Re-visiting "A Lost City of Dreams"
By William Gibson White
05/17/12
Last Saturday our destination was the exhibit, "Graysonia, A lost City of
Dreams," at the Clark County Historical Museum in Arkadelphia.
It was a lousy day for traveling, rain. The Weather Channel on my computer
stated, "Expect dry conditions over the next six hours." Good enough.
Later, I realized it didn't say exactly where these dry conditions were. Possibly, in
the Mojave Desert—Not on Route 7 south. When Cupcake and I left Hot Springs, the
rain didn't start until we crossed Lake Hamilton. Not much, but enough to irritate the
driver—me. You know the kind, a sprinkle just enough not to need the windshield wipers
unless a passing car throws a dirty film up on the glass partially obscuring the driver's
vision. At my age, I don't need that. I turned on the van's lights and wipers. Two swipes
and then the squeaks. I turn them off. Then on, you know the drill.
Then Cupcake and I notice something strange—a traffic pattern. No cars coming
toward us. Then maybe 20. Again no traffic. Then 20 or 30 cars. We've made many trips
on this road. I love Arkadelphia, as well as Lake DeGray.
Two miles past Bismark, we found out why. Police had closed one traffic lane
near a hellish wreck. Several emergency vehicles and personnel were at work. We only
saw one crushed car in the ditch as we passed. With traffic back to normal, we headed for
the museum.
Graysonia was where my father worked in the sawmill. He and other mill hands
went to the big city of Delight on Saturday night to go to the movie house owned by my
Grandpa Gibson Mills. That's where he met my mother. They married and lived at
Graysonia until the mill shut down. Also, my Grandma White ran one of the three
boarding houses. Although I was born at Hot Springs, we eventually moved to Delight.
From the stories I heard at Delight, life for my parents and grandmother at Graysonia was
good. We went there a couple of times while I was growing up so daddy could fish in the
Antoine River. Very few families lived there then. Only the concrete foundations of the
mill were left.
The museum exhibit showed many pictures. One of a boarding house and its
employees. Could have been my grandmother's. I didn't bring along my magnifying class
or I might have found her.
I did recognize two pictures while there. One was a big one hanging on the wall
of Graysonia mill owner William Grayson and the town's namesake. As I recall, he also
owned the mill at Delight. From the stories, I was told, he really enjoyed Grandma
White's cooking at her Graysonia boarding house. (He probably owned that, too.) So
when he visited the Delight sawmill, Daddy invited him to our house for a meal. Talk
about "putting on the dog," observing it from my point of view!
Consider, we lived in a shack with no running water or electricity and Daddy had
invited a millionaire for lunch! Luckily, Daddy gave Mama and Grandma a day to
prepare. While Grandma cooked, I carried water from the well for Mama to clean. In
spite of the fact it was summer, Grayson arrived by car wearing a suit and tie. Our dining
room table was in the kitchen, so the room was just about as hot as the stove. Sweating
profusely, I'm sure, he soon shed his coat. A nice man, he seemed to enjoy the meal and
had a big piece of Grandma's lemon meringue pie for dessert with his iced tea. The affair
was deemed a success.
However, I'm sure any points Daddy made were lost when he and a few others
tried to unionize the Delight mill. You didn't do that in Arkansas. Still don't!
Oh, the other picture was of that now notorious editor, Joe May. Cupcake found a
laminated column of his from the Daily Siftings Herald. Judging from his picture, he
wrote it while in kindergarten. It was stuck in a 1900 cash ledger from a pharmacy.
I bought a book, "News from Graysonia 1908-1951," hoping I might find
something about my family in it. But we didn't make the social calendar of the "Lost city
of Dreams."