The following are varous histories that have been written about Greene County Arkansas. Some come from published manuscripts while others are original writings and were donated to the Greene County Arkansas History & Genealogy Project.
Beliew Community
See: History of Beliew Community
Breckenridge Township
See: History of Breckenridge Township
Coffman Community
See: History of Coffman Community
Delaplaine
There is evidence that a large Indian settlement was once located near the site of Delaplaine. An Indian mound and a great pile of chipped flint still remain.
The oldest records in the Greene County court house contain numerous references to the town of De la Plaine. For convenience, the name has come to be written as one word.
The main line of the Iron Mountain Railroad passed through Delaplaine before Gainesville secured a railroad. When the county safe was purchased in 1877, it was shipped from St. Louis to Delaplaine, then hauled to Gainesville. Charlie Stedman says that the roads were so bad that the safe had to be pulled on a sled. Three streams had to be crossed during the journey. County court records show that James R. Jackson was paid $200 for hauling the safe from Delaplaine to Gainesville.
Delaplaine is one of the three incorporated towns in Greene County, the other two being Paragould and Marmaduke. The community surrounding Delaplaine produces the major portion of rice grown in Greene County.
Gainesville
See: History of Gainesville Arkansas
Hopewell
Sometimes in the 1880’s a one room schoolhouse was built on the southwest corner of the John Cooper farm about 4 1/2 miles west of the Dixie railroad crossing. Therefore it was called Cooper school.
It was built on rough sawed lumber boxed and stripped and set on wooden blocks and was about 30 – feet long and 24 feet wide. For several years Cooper school district had only three months school during the winter of each year and the teacher received only $100 for the three month school term.
In 1902 the old house was torn down and a nice one room schoolhouse was built in it’s place. It was weathered boarded on the outside and ceiled inside and set on natural rock found on Crowley’s Ridge. In 1931 this building was burned. Another school was built and set on concrete foundation. It was used for school purposes until Cooper School was consolidated with Marmaduke School.
Lafe
Some of the people who settled in the Ramer’s Chapel community from 1850 to 1865 were W. T. Staires, Henry Starnes, William Fisk, D. L. Baxter, G. W. Ramer, Jeff Ramer, John Eastep, Moses Eastep, Murph Seagroves, Tom Dortch, and the Beaton family. Other settlers in the vicinity were Hezekiah Wright, Bill Hill, Dan Frock, and the Nolan, Lauchstaedt, and Wagner families.
Herman Toelkin came in 1886 to the section later known as Upper Lafe. He advertised in the newspaper Germania for other German Lutherans to come to the community, and was successful in inducing many families to come. They founded a Lutheran church at Upper Lafe and later united with the Lutheran church at Lafe.
The town of Lafe was originally named for a sawmill owner. The postmaster secured the name of Loulyma for the post office. This caused confusion, since freight was billed to Newberry. A group of citizens circulated a petition and obtained the name of Lafe for the town, in honor of a local merchant, Lafe Miller.
This little town has a reputation of producing substantial, law-abiding citizens. Young people who come to Paragould from Lafe are highly regarded.
Loulyma
In 1886, Mr. Herman Toelken, a German immigrant, came south from his home in New Haven, Franklin County, Missouri, seeking a new life for his family. He got off the train at Gainesville with an axe and with 35 cents in his pocket.
In an effort to establish himself, he began cutting railroad ties and selling them to the railroad company. As soon as he had saved enough money he paid the railroad company $40.00 for forty acres of hill land about 1 1/2 miles east of the present town of Lafe. He built a little log shack and sent for his family in New Haven. His wife, the former Lina Ommen, and their children, came on the train to Gainesville, bringing with them a dresser, a chifferobe, a bedstead and some chairs. After having paid for having the family and furniture hauled to the cabin, he again found himself with only seventy-five cents. Again, by cutting and selling railroad ties, he saved enough money to buy a yoke of oxen for hauling the ties. Then, seeing the abundance of land in the area, he began advertising in a Minneapolis newspaper, the “Germania”, for other German Lutherans to come and settle in the community. In fact, several had already arrived prior to the end of 1886.
