The Seed and the Story: CAAH and Arkansas Seed Swaps

2011 Russellville Seed Swap. Photo by author

The Seed and the Story is a bi-weekly column exploring folklife, sustainability, oral history, human rights,and community in Yell County, Arkansas.   The column is published in the Post Dispatch and is syndicated in the Courier.  Please remember to support your local paper and independent media!

You can follow the Boiled Down Juice on Facebook and Twitter.  If you enjoy our posts, please tell a friend. And thanks for reading!

——————————————————————————————————–

Beginning earlier this month the organization CAAH (Conserving Arkansas’ Agricultural Heritage) began their yearly series of Seed Swaps across the state.  With the motto “One for the cutworm, one for the crow, one to share and one to grow,” the organization seeks to preserve both the agricultural folkways of Arkansas and the seeds themselves, many of which have been in families for generations.

They operate a Seed Bank on campus at the University of Central Arkansas, studying and preserving the genetic diversity of regional seeds and host twelve statewide swaps, providing a space where community members can trade heirloom seeds and gardening knowledge, sharing the wealth with both fellow community members and the CAAH organization.

I’ve had the pleasure of meeting project leader Dr. Brian Campbell and hear him speak about this project and his other work, and I attended the Russellville Swap last year.  Regardless if you’re a master gardener with decades of experience or a person who’s never put a thing in the ground but posses an interest in learning more about growing your own food, CAAH is an excellent resource.

They seek to raise awareness about the problems with crop monoculture, wherein regional heirloom seeds are replaced by hybrids, the seeds patented and owned by major corporations.  As growers shift to these seeds, the regional ones die out, taking with them genetic diversity, regional traditions and a hardiness to local conditions. Just take the example of tomatoes.  There are only few varieties sold in grocery stores but literally hundreds of different heirloom tomatoes you can grow at home, ranging from pink to green to yellow and each with their own unique taste.  Heirloom gardening opens up a whole new world of eating.

Last year when I attended the swap in Russellville there were several people who brought seeds to give away and an even larger group of folks who just wanted to meet other gardeners in the area, many of whom were starting their first plots.  I came home with some okra seed, daffodil bulbs, a hummingbird vine, and French melon seeds, all of which have done well. If you have seeds passed down in your community, donating some to CAAH is an excellent way to make sure they never die out.  But don’t feel like you have to have seeds to swap to attend the event. It’s for everyone, gardener or not.

The event in Russellville will take place on the 25^th of this month at All Saints Episcopal Church from 10:00-1:00.  If you miss the Russellville event, you can make it to the Conway swap on Sunday the 26th 1:30-3:00 at the Faulkner County Library.   You can check out the full list of swaps below.

You can read more about CAAH and learn what’s in their Seed Bank here: www.arkansasagro.wordpress.com.  If you want to read more about last year’s swap and see a few more photos, go here. If you have seeds that have been passed down to you, I’d really love to hear about them!  I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait for spring.  What are you going to be growing?

Oxford American Offices Open in South Main Neighborhood

Soon to be event location for Oxford American. Little Rock South Main District.

The Oxford American magazine recently purchased Juanita’s old space in downtown Little Rock, and this past Saturday they hosted an open house for the new location.

The majority of the magazine staff will continue to operate out of their offices at UCA in Conway and this location will serve as both a home base for the business office and an event location. Someday soon this front space (pictured above) will be used for Oxford American sponsored events and shows ranging from live music to art openings.  With its location just up the street from Community Bakery, the Root Cafe, Bernice Garden,  Boulevard Bread, and other South Main locations, it all sounds very promising.

We got there late in the day after most folks were already  gone, but this photo gives you a good example of the location’s potential.  If you’ve spent time in Little Rock you’ve probably seen many shows in this venue over the years, so it’s exciting the building will still be used for live music. Some of my favorite shows there were Southern Culture on the Skids and Victoria Williams.  What about you?

13th Annual Music Issue.

If you haven’t picked up a copy already, the annual Music Issue is out and this year features music from all over the state of Mississippi.  Check it out there.

The Seed and the Story for February 8, 2012: Origins of the Chickalah Name.

