Turning the corner in L. A.—Lower Arkansas

Everybody likes to see an underdog, after hitting bottom, start moving toward the top, and when that underdog actually makes a turn-the-corner move, it is all the more satisfying. Yes, and after a season of turning around, the Hogs are going to kick Alabama’s ass, and I want it to be in Tuscaloosa where I can rub their nose in it. But what has that got to do with L. A.?——Lower Arkansas.

Uh, huh, Lower Arkansas gets a small grin, and folks, that just about all we get down here from the rest of you folks up north. Yes, we’ve been the Arkansas underdog for a number of years, and most Arkansas folks think of L. A. as just a place you drive through to get to somewhere else. Yes, L. A. is usually cutoff from state TV weather-casts, and unless there’s a serial killer on the loose, we’re never mentioned on news broadcasts. It’s like we don’t exist… like we’re not even part of the state, but that’s changing.

A few weeks back, as I sat in the Griffin Cabaret and dined on grilled quail and other guests enjoyed Scottish Salmon that had been flown in for the occasion, while on the cabaret stage some great entertainment played to a packed house for Thursday Night Live, I had a moment of reflection. “Yes,” I nodded to Vertis, “This is really working.” It was as if we had turned the corner here in L. A. We’ve been bouncing on the bottom for a good while, and it was a good feeling to see the excitement in the room, and yes, the Griffin Restaurant and Cabaret, was packed, —-knocking ‘em dead with great quality food and entertainment.

Of course, L. A. especially around El Dorado, hasn’t always been down and out like a used tennis ball. Back in the early 20s we were soaring after a Louisiana promoter lucked out and brought in a roaring oil boom gusher. By 1925 Union County’s was somewhere around a 100,000, and we had high schools all over the county: Sandyland, Quinn, Standard Umstead and Crossroads.

Today those former high schools are gone. Most of them don’t even have a building still standing. As the boom played out and the oil flows slowed, El Dorado settled out at around 28,000 in the 1950s. Then a series of closings, like a refinery, and then other plants headed for Mexico or other lowcost manufacturing places, but when the chicken processing plant shut down, El Dorado was scraping to stay above 20,000.

However, the oil boom money left us with a lot to work with, and a college-size football stadium is just a sample of what oil money can do. But the big story has to do with the oil boom families who are still here. Their contributions to El Dorado has made this turn around possible. The three major companies who make El Dorado their headquarters or regional headquarters, Murphy Oil, PotlatchDeltic Corporation, and Murphy USA are all here as a result of the oil boom, and El Dorado is thriving because of their commitment to the town.

Well over a decade ago Claiborne and Elaine Deming made a commitment to pursue education excellent in our town, and their commitment resulted in Murphy Oil making a $50,000,000 commitment to fund the El Dorado Promise, which is a college tuition gift that can’t be over emphasized. Today, kids who never thought they had any hope of attending college are college graduates.

Well, maybe the big news is still Northwest Arkansas, but I don’t think by just being bigger with more people, can’t beat out our quiet rolling hills, even if they’re mostly pine plantations. Yep, a quiet, serene life, where traffic is sparse, and deer are plentiful is L. A. Of course, we like it that way, but we are a part of the state, and as a politician might say “We want equal time.” That’s right and here in the capital of L., A. El Dorado, where we’re 5 minutes from everywhere, we deserve to be heard from, even if it’s just a police report or an obituary. Well, do we deserve it? Let’s look at our hole card, and in every town the hole card is always your downtown. In 2009 Downtown El Dorado beat out over a 1000 Main Street Downtowns nationwide, including all the Main Street towns in Arkansas, for the title of “The Best Downtown in America.” That’s great but, we’re a whole lot more than the best under 50,000 in population downtown in the country.

Yes, Arkansas’ game and fish are are heavily weighted south, and everyone knows if they want a decent shot at a deer, they head south. Union County, in the heart of the deer woods, leads the state almost every year in tagged deer, and we can drive less than ten minutes to a quality fishing hole.

Sure we’ve lost a few folks, but if you think more people equals quality, go live in India or China. But we’ve turned the corner with new quality jobs and residents, and before you can look up, the entertainment capital of Arkansas is going to be El Dorado, The Festival City of the South. The opening shot, which is Phase One of MAD (The Murphy Arts District) in downtown El Dorado has already had the distinction of putting together the greatest group of entertainers ever assembled in the state, and the MAD PlayScape, which opened May 19th, is the largest, and very, very, very, best children’s PlayScape in the whole danged State—as the Pres. would say. I’m sure the hundreds of kids who frolic daily in the spray of the big water feature would surely agree. Along with the PlayScape a new Farmer’s Market opened, and plans are in the works to expand it along the new canopies that line the Amphitheater until it rivals some of the best in the State. But Phase One is only the opening shot, and when Phase Two, which features an 8,000 square feet, four floors MAD Art Museum along with the grand Art Deco Rialto Theater, quality art and Broadway productions will combine to where visitors will have attractions to visit during day and entertainment every night. When MAD is up and running with all the planned additions, it may give us a Northwest Arkansas type of clogged roads as folks head south.

I could go on and on about the acts that are being booked for the Cabaret, the Griffin Music Hall and the MAD Amphitheater. But all I can say is, after the huge crowd that attended the Hank Williams Jr. concert, I would recommend you get your Rascal Flats tickets before they are sold out. Of course, Arkansas’s award winning (7 times and accounting) winning MusicFest is coming up in October with 3 days, 3 stages and 16 acts including Toby Keith, Cardi B and Sammy Hagar. But that’s just a taste of what the Festival City of the South is up to. So hold on to the seat of your pants, because it’s happening. We’ve turned the corner.