In the meantime, more settlers had arrived and settled down closer to the railroad. A large sawmill, located in the area, was operated by Mr. W. C. Newberry, and as more houses and stores sprung up, the settlement became commonly referred to as “Newberry”. On December 9, 1889, Mr. Carl Gilg submitted an application to the United States Postal Service for establishment of a Post Office at Newberry, Arkansas. He described Newberry as a “flag station” on the St. Louis Iron Mountain Railroad. Records indicate that the name “Newberry” was considered by the Postal Department, but not accepted. Mr. Gilg was asked to submit another name for consideration. In selecting the name, Mr. Gilg decided to combine portions of the names of each of his three daughters, Louise, Lilly, and Mary, with the name subsequently becoming Loulyma (pronounced LU – LA – MAH). The application listed the number of inhabitants as twelve. It was accepted, and the official name of the little town became Loulyma.
Loulyma would never have survived without the railroad; but it was also the railroad which caused it to disappear from the map.
Marmaduke
During the Civil War, General Marmaduke established a camp on the present location of the town that bears his name. He and his men had crossed the St. Francis River at Chalk Bluff in Clay County and came on into Greene County to stay in camp for two or three months. They used the camp for headquarters and sent out scouting parties to watch a group of guerilla soldiers under Quantrell in Clay County. About five miles east of Rector, there is a little grove with about thirty graves holding the remains of Quantrell’s soldiers.
Godspeed’s history gave a description of the town in 1889:
“Marmaduke, a town of about 200 inhabitants on the Cotton Belt Railroad, twelve miles northeast of Paragould, contains four stores, a blacksmith shop, cotton gin and press, church, school house, a sawmill and boarding house. From here a tramway is run a mile out on the St. Francis River, where other mills are located. The village was first laid out in 1882 by the Railroad Company.”
Marmaduke was a prosperous sawmill town as long as the timber lasted. Fire destroyed a number of business houses and the town was hard hit by the depression, but has recovered to some extent. Marmaduke has its own water system, has electricity and telephone service, has a good school system and three churches—Methodist, Baptist, and Church of Christ. At present, the town has about eight hundred inhabitants.
See: History of Marmaduke
Meadows Grove
On the south side of State Road 141, about halfway between Hooker and Beech Grove, lies a small cemetery by the name of Meadow’s Grove probably unknown to most Greene Countians. Mr David Meadows, his wife Barbra, and some of their children moved to the area from Moline, Illinois, in the mid 1850’s, purchased 43 1/2 acres of land, and built their home.
Dave and Barbra Meadows had five sons: Bartholomew, Henderson, Nathaniel, Hamilton and Buchanan. Buchanan died in 1858 as a infant, and was buried just north of the home. Within the next tewnty-eight years, Mr. and Mrs. Meadows and the other four sons had died, three of the sons dying in their 20’s, one at age 34. Exact dates of birth and death are given in Meadows Grove Cemetery listing.
Nathaniel Meadows and his wife both died at eaarly ages, leaving a small son , David H., who was taken to live wwith the A.G. Breckenridge family. Later he married and continued to farm land in the same general area. He and his wife, Amanda were parents of six children: Fannie, Winnie, Clara, Ella, Elgin, and Cecil. Fannie was married to John Dowler.
Sometime in the late 1800’s a school was built just north of the Meadows Grove Cemetery, at the foot of the hill, and appropiately named Meadow’s Grove. Fannie Meadows was one of the teachers in the little school. In 1914, the Meadow’s Grove district was split, with one portion being consolidated to Beech Grove. The little Meadow’s Grove school was no longer centrally located in the remaining district; and futhermore, it was too small and inadequate to accommodate the growing number of students. In 1916, another school was built about two miles east of Meadows Grove, on land donated by Mr. Harris Earp. Because Mr. Alvin Jackson had the largest number of children attending the school, it was named “Jackson College” by Mr. Grover Eaker. Some of the teachers at Jackson College included: Vera Davidson, Della Breckenridge, Charles Wells, George Butler, Clara Starnes, and Hester Starnes. Mr. Jackson and Mr. Avery Cunningham both served as school directors. The school (Meadow’s Grove District) consolidated with Gum Grove and Beech Grove in 1928.
