A Town the World Forgot - Part Three

      Like I said, it just seems that Wing is a town the world forgot. Wing was first named Mineral Springs, due to the large amount of fresh spring water produced right behind the old church. Wing was a thriving town around 1898, when the Gillum's first arrived. At that time, there were said to be seventeen houses up Wing hollow, right behind the old church, with every cleared spot as large as a wagon sheet growing cotton. There were none in my days at Wing, just old home sites. In 1898, the rich bottom land carved out by the river was dotted with small farmers rapidly clearing more land, more cotton and other row crops appearing. A cotton gin, a sawmill, and a grist mill sat at the mouth of Wing hollow, with the very large spring producing a large amount of cold water year around for steam power.

     Wing and the surrounding area was then an educational mecca. In 1915, fifteen school teachers lived around Wing. The old school room above the church was only an overflow classroom. Mineral Springs Academy took in boarding students from many miles around, advertising, “Room and board with a nice local family for two dollars a month.” Thousands of acres of prime, virgin forests covered the mountainsides. The walls of many of those old houses were made from 1x20 pine boards from that virgin timber. The mountains were free range land, with large numbers of cattle ranged out into those hills. My dad often had to ride horseback for many, many miles to locate his cattle. A bell cow, wearing a cowbell around its neck, was with each herd to help in locating the herd.

     But all this was not to last. By the time I came along in 1944, many changes had taken place in the valley. The thin rich topsoil was rapidly getting tired, and cotton and other row crops were becoming less productive. Cotton gins disappeared. Nimrod lake was built, taking much of the richest bottom land. Hundreds of acres of cropland were reclaimed by the forests. Most of the small landowners lived by grubbing out a living from the soil, and had to put the wagon sheet back on the wagon and move on.

 

     The word was out. The delta land of southeast Arkansas was now a mecca for farmers, and the exodus from Yell County to the delta was in full swing. I met the love of my life at the Delta Dip in Dumas, home of the Ding Dong Daddy. I also learned while I hung around nearby Watson, trying to win her heart, that many, many farmers in that area came to the delta from Fourche Valley during that time period.

     The larger landowners, including the Gillums, began to depend more and more upon cattle as a money source. The virgin timber was gone. In the 1920's, a rail line was built up the South Fourche River Valley, to reach that virgin harvest. This brought about temporary prosperity. Saw mill towns sprang up, large bustling towns. Once the virgin timber was harvested, these towns disappeared, and were reclaimed by nature. The only signs remaining to show they ever existed is a rusting piece of metal or concrete lying here and there on the forest floor. In 1927, the harvesting was winding down in the south mountains. The flood of 1927 destroyed the rail line, wrapping rails around trees. Two of the large train engines were trapped at line's end. One was moved onto the railroad bridge during the height of the flood, to help keep it from washing out. Afterwards, the rail line had to be rebuilt to get the engines out, taking up the track behind the engines as they were moved out.

     The government bought up much of this timberland for as little as fifty cents an acre during and after the Depression, which became part of the Ouachita National Forest. The free range mountains were no more. Without that free range land, many of the cattle farmers had to move on. Hundreds of old, deserted home sites dotted the valley.

      But this is not the end of my story.    CONCLUSION NEXT WEEKEND.