Wing - A Town the World Forgot

SOME TIME BACK I TOLD YOU  about the beautiful old church at Wing, Arkansas. It was built in 1880, totally from virgin pine. I told you all I knew, at the time. But then I started wondering, how can it still be so solid, and so beautiful, after one hundred thirty three years? Are there no termites in Wing? I did a little more research about that. Seems the answer was right there, under my nose, the whole time, right in the back of my brother Harold's mind. Harold is eighty two, does not get around much. He's told me a lot about Wing in my research for my book, Spreading Wing. But Harold's a private person. Some of his revelations were followed by, “But you can't put that in a book!” Anyway, I stopped in to say hi a couple of days ago, and Harold told me he had come up with one more memory. Well, I was due in Russellville in a short time, needed to go, but he said, “Sit down, and listen to this story!” I sat. And I listened.

     Seems in the 1940s, Arthur Walden, reputed to be the best carpenter around, noticed the floor of the old church was infested with termites. He told the church, “I know of a certain type of oil to handle that problem.” Well, the church folks listened. But the church operated on pennies in those days. The pastor was paid in produce from the gardens, and chickens. That oil was expensive. It seemed the church building was doomed.

     Right about there was where Buford Compton, the legendary sheriff of Yell County for sixteen years, and a resident of Wing, stepped in, bought the oil, and put it on the floor. The termites just could not stomach that stuff. I remember my mother always told us, “If you're going to pray, don't kneel. Stand up.” That seemed strange to me at the time. But apparently, she well knew what that black oil would do to our Sunday best. We stood. Actually, the most likely reason for me to be on the floor was when I was wrestling around with Sammy Charles Turner when I should have been sitting up and listening. I was two years younger, and I was usually the one on the bottom. But it sounds better when I put it in terms of how I was praying.

     Many years later, a new floor was put down, right on top of that black floor. Kneeling was not only allowed now, but encouraged. Seems that old church would never have made it to the sixty's, when the Turners took over and completely renovated it, without Arthur Walden and Buford Compton's black oil.

     My good friend Skeet, (short for Skeeter) decided to go to Wing recently, since I was always talking about it. But he came to me with a big handful of maps, said he had been going over all his maps with a magnifying glass, couldn't find it. I told him, “The map makers of Arkansas have forgotten Wing. Just go to Rover, turn west, drive two miles, only church on the right.” He still headed out to Walmart, grumbling to himself, to get another map. Skeet just leaves nothing to chance. I knew going to Wing and back could be an all day trip for Skeet. He drives so politely, he told me one day it sometimes takes him up to an hour to get through a four way stop.

     If you want to go see Wing, just remember those directions. When you get into Yell County, you start to notice that cars you meet will usually have a smiling face behind the wheel. And, they will wave at you. But about the time you leave Rover and head up the valley, put away your cell phones and your GPS. You are now entering a forty five mile dead zone. But I have found there is one place at Wing where you can get a good cell phone signal. Go two miles south of Wing, wade out to the middle of the Fourche La Fave River, and it will work wonderfully. Though one is often unable to hear, this time of year, what with all the teeth chattering going on. If you are there at night, you city folks might want to bring a pair of sunglasses. Those bright stars just jump right out at you in Fourche Valley. My friend Cindy Aikman, who seems to be a star gazer who knows about such things, says the valley has some of the darkest skies in the country. There are no large light sources in the valley, and those steep mountains on both sides shields other light sources out. I noticed the stars looked very dim in 1962 when I left Wing.

     When you are arriving, you have to look closely for that tiny sign announcing Wing. Just remember, that old church is right in the geographical center of Wing. Just like it was the  center of our world when I was a child.

      Well, last fall, after three long years, I finished my book, Spreading Wing. I put it on Amazon, but Amazon seemed sorta hit or miss. One day right off, my friends and relatives, I guess, bought seven books, and I looked to see where I stood in the top one hundred. I was sitting right on number sixty nine thousandth. The next day I looked, nobody bought a book, and I was right around two hundred thousandth. After another day of bad sales, I had dropped to around four hundred thousandth.. I've been afraid to look at those stats after that. I decided I had to step in, Amazon needed some help. This was no way to sell a book. Nobody seemed to know me, or Spreading Wing at Amazon, once we got past friends and relatives and readers of my blog, Forever a Hillbilly.