Miller Community
See: History of Miller Community
Paris
The original seat of justice was located about 1835, at a point five miles northeast of Gainesville, and was named Paris. Here a log courthouse was erected and one or two stores opened. Afterward the question of re-locating the county seat was agitated, and of the different points competing for it, the one where Gainesville is situated gained the location, hence the name Gainesville. To this place the seat of justice was moved about the year 1840. A log court-house and subsequently a log jail were erected. The former was soon abandoned and in its stead a three-story frame court house, about thirty feet square, was constructed. The first floor of this building was occupied with the county offices, the second with the court-room, and the third with a Masonic hall. The building, with a portion of the records, was burned in 1874. A store room was then rented for a court-house, and soon thereafter, in the same year, it was, with all the balance of the records, also burned. These buildings were supposed to have been set on fire by certain parties, that the records, noting their rather questionable conduct, might be destroyed. This led to the shooting and killing of Sheriff Wright, by a citizen whom the people justified by not prosecuting. Two other persons, supposed to be implicated in the crime of burning the buildings, were arrested and placed in jail, from which they escaped and were not afterward apprehended. One of them, it is said, confessed his guilt.
The next court-house was another store room, which, with all accumulated records, was burned in 1876, presumably by an incendiary resting under indictments for crime. A one-story frame court-house was then erected, and continued to be used until 1884, when the county seat was removed from Gainesville to its present site, at Paragould. In 1884 the one-story frame building now standing east of the court-house square was erected for a temporary court-house. In 1888 the present beautiful and well- proportioned two-story brick building, with the halls and offices on the first floor and the court-room on the second, was erected by Contractors Boone and McGinnis, at a cost of $14,700. The clock in the tower cost $700 more. In 1877 the same contractors built the present two-story jail, containing four iron cells or rooms, and the jailer’s residence, at a cost of $7,000.
Salem
See: History of Salem
Scatter Creek
From several tiny tributaries in Union Twp., approximately 2 1/2 miles south west of Lafe, Scatter Creek is formed. then channels due north into Breckenridge Township. Shortly after it passes to the west of Hooker, a canal ditch drains it into Cache River. Scatter Creek Community generally refers to the area due west of Lafe. It was never a village as such, but did boast of a good Church and School. Both were located near where Scatter Creek Road turns directly south. The first school was a one room frame building located across the road from Scatter Creek Methodist Church. The school burned in 1911, and a new one was built. Those known to have taught school there include: Lela Bishop, Dick Poole, Albert Jackson, a Miss Garner, Orley Johnston, Myrtle Weddington, Clara Meadows, Roy Walden, Irvin Butler, Elsie Livesay, and Verla Gerdes. The school held classes for all twelve grades in the later years, and at one time had an enrollment of 94 pupils.
Scatter Creek School consolidated with Lafe in 1944. The building was then purchased by the Church and services were held there. A Methodist Church had been built in Lafe approximately fifteen years previously and most of the members left Scatter Creek to attend services in Lafe. However, membership dwindled there, too, and services were finally discontinued. On Nov 14, 1968, the building was purchased by members of the Hurricane Methodist Church, and placed alongside Highway 34, about one-half mile north of old Hurricane, just across the line from Breckenridge Township.
Stonewall
See: History of Stonewall
Walcott
The Crowley family settled in 1821 near the present location of Walcott. Since that time, there have continued to be industrious, thrifty settlers who have upheld the traditions of their predecessor. Walcott has never been a very large town. In 1910, the Bank of Walcott was established and lasted until 1924.
During the time of development of Crowley’s Ridge State Park, the Civilian Conservation Corps built barracks for the young men who were stationed there. The park opened in 1934, and has brought thousands of visitors.
Back to: History of Green County Arkansas
Back to: Greene County Arkansas History & Genealogy