull to the side of the road for fear of being hit from behind. Our saving grace was when we came upon a large Tyson Foods truck with its emergency flashers on. We followed those blinking yellow lights (had the truck gone off the side of the mountain, we would have followed) until the fog cleared a few miles north of Alma.

This thankfully is a sunny day. I turn left out of the Drake Field parking lot and head south on the highway. The irony of this trip is the fact that there are signs proclaiming Highway 71 to be a scenic byway even though Interstate 49 is by far the prettier route. Two decades after it was opened, the interstate remains a beautiful stretch of mountain road that's remarkably free of billboards and clutter. Highway 71, on the other hand, features abandoned buildings, rusting cars in fields, faded signs and the other detritus of a more prosperous time. Still, the drive proves interesting if for no other reason than the fact that it has been so long since I've taken this route.

I drive through Greenland, whose population grew from 127 in the 1960 census to 1,259 in 2010. I pass the Greenland schools and a restaurant named Pirate's Cove in honor of the high school mascot. A community first known as Frog Pond was being called Greenland Station by the early 1900s. The name Greenland may have come from the fact that the fruit industry was strong at the time. Farmers grew apples, strawberries, pears, blackberries and raspberries.

"There were two grocery stores in Greenland, Jacob Yoes' store and Marion Bruce Crider's store," Steven Teske writes for the Encyclopedia of Arkansas History & Culture. "According to local lore, when a Republican president was in the White House, Yoes was appointed postmaster and ran the post office from his store. When a Democrat was elected, Crider was appointed postmaster and ran the post office from his store."

I cross the west fork of the White River and soon find find myself in the town of West Fork, which also has taken advantage of the northwest Arkansas population boom. West Fork grew from 350 residents in the 1960 census to 2,317 in 2010. The first post office opened in 1848 four miles south of here and was relocated to the current location in 1878. In 1933, Civilian Conservation Corps workers began building a gravel road from West Fork to what's now Devil's Den State Park, where the CCC constructed a stone dam on Lee Creek along with cabins, a restaurant and offices. The park soon became a popular attraction.

It's evident that this once was a busy road due to the abandoned service stations and the old tourist courts such as the Dixie Courts at West Fork, which were built with native stone. Just to the south in the community of Brentwood, the Brentwood Cafe also was constructed of stone.

At Winslow, the road sign reads: "Crooked and steep next 17 miles."

Because it's farther from Fayetteville, Winslow hasn't had the growth seen at Greenland and West Fork. Its population went from 183 in 1960 to 391 in 2010. Proclaimed as the highest railroad pass between the Rockies and the Appalachian Mountains, Winslow at one time was a popular resort. The Encyclopedia of Arkansas notes that in the late 1960s the area "attracted an influx of people looking to find a simpler life by growing their own food and raising their children away from the complications of the big cities." We called those people hippies.

Grandma's Cafe on Highway 71 still draws a crowd. I cross into Crawford County where the Sky-Vue Lodge hangs on two decades after most of the traffic left this road. There are 15 cabins for rent here near the top of Mount Gayler. I stop at Ozark Folkways, where traditional crafts are taught. Two siblings from Iowa were taking their mother to Hot Springs for treatments decades ago when they spent the night at Mount Gayler. They fell in love with the area and bought land here. They began holding Catholic services in a converted gas station and later gave land and money for a shrine known as Our Lady of the Ozarks. In the 1940s, one of the siblings, Clara Muxen, founded the Craft School of the Ozarks and opened a gift shop. She died in 1966 before finishing the rock building that was meant to house the craft school. The structure was acquired in the 1970s by the Ozark Native Craft Association, and construction was completed.

Just to the south, the memories flood back at the site of the Mount Gayler observation tower and gift shop, where my parents often would stop when I was a child. The tower is now fenced off and covered with "no trespassing" signs, as is the building that housed the gift shop. Across the highway, there's a "for sale" sign on what was the Burns Gables Restaurant & Gift Shop. A massive stone building was constructed by the Burns family in 1937. It burned in 1952 and was replaced by a smaller stone structure. Burns Gables proclaimed itself "the home of good Southern vittles" and was known across the state for its fried chicken dinners and huckleberry pies. Residents from Fayetteville to the north and Fort Smith to the south made regular trips to eat there.

One business that has managed to hang on is Artist Point, which was opened in 1954 by Bill and Helen Folks. I buy various jams and jellies from the gift shop and admire the view from the back deck. A small collection of native American artifacts that the owners still bill as a "museum" doesn't appear to have changed much since I was a boy five decades ago.

I survey the damage caused by the April 13 tornado at Mountainburg and am delighted to see that children still play on the two big dinosaur replicas in the city park. I remember those dinosaurs from when this was the main route to northwest Arkansas. Mountainburg was a stop on the Butterfield Overland Express, which was established through the area in 1858.

"By that year, the community already had a gristmill, a sawmill, a store and a hotel," Teske writes. "It also had a primitive one-room school. Most families lived in log cabins. A Masonic lodge was built in Mountainburg in 1874. In 1876, a post office was opened."

The town hasn't grown much through the years. It had 405 residents in the 1950 census and 631 in the most recent census.

The road begins to flatten out a bit from Mountainburg to Alma. I pass the site at Alma where cult leader Tony Alamo operated a restaurant. I stopped at that restaurant several times when this was the main road. Alamo's followers would deliver religious tracts along with my food.

It's yet another memory of days gone by, the days when Highway 71 from Alma to Fayetteville was how Arkansans reached Fayetteville, Springdale, Rogers, Bentonville and points to the north in Missouri. At least there wasn't fog on this spring day.

Editorial on 06/03/2018

Upcoming Events