The Seed and the Story is a bi-weekly column exploring folklife, sustainability, oral history, human rights,and community in Yell County, Arkansas.   The column is published in the Post Dispatch and is syndicated in the Courier.  Please remember to support your local paper and independent media!

You can follow the Boiled Down Juice on Facebook and Twitter.  If you enjoy our posts, please tell a friend. And thanks for reading!

Update:  I originally listed the Highway as Highway 28 instead of Highway 27.  A reader from Chickalah corrected me.  Thanks so much!  This is what I get for working in a hurry due to computer problems.  But computer problems are fixed now.  Thanks so much! 

I’m very excited about the continued response from these recent columns on Chickalah.  Please excuse my delay in responding to emails.  Last week my computer, which has long since seen better days, crashed one last and final time.  Thanks to the generosity of some very dear friends, I’ll soon have a new (to me) computer with several nice upgrades!

In the past few weeks I’ve discussed the somewhat recent history of Chickalah (click here to read the first installment and here to read the second), but this week’s column will go back quite a bit further and explore what little we know about the community’s unique name.  I don’t about you, but as soon as I was old enough to read, those white letters on the green background of the sign on Highway 27 always intrigued me.  It’s a Native American name, but where did exactly did it come from?  And why don’t we pronounce it phonetically, I’ve always wondered.   How did it sound on the lips of the early settlers?  I don’t have any answers for these last two questions, but, of course, the word is full of places whose names ring quite differently from the lips of the residents than the sign might suggest.  One of my personal favorites is the Newton County community of Mount Judea, which is pronounced by locals as Mount Judy.

There are more mysteries to Chickalah’s Native American history than there are answers, and the sources we do have are, at best, fragmented and incomplete. Tribe members have long since left the area, forced out of this region, and most of the rest of the United States, by a host of factors, including what amounts to genocidal acts perpetuated by the U.S government to eradicate their presence in the area.  We do know, however, that the community’s name is a variation of Chikileh, the name of a Cherokee chief, who, according to researcher Samuel Dickenson, was “noted for his oratory.” Continue reading »

The Seed and the Story for January 25, 2012: Visiting with Bud Rector

Bud Rector and J.L. Martin Chickalah, Arkansas, 2012

The Seed and the Story is a bi-weekly column exploring folklife, sustainability, oral history, human rights,and community in Yell County, Arkansas.   The column is published in the Post Dispatch and is syndicated in the Courier.  Please remember to support your local paper and independent media!

You can follow the Boiled Down Juice on Facebook and Twitter.  If you enjoy our posts, please tell a friend. And thanks for reading!

———————————————————————————————————————————————–

Before I get into this week’s column, I want to thank all those who called or wrote in response to the previous column about the history of Chickalah.  It’s such an honor to hear from readers with memories and stories to share, and I’m thankful to all of you who took the time to tell me about the places you call home.  I learned from Carolyn Garner that back in the 1940s people would gather to watch outdoor movies on the back wall of Neil Cowger’s Chickalah store.  And I had several people tell me about the rural baseball league from the area, including the days when the Dean brothers lived on Chickalah Mountain.  So this week’s column is a continuation of the recent Chickalah research and will highlight just few stories I learned from a man many of you know and love: Bud Rector.

My father and I recently had the opportunity to visit with Bud in his home on Harkey’s Valley road in Chickalah where we were greeted by his friendly dog who got up from her cozy front porch chair to come say hello.  Bud Rector was born in 1914 and has lived in the Harkey’s Valley area all of his life.  He’s hauled logs in the timber woods, raised chickens and cows, worked for the WPA, driven the rural bus route for Dardanelle Schools for decades, and traveled throughout the area singing in a gospel quartet.  He’s also an excellent storyteller and a joy to be around.  I can’t begin to do justice to all his stories in this short column, so I’ll just highlight a few.

