Save Terry Mansion

As a lifelong member of the Little Rock community, I was dismayed to learn that the magnificent 1840 Terry Mansion at Seventh and Rock streets in Little Rock has been left to deteriorate. In addition to its historic and aesthetic appeal, the stately old house, built by Albert Pike, holds fond memories for many of us.

As teenagers, my friend and I would walk by the canopied yard and chat with its resident, Mary Terry, whose confinement to a wheelchair, it has been said, did not prevent her from traveling the world. Her pet parrot, perched on her shoulder, added to our conviction that we were in an exotic and uncharted land.

In the late 1950s, Mary’s mother, Mrs. Adolphine Fletcher Terry, figured strongly as a positive force in the Central High crisis. In the parlors of the Terry Mansion, the Women’s Emergency Committee was organized, and the group eventually caused the defeat of segregationist school board members and reopening of the schools. Adolphine’s brother, John Gould Fletcher, was one of Arkansas’ most notable literary figures.

Currently, the house, which was donated to the city for use by the Arkansas Arts Center, sits abandoned and decaying.

What is now raising some eyebrows is that a permanent endowment of over $1.6 million was generated in the 1980s by volunteers and was to be managed by the museum. Where is this endowment now, and why is it not being used to maintain and repair the building it was set up to protect? Meanwhile, $140 million is being spent for a new museum. It is troubling to think the museum would neglect the Terry Mansion and unimaginable to think it has not offered any accounting to the public for the whereabouts of the funds donated in all good faith to protect it.

JEAN CAZORT

Little Rock