It’s always bothered me whenever I heard people speak ill of Arkansas. Anything that Hollywood produces makes us appear backwoods and ignorant, barefoot and pregnant. The news only follows the negative media. Everyone who lives here assumes that Arkadelphia and all of its rural areas are just a place to be born, grow old and die without ever seeing history being made. However, we have our own fair share of fun facts and intriguing (almost scandalous) news that even Hollywood would kill for.
irst of all, I assume most of you readers have heard of the actor, Billy Bob Thornton. Well, this master of comedy was actually born just a few miles away in Hot Springs. He grew up just a little ways up I-30 in Malvern, and he even attended college across the road at Henderson State University. (It was only a semester, but still.) Because of his close ties to this area of the state, the landscape of Arkadelphia and other cities in our small state have appeared in a number of films in which he has starred and produced. These include “Waking Up in Reno” (2002), “Daddy and Them” (2001) and the critically-acclaimed “Sling Blade” (1994). Highway 7 outside of Arkadelphia appears in “Daddy and Them,” and a small burger place in Malvern can be seen in “Sling Blade.”
ven more intriguing is the fact that during his marriage to Angelina Jolie, it is said that she purchased a cemetery plot in nearby Alpine, and after she visited that location, she was upset that there was no chapel with which to hold services in. Because of this, she had one built. Those who were building it actually hired my father to hang and finish the Sheetrock in that chapel. Sadly though, he never met Angelina Jolie.
urthermore, our nearby Hot Springs, while just a weekend getaway for us, serves as a tourist attraction for people from all over the country. A friend of mine from my days at Arkadelphia High School is from the nearby small town of Glenwood. His father is a building contractor, and several years ago, he was hired to build a vacation home on the lake in Hot Springs for award-winning actor John Malkovich.
Now, think back to Depression-era gangsters in Prohibition South. It’s about to get good. Hot Springs is not a new discovery, but it actually was a popular destination for many members of the mob during the 1920s and 1930s. Big-name crooks like Al Capone and Lucky Luciano would frequent the infamous Bathhouse Row and found underground gambling rings and casinos. The horse track would be the place to catch them on weekend afternoons. To bring that even closer to home, one of my dearest friends had a great uncle (now passed away) who was a mechanic in this area. It was rumored in their family that he was the one to work on all of Al Capone’s cars when he came to Hot Springs. This uncle would put on his Sunday suit for a meeting and then return home with a pocketful of cash.
Let’s not forget that Morgan Freeman, perhaps one of the greatest actors of our time, has a sideline hobby of beekeeping (to each, their own). There was a video that went viral a few years ago with one of his late night TV interviews in which Freeman said that he got his bees “from a small town in Arkansas called Arkadelphia.” Whoa. The silky-voiced narrator of our childhood has been to our town, and it’s rumored that he stays in Caddo Valley when he’s here.
One of the greatest snipers in American military history, Gunnery Sergeant Carlos Hathcock, was born and raised outside of Little Rock. Nicknamed “Whitefeather” by his fellow Marines because he wore a white feather in the band of his helmet, he has a confirmed 93 kills for the American military in Vietnam. The character of Bob Lee Swagger from Stephen Hunter’s novel, “Point of Impact,” and later film “Shooter” starring Mark Wahlberg is based upon the career of Carlos Hathcock. Furthermore, Barry Pepper’s famous sniper scene in “Saving Private Ryan” (1998) is a tribute to one of the most famous Whitefeather kills. Springfield Armory even released a rifle they called the M-25 White Feather in Hathcock’s honor.
Glen Campbell, the famous country-western singer and actor in the 1960s and 1970s, was born in the neighboring town of Delight, Arkansas. He played the first ranger LaBeouf in the 1969 John Wayne version of “True Grit.” He is perhaps most famously known for his song, “The Rhinestone Cowboy.”
Mary Steenburgen, one of the classiest Southern actresses on screen, was born in Newport, Ark.
While she was born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Beth Moore was raised in and calls Arkadelphia her hometown. She spent much time on campus with friends while growing up in Arkadelphia.
Nor the sports enthusiasts, football coach Paul “Bear” Bryant was born in Moro Bottom and lived in Fordyce.
General Douglas MacArthur, Commander of the Pacific Theater during World War II and Korea, was born in Little Rock.
Johnny Cash (born J.R. Cash), the Man in Black, perhaps one of the most classic country vocalists of all time, was born and raised in Kingsland, Arkansas. His time in Arkansas is reflected in some of his music, famously in his piece, “How High’s the Water, Momma?”
Former President Bill Clinton was born in Hope, just down I-30 from here, and spent most of his early life in Hot Springs. Dr. Paul Root, a retired faculty member and father of Dr. Jeff Root, dean of the School of Humanities and interim dean of the Huckabee School of Education, was Clinton’s 10th grade World History teacher at Hot Springs High School. The woman who designed Former First Lady Hillary Clinton’s White House gowns is a native of Arkadelphia.
Former Governor Mike Huckabee was also born in Hope, and then graduated from Ouachita Baptist University.
We may look like just a small town in the middle of a Podunk state that the rest of the world may look over as backwoods and ignorant, but without the state of Arkansas and the city of Arkadelphia, the fate of the nation would be eternally different. We do have some bragging rights. Even if we don’t have a movie theatre to go to on Saturday nights, we still have Angelina Jolie’s chapel, Al Capone’s mechanic, America’s greatest sniper, the best country music has to offer, former presidents and presidential candidates and Morgan Freeman’s bees.
Written by Copy editor, Julie Williams