For decades the Chickalah area was home to a thriving timber economy, and Bud recalled many of the early logging operations and sawmills that dotted the mountains.  He and my father swapped memories of those days when, as Bud recalled, “everybody was going around with the chopping ax and cross cut saw.”  While my father recalled skidding logs, Bud and his brother Buford found work hauling the lumber to town.  He mentioned his short stint with the WPA where men were given shovels to help dig out the bluff and told of the well known store in Sulpher Springs operated by a man with, quite possibly, one of the best names I’ve ever come across: Bonaparte Rutledge.  Come to find out, my own grandparents were married in front of Mr. Rutledge store.

Thanks your suggestions, I was sure to ask him about the rural baseball leagues that were so popular in the area during the 1930s and 1940s.  He recalled teams from Spring Creek, Chickalah Mountain, Chicklalah Village, Slo Fork, Pisgah, Casa, Sulpher Springs, Ard, and Harkey’s Valley, the team for which he played.  While he never had the chance to play with Dizzy, he did play with Paul and their younger brother, often known as “Poodle.” The teams played at places like the old Gatley ball field near Sulphar Springs and in numerous cow pastures all around the county.  Readers might recall the team’s manager Pete McMullan and some of well-known players like Burt Tucker, Roger Harkey, Grover Martin, John Martin, and Ame Bates.

In the near future I’ll have some of the audio of Bud up online so you can listen to Bud telling these and other stories in his own words.   Do you remember the ball teams, the logging woods, or Bonepart’s store?  I’d love to hear from you!  A very special thank you to Mr. Bud Rector for allowing me to visit and share some of his stories here.

Arkansas Tattoo Project Update

Native Arkansan, Rapper Cboddy of Little Rock with the Little Rock symbol and ARK in graffiti-style letters.

From Cboddy:  ”I was doing shows from state to state and I got to represent where I’m from in a way.  And what better way than to put the official Little Rock logo stamped on my arm.”  

Discussing what he loves about Arkansas: “Everybody knows everybody, so to me I look at everybody like family.  Everybody is so open-armed, to me anyway.”

Recently we began a documentation project examining the diversity of ways people choose to represent their home state of Arkansas on their body.   The project is in its beginning stages, and we’ve taken the documentation process online so it can be community-driven and grow organically.

Since we started the online Facebook version of the Us Tattooed Kids:  Arkansas Project last week, thirty-six tattoo photos have been submitted and we have 236 likes!  We also started a Twitter account for the project, which you can follow here.  I’ve also been doing interviews with as many people as possible—either online or in person—and many of these stories will be featured in the upcoming article.  In case your unfamiliar with the project, you can go here to read all about it.

Here are just a few photo updates we’ve received and a glimpse into some of the things people are saying about their tattoos and the larger concept of Arkansas as home.  If you know of someone with an Arkansas tattoo, please spread the word.  We want to hear from you!  To read more and join the conversation, visit us online on facebook or Twitter.

Basic state outline uploaded by John Crouch, a native Arkansan and classical composer who now lives in Maryland.

From an email interview with Crouch:  ”I had been saying for about a year that I wanted it. I don’t know if I would have gotten it if I still lived in Arkansas, but living in Baltimore for 6+ years made me miss Arkansas.”      ”After high school in Springdale, my formative early adult years were spent in Fayetteville. Now I’ve lived in Baltimore for six and a half years and I’m still amazed at how much more interesting and progressive a small Southern town can be than a fairly large Northeastern (technically, to some, a Southern Mid-Atlantic) city. I’ve had more than one instance of proclaiming the virtues of my small college town and how it adopted progressive causes and issues years prior to Baltimore.”

Here’s a few more images that have been posted to the site.  We’re still waiting to learn more about them.  But the images are pretty strong as is.  What’s your story?  

Submitted by tattoo artist, Scott Diffee. Waiting for more info on this tattoo.

I've been wondering if there are other city specific tattoos besides Little Rock. There are! Tattoo by Scott Diffee at the Parlor.

Skyline of LR. Tattoo by Scott Diffee.

Director Sharon La Cruise Discusses the Film, “Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock.

Film maker Sharon La Cruise. From PBS.

Last week’s Friday Video was a preview of the upcoming film Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock.  Today on the University of Arkansas campus director of the film, Sharon La Cruise, will preset the film and answer questions.