     I mentioned to a friend in Fourche Valley the other day that some of my blog readers had heard so much from me about Wing and Fourche Valley, they just had to come see it. She said, “Tell them if they want to come, and don't have a place to stay, I've got a big house. Your friends can stay with us!” Wow. I thought that mindset played out along in the 1800's.

      I have always wanted to have my book launching at Wing, in that old church of my childhood. I knew that was a big risk, since I had been gone from Wing fifty years. I wasn't sure very many would remember me. We cooked up six packages of salt pork and a ton of biscuits, since that was a staple at our house in the 1940's when I was a child. I knew I was running the risk of having to eat salt pork and biscuit sandwiches for the next few months if nobody showed up, and I had way more than my share of that fifty years ago.

     Pat Gillum’s book, Spreading Wing, can be found on amazon.com  Hundreds of true stories of life in the Ouachita Mountains, much like the pioneer days. My second book, Forever Cry, can be found at Hardman Interiors in Arkadelphia, and also on Amazon.

     Well, to make a long story short, (too late) those valley and mountain people of Yell County just seem to always support their own, even those fifty years removed, and when launching day arrived, they just kept coming. Sometimes, I had a stack of books half a dozen high waiting to be signed, and still they came. I've always dreamed about how great it would be, with a line of people coming to me to get my signature! But I didn't have time to fully enjoy it. Even so, it was one of my best days ever. I didn't even get a bite of that mountain of salt pork and biscuits. We sold seventy books that day.

     Equally as important, they ate up every last scrap of that salt pork. Even more importantly, I had a chance to renew a lot of very old, wonderful  relationships. Edith Turner was there. She was ninety, but not anywhere near the oldest person in Wing. My children, Corey and Kinley, found out she was a friend of my mothers. My mother passed away when they were at or near infancy, and they are now at or near forty years old. They just could not seem to let her go, just hung with her every word, until long after the big event was over. She told them story after story of my mother. Kinley said, “Holding her hand was like finally getting to hold the hand of my grandmother.”

    Corey and three others, at great risk to life and limb, climbed up to the old classroom above. The stairs were long gone. I started up the ladder, but at the top was a three foot wall, to keep people from climbing up, I guess. Well, I'm old, so I headed back down. But Cindy Turner Buford, whom I knew was at least eight years older than me, (maybe more, but who's counting) just upper middle aged by Wing standards, scrambled up and over that wall. When they were all about to come down, Corey came first, and I saw him standing under that ladder, panic in his eyes, already holding his arms out as if to catch someone. He told me, “There's a lady in her seventies about to come over that wall!” I didn't worry too much about that. Those normal age limitations don't always apply to Wing people.

      I grew up with Cindy, just a tall ridge over. We often communicated with a loud holler, that went something like this: “Whoooo, Whoooo, Whoooo weeee ouhooooo! Of course, that was back at a time when I could still holler that loud. I well knew Cindy could have climbed that tallest mountain behind Wing again, if she set her mind to it. That hill up to her house was about as steep as any mountain around.

      Anyway, in the old classroom, they found the name of my aunt, Leta Lazenby, who left Wing forever in 1930. It was on the chalkboard, still just like it had been written yesterday.  It was just like it was when I saw it in 1950. That chalkboard was made, it appears, by painting or spraying something on those very wide, (1x20’s) virgin pine boards. It also had a lot of newer names. Seems climbing up there has become a “rite of passage” for Wing children.  Nephew Ken Gillum said, “It was just like stepping back in time.” The old classroom had not been used in at least eighty years, maybe much longer. Nobody living knows for sure.

     Effie Turner, an icon of Wing, ran the store next door all during my child hood. She died in 1979, at one hundred years of age. During her lifetime she rode to Wing in an oxcart, and saw men walking on the moon. Her son, JR, passed away last year at one hundred two.

