North Little Rock's most famous landmark shows up ever so briefly at the start of the blockbuster 1939 movie Gone With the Wind." Blink and you might miss its six-second appearance near the end of the opening credits.
This popular attraction is the Old Mill, open again to the public along Lakeshore Drive in T.R. Pugh Memorial Park, after a seven-week closure in the ongoing efforts to stem covid-19. Signs at the entrance urge social distancing and other precautions to avoid spreading the virus.
Visitors may bring an altered perspective to touring the mill if they're aware of the cameo role played by Gone With the Wind in the ongoing nationwide protests over police killings of black Americans.
The Clark Gable/Vivien Leigh epic was temporarily removed from the HBO Max streaming service on June 10, mainly over its benign depiction of slavery in the Old South. The film was to be restored to HBO Max with commentary added by a scholar of African-American history for context about the cruelties of slavery.
As for the Old Mill, it was crafted in 1933 by noted Mexican sculptor Dionicio Rodriguez at the behest of Justin Matthews, a developer of North Little Rock's Park Hill and Lakewood neighborhoods.
Built as the centerpiece of Rodriguez's art in the sylvan park, the mill "is not that old, and was never actually a mill," as noted by the website Atlas Obscura (atlasobscura.com). "Yet the misnomer is far from the most deceptive thing about this strange place.
"More deceptive would be the large gnarled bridges; the rustic water wheel, railings and floor planks; the scattered branches and logs; and even the mill's rope and pulley. Because although they appear to be made out of petrified wood and stone, they are all in fact sculpted concrete."
Atlas Obscura explains that "Rodriguez's constructions were fashioned by covering bound rods, wire or other fragments in layers of concrete. Then the concrete was hand-sculpted in detail to best imitate the supposed nature of the object."
Rodriguez "was extremely hush-hush about his process, and was even said to mix the materials covertly in the trunk of his car so others would not be able to learn the secrets of his craft."
When the Old Mill was dedicated on Aug. 6, 1933, Rodriguez spoke briefly through an interpreter. He told the audience that this work was "his greatest commission ever in the United States. He said he used only the finest grade of cement and the best structural steel and copper, so the creations would 'live in the sight of any who may live or visit in this community for centuries.'"
A week later, according to the Central Arkansas Library System Encyclopedia of Arkansas, developer Matthews took out an advertisement in the Arkansas Gazette to laud the mill's rustic charm. The ad asserted that Rip Van Winkle "would feel at home in Pugh's Mill Park" as it was "quietly weathering the years in the hollow of a secluded little valley."
It is unclear why Gone With the Wind producer David O. Selznick included the Old Mill in the movie's melange of opening-credits images. It is believed to be the only structure still standing of all those depicted 81 years ago in the film. And it endures as a North Little Rock treasure, even with the artifice built into its creation.
The gates to T.R. Pugh Memorial Park are open free of charge 10 a.m.-6 p.m daily. The credits for Gone With the Wind, including the glimpse of the Old Mill, can be viewed with a search on youtube.com.