Yesterday Ozarks at Large’s Antoinette Grajeda spoke with La Cruise about the making of the film including her research in Little Rock, her quest to discover why Daisy Bates was not initially seen as potential leader of the movement, Bates’s life as a social and political radical, and a her role in the desegregation of Central High.

“Daisy Bate’s life” La Cruise says, “is the classic example that life really is like ten percent of what happens to you and ninety percent of how you handle it.  Because that is how she lived her life because she could have had many options as far a path she could have went down considering where she came from and what she went through.  And she made a decision to do good with her life.  I’m hoping she’ll be inspirational to young adults….”

To listen to the entire interview go here and click on the link.

In case you missed the Friday Video here it is again.  Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock will be airing nationally on February 2nd at 9:00 pm on the PBS series, Independent Lens.  The presreening will be held today at 2:00 PM at the Reynolds Center on the U of A campus.   The event is hosted in connection with Martin Luther King Jr. week and organized by the University Libraries and Diversity Affairs.

A Few New Tattoo Photos from the Us Tattooed Kids: Arkansas Project

This project is an outgrowth of an article and radio piece that are both in the works.  Due to the large response this research,  the project has grown to a more interactive format and will hopefully continue to grow and grow.  You can help us out by spreading the word.  Thanks!  

Follow the project here:  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Us-Tattooed-Kids-Arkansas-Project/341024649259834  

  To read more about this project check out the previous post  or this post about how the project started.

Here are just a few new photos being sent to Facebook.  To see more go here.  The Tumblr page is in the works.  Stay tuned for that.

Here’s on from Rick Millard of Dardanelle, Arkansas, one of a few out there that have the Black Flag symbol merged with the state outline.

From Rick Millard. Tattoo by Ramses Shadow in Memphis. 2003.

From an email interview with Rick:  “To me Arkansas is the most geographically unique state that exists, and correct me if I’m wrong but what other states have: A delta region, mountains, plains, timberlands, all in the same state?, there isnt another state like this. plus Arkansas is the only place you can mine for Diamonds. there are so many wonderful people here, and places to visit, live and spend time. I could go on and on.”

And here’s one uploaded to the group from Benjamin Singleton.  

From Benjamin Singleton. Tattoo by Caleb Pritchet at Electric Heart in Little Rock.

From his facebook post: “For me, the most important aspect is the concept of home… thanks to caleb at electric heart for the design and application.”

~ Stay tuned for the article and the radio piece…..after that, who knows?

Follow the project here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Us-Tattooed-Kids-Arkansas-Project/341024649259834

Friday Video: Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock.

From the U of A page. Daisy Bates with six of the Little Rock Nine. Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock. Courtesy of Independent Television Service, 2012.

I’m super excited about this week’s Friday Video, a trailer for the upcoming film, Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock.

Produced by Sharon La Cruise, this film will makes its debut on February 2, 2012 on PBS’s Independent Lens.

If you live in Fayetteville, however, you can catch a pre-screening of the film Thursday January 19 at 2:oo PM at the Donald W. Reynolds Center.  The event is hosted in connection with Martin Luther King Jr. week and organized by the University Libraries and Diversity Affairs.  After the screening, producer and director Sharon La Cruise, “will discuss the documentary filmmaking process as well as the social and historical issues the film brings to focus.”  If you live in the northwest Arkansas area this is a great opportunity.  If you get a chance to attend the event please let us know because we’d love to perhaps do a follow up post about the event.

Here’s more on the film.  Continuing from the University of Arkansas press release:

Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock tells the story of a seven-year journey by La Cruise to unravel the life of the Arkansas civil rights activist Daisy Bates. Beautiful, glamorous and articulate, Bates was fearless in her quest for justice, stepping into the spotlight to bring national attention to civil rights issues. Unconventional and  strong-willed, she became a household name in 1957 when she fought for the right of nine black students to attend the all-white Central High School in Little Rock. Her public support divided the Little Rock community and the state itself – culminating in a constitutional crisis that pitted President Dwight D. Eisenhower against Arkansas Governor Orville Faubus. 

To read the press release in its entirety click here.  

Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock premieres on the Emmy Award-winning PBS series Independent Lens on Thursday, February 2, 2012 at 9 p.m.http://newswire.uark.edu/article.aspx?id=17459

The Seed and the Story for January 11, 2012: Chickalah Academy

Chickalah Methodist Cemetery. Click on photo to see full listing of graves in cemetery.

The Seed and the Story is a bi-weekly column exploring folklife, sustainability, oral history, human rights,and community in Yell County, Arkansas.   The column is published in the Post Dispatch and is syndicated in the Courier.  Please remember to support your local paper and independent media!

You can follow the Boiled Down Juice on Facebook and Twitter.  If you enjoy our posts, please tell a friend! And thanks for reading!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I recently began doing some research on the history of Chickalah and have been reading two books which provide a great deal of information about this and other rural communities in the area.  Both Wayne Banks’ 1959 publication, A History of Yell County Arkansas, and Catherine Eikleberry Roger’s Readin’, ‘Ritin, and ‘Rithmetic, published in 1981, are filled with oral histories from community members who have long since passed away.  In addition to many of the stories I’ve heard over the years from family and friends, these books help shed light on this community which once boasted eight businesses and two hundred and fifty residents.

Today Chickalah is a small, rural community with a few churches, a community center, and a rural fire department.  In the late 1800s, however, Chickalah, often referred to as Chickalah Village, was located about a mile north of its present location and was home to the Chickalah Academy, a two story building which provided the first non-denominational educational opportunities in the area.  Prior to the Academy, all schools in the village were subscription based and conducted by the Methodist church on Harkey’s Valley road across from Little Chickalah Creek.  The Chickalah Academy, located near where the fire station stands today, was a two story building with four separate entrances.  The school boasted three departments: “Primary,” “Grammar” and “Academic,” and in addition to these regular classes students also had access to classes in vocal instruction, piano, organ, guitar, and violin. 

The Chickalah Academy burned sometime during the early 1900s, and although another two story building was constructed, the subsequent school appears to have only hired two teachers.  Eventually that building was torn down and replaced by the one-story, two room building that still operates today as the Chickalah Community Center.  As many readers may remember, beginning in the 1930s, the Chickalah School began a gradual process of consolidation with Dardanelle Public Schools.

To my knowledge there is no one living today who attended the Chickalah Academy, but some of you have probably heard stories about the school, and no doubt there are many readers who remember attending the later school before consolidation.  In my quest to understand more about Chickalah, I’m especially curious to learn more about the coming of Highway 27 and how this shifted the population from what is often referred to as Chicklaha Village to the Chicklah we know today.   I’m also curious to learn more about a shoe factory that may have once been located in the area.  Operated by the McCray family, the factory would have existed sometime in the mid 1800s.  I’d also love to learn as much as possible about the sawmills in the area and the role they played in the larger timber industry. Do you know anything about these topics?  I’d love to include this and any other information in our ongoing research at the community center I’m working to open, the McElroy House: Organization for Folklife, Oral History, and Community Action.   As always, I’d love to hear your stories.  You can visit me online at www.boileddownjuice.com.  If you want to know more about the McElroy House and our goals, you can check us out online at www.mcelroyhouse.wordpress.com. Of course, I always love handwritten letters or phone calls as well!  Thanks so much for reading and sharing your stories.  I feel very thankful to be learning from you all.   

Undocumented Youth Organize for Civil Rights: Recent Story by Zessna Garcia on Ozarks at Large.

From the United We Dream page. (click on photo to visit source).

A friend recently told me about this Ozarks at Large piece profiling the United We Dream confernece in Texas.  This piece, which aired last Wednesday  and was produced by Ozarks at Large intern Zessna Garcia, details  just a few of the diverse groups which support the DREAM Act, a federal bill which seeks to provide a path to citizenship for undocumented youth who were raised in the United States.

You can listen to the piece by clicking here.  

Don’t forget you can follow Ozarks at Large on Facebook.

In the coming days we’ll explore some of the groups mention in this piece who were represented at the conference.  For more on the DREAM Act and the conference:

http://unitedwedream.org

http://dreamact.info/

http://www.dreamactivist.org/

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/12/01/get-facts-dream-act

http://americasvoiceonline.org/index.php/dream