     Elois Hunnicutt, just across the road and down the lane, ninety four, still grows a large garden. But she fell, out in that garden last year, and broke some bones. She managed to crawl to her back door, but could not get in. She had to lay out most of a day and a night. Remember, cell phones don't work well in Wing. But she's back now, as lively as ever. I know I'd have a hard time keeping up with her now, doing the kind of day's work she does.

     My sister Jonnie taught Sunday school classes in Fourche Valley for many years. Once I visited her class. The best I remember, her youngest class member was in his ninety's.

     Scientists should do a study of folks in the Valley. Try to figure out how they live so long and so well, here in a remote place far from a major hospital. But actually, I already know. People in Little Rock would be shocked to realize how quiet, peaceful, and wonderful life can be, only sixty miles away from the hustle, bustle, rush, and tension of life in a major city, with next door neighbors often a mile away. My Dad always said good fences make good neighbors. A little distance can do the same thing.

     I'm learning some good life lessons along the way, though. I was scheduled to read one of my stories at a Senior Citizen's Center a few days ago. But as luck would have it, I was scheduled to start reading my story along about the time the food was passed out. I thought the story was one of my funniest, but I don't remember hearing many laughs. All I could hear was a hundred or so spoons hitting plates. I'm always a little nervous starting a reading, then when I hear a few laughs, (and it doesn't really seem to matter if they're laughing with me or at me) I just seem to feed off that and really enjoy the rest of it. But that day, I was nervous all the way through. Like I say, I'm learning some good life lessons along the way. But on the other hand, I did sell books as a result. Beats the heck out of hauling hay at a penny a bale, like I did as a kid at Wing. Now, I'm not saying my Dad ever paid a penny a bale for hauling OUR hay. That was when I hired out to someone else. My dad figured room and board was payment  aplenty. Of course, hauling hay was not nearly as embarrassing. 

      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 holler, 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.

     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.

      In our day and time, all of these factors, many of which seemed so negative when they were brought to bear, have come together to produce a  valley which is an ideal place to be, whether it be living there or visiting.  Of course living there would be a problem, for many. Options for making a living are few, and a child might have to ride a school bus two hours to get to a school, while never passing through a traffic light, probably not even a four way stop. I think that's why Skeet likes it so well. Those four way stops can be a booger for Skeet. He’s just far too polite in his driving. If another car is in sight, he will always give them the right-of-way. The pollution problems of most of our world, whether it be air, sound, chemical, vast areas of concrete, an excessive number of large lights, or too many people crowded together in a small space, just do not exist in Wing or the valley. Having next door neighbors a mile away helps assure they stay good neighbors. Even in my day, Fourche Valley School was one of the largest school districts in the state, yet twelve students graduated with me. One year more recently, the senior class consisted of five girls. Even the old abandoned home sites that dotted the landscape in my day have been pretty well reclaimed by nature. Hard to find one today. The river still runs clean and pure, without an excessive number of canoes or boats all crowded up on it, as with most of our beautiful rivers.  The Fourche is a good river to float in the spring, but gets a little too shallow in the summer for a long float. The deer, which had mostly been chased down and eaten up in my time, are back in large numbers. Furry wild animals, no longer considered very valuable for their pretty fur as they were in my time, have returned. The squirrel, a prime choice for the dinner table in my day, can rest a little easier. The trees on the mountainside are large and beautiful once more.

       Maybe I named this story wrong. Maybe, in this day and age, I should have named it, “The town the world has not discovered.” Take a day sometime and make a slow drive up highway 28 from Rover to Needmore, where highway 28 hits 71. Stop along the way, and meet those friendly people of the valley. You will discover a world new to your experiences in Arkansas. Take a little time and explore, and get to know that long, narrow strip of land along the Fourche La Fave River. A place like no other, I can honestly say, and I've seen a very large chunk of the world. Once you've spent a full day in Fourche Valley, you will always want to return.