Arkansas History

Historian Jared Phillips draws on Vance Randolph’s collections for stories of Ozark water witchers, yarb doctors, Bible magic, a phantom black hog and the ghost of Dead Man’s Pond.

Randy Dixon digs into the Pryor Center archives to revisit Frank White’s 1980 upset of Bill Clinton, his push for austerity and the creation science law that defined his single term.

Becca Martin Brown on Fayetteville’s Headquarters House, used by both armies in the Civil War, where Arkansas Classical Theatre stages a Poe show through Oct. 31.

Randy Dixon revisits Joe Purcell, the two-term attorney general and three-term lieutenant governor known as “Honest Joe” who served six days as Arkansas governor in 1979.

For American Archives Month, UofA Special Collections staff show how the Mullins Library reading room, digitization lab and architectural archives make Arkansas history available to the public.

Randy Dixon of the Pryor Center looks at David Pryor's two terms as governor, from a failed constitutional rewrite to the Coon Dog Plan, Fort Chaffee refugees and a U.S. Senate appointment.

Historian Jared Phillips looks back at the early years of Razorback football, from Latin professor John Futrall's first team in 1894 to Hugo Bezdek, the coach credited with the Razorback name.

Randy Dixon of the Pryor Center revisits Bob Riley, the World War II veteran and two-term lieutenant governor who served 11 days as Arkansas governor in January 1975.

Randy Dixon returns to the Pryor Center archives with the four years Dale Bumpers spent as Arkansas governor, from reorganizing state government to unseating Sen. J. William Fulbright in 1974.

Tommie Flowers Davis gathered signatures to protect the Fayetteville neighborhood she grew up in. The City Council unanimously approved the Black Historic District on Aug. 4.