OPINION

OPINION | REX NELSON: Mountain of opportunity


It's time to escape Little Rock and celebrate the fact that legislators have gone home following a session that could only be described as divisive and mean. I'm spending the day atop Petit Jean Mountain, one of my favorite spots in the state. The afternoon coffee break is at Petit Jean Coffeehouse & Mercantile, which is operated by Stephanie Buckley.

Buckley is a renaissance woman if there ever were one. She grew up in Meridian, Miss., attended college at the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg (where she played soccer and majored in journalism) and met her husband Joe in 1998 when she was marketing coordinator for Baptist Memorial Health Care in Memphis. She was at a trade show in that city, and her booth was across the aisle from the one her husband was staffing to promote state parks in Arkansas.

Joe, who grew up in Caddo Parish in north Louisiana, was a ranger at Petit Jean State Park when the couple married in 2000. Stephanie did public relations work for Winrock International during the first two years of their marriage. Joe later became superintendent of Historic Washington State Park in Hempstead County. After seven years there, he went to the Ozark Folk Center in Mountain View for 18 months. The return to Petit Jean took place a decade ago.

While at Washington, Stephanie Buckley began a blog titled The Park Wife. In 2009, she began a site called Arkansas Women Bloggers. Five years later, there were 560 member blogs. She later began Texas Women Bloggers along with sites in five more states. In The Park Wife, Buckley writes about everything from gardening to porch swings. Buckley also handles content for First Security Bank's onlyinark.com website.

The coffee shop opened in February 2020, just weeks before the onset of the pandemic. She found an A-frame house along the main road to the state park and was determined to transform it into a business.

"It had been empty for a year when we bought it," Buckley says. "We saw the potential. Joe and I talk a lot about what else the mountain needs. We needed a gathering spot for those who live and work here. And, at the time, my teenager needed a job.

"This place has become almost like city hall. It's where folks share local news. I have a group of ladies in their 80s who come every week. I knew in my heart that this would work, but we had to regroup once the pandemic began. We closed a couple of weeks so we could figure out what to do. Then we added an outdoor table. Since people figured it would be safe outdoors and outside cities, traffic on Petit Jean actually increased."

Buckley says her business has been profitable since the day it opened. More than 75 percent of customers are one-time visitors. She also sells Arkansas-made products and rents out an adjoining space to overnight guests.

"We just hit the three-year mark, and I couldn't be more pleased," she tells me. "You have to bob and weave at times, but we've done that. This is the meeting spot for the mountain."

Petit Jean provided an opportunity, and Buckley took advantage of it. I drive down the road to a monument honoring those who served in the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression. It strikes me that this mountain has long been a place of opportunity for those willing to seize it.

By 1932, the U.S. unemployment rate was 23 percent. More than 13 million Americans had lost jobs since the start of the Great Depression in 1929. When Franklin Roosevelt was elected president in November 1932, he promised to go to Congress during his first 100 days in office and propose programs to pull the country out of the Great Depression.

In April 1933, a bill was introduced to establish the CCC. It put men to work in rural areas across the country. CCC camps were operated by the U.S. Department of War, U.S. Department of Agriculture and National Park Service. Hundreds of companies had formed across the country by summer. In July 1933, the men of Company V-1781 began arriving on Petit Jean. The V indicated that they were World War I veterans. Most camps consisted of men ages 17-25. Only four of the 65 CCC camps in Arkansas were veteran camps.

The men on Petit Jean were between the ages of 35 and 45. Most were married and had families back home. Many had trade skills that allowed them to begin building facilities for Petit Jean State Park. In the process, they learned additional skills that helped them once they returned home.

Camps had a military-style structure with a commanding officer, camp surgeon and other positions. Those in the camp were paid $30 per month. Since food and lodging were provided, they only kept about $5 a month. The rest was sent home to family members or kept in savings and then received as a lump-sum payment at the end of enlistments.

The threat of U.S. entry into World War II meant that the program was winding down by 1941. Company V-1781 closed June 6, 1941. The work of that company is preserved in three national historic districts atop the mountain. These districts contain more than 80 structures, trails and bridges.

According to the Arkansas Department of Parks, Heritage and Tourism: "Enrollees were well provided for, even if their wages seem ridiculous by modern standards. They were given uniforms, three meals a day, medical care, education and job training. At a time when many had nothing, CCC enrollees were fortunate to have good jobs. Many men opted to re-enlist beyond the basic six-month commitment and stayed for the two-year maximum enrollment."


Senior Editor Rex Nelson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He's also the author of the Southern Fried blog at rexnelsonsouthernfried.com.


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