ETOWAH PERSONALITIES
BUSTER BROWN
J. M. BRACKETT
WM CHAPMAN DEWEY
CARL HEARD
“BO” MCCOLLUM
E.S. WILDY
BOB WILMOTH

ESTER BINDURSKY

BUSTER BROWN OPERATED STORE IN ETOWAH
Let your mind wander back over the years and think of the shoes that you wore as a child. More than likely they were Buster Brown shoes and had a sticker inside with Buster Brown and his dog inside the shoe.
Perhaps you might even remember the Buster Brown slogan that was “ My name is Buster Brown, I live in a shoe. This is my dog Tige - He lives there too.”
This should bring back memories of a long ago time, when children usually had only one or possibly two set of shoes yearly. In the summer they went barefoot and when school shoes wore out they wore the Sunday best. Buster Brown and his dog really were the hero’s of the day. They were the Nike's, Reebok's of the early day.
Every child had a pair and when purchased you usually received a prize such as a whistle or key chain much like the Cracker Jack prizes. My mother usually took my sister Judy and I to Nathan Weinberg and what a treat that was, usually topped it off but a visit to Massengill Drug Store to get an ice cream soda. We even sported Buster Browns haircuts complete with
bangs and Dutch boy bob.
I know you will remember the funny looking boy and his dog, but did you know that the man went around the country posing as Buster Brown was a midget and once ran a store in Etowah? Yes, it’s true and here are the facts about him that I gathered up from newspapers The Town Crier at Manila and from his aunt who still lives at Etowah. Her name is Mrs Jennie Sharp and what a delightful time we had visiting with her. She has so many wonderful memories of Major; I couldn’t put them all down. Mrs Jennie remembered his home was at Hornersville, MO before he married her aunt. You see Major Ray married a Miss Jennie Meadows, so he always had a close relationship with the Etowah community.
They were a precious couple and it was for Miss Jennie that he gave up the sawdust trial
Major Willie Ray, the name Major is purely honorary but it is always used with his name. He was born in Tennessee on April 22 1860. Apparently, he was an average size boy, but when attaining the tenth year he simply never grew more than 3 1/2 feet tall.
When just a boy his parents Mr and Mrs J.M. Ray moved to MO. The family resided near Cotton Plant, MO until 1881 when he capitalized on his size and joined the Will Stone Circus. It was from this traveling show that he gained the name of Major. After traveling with the group for about two years the boat sank and everything was lost. After being at home, which was Hornersville at this time, he joined the Sells Brothers circus and while at Paragould, AR he met his future wife, Miss Jennie Meadows, also a midget, about an inch taller than her husband. They were married on the stage before an audience of over 2000. They continued for several years and billed as the world’s smallest couple, and were teamed with a Captain Shields and his wife who were billed as the world’s tallest couple. They were originally from the Turrell area.
They toured the major cities of the U.S. and had audiences with royalty in Hawaii, and the crowning bit of their lives was a command appearance for the King and Queen of England with the Royal couple placing a midge on each knee.
In the early 1900s they left the show business trail and returned to Hornersville to live, and they induced the Captain and wife to come with them. Mrs Jennie was of the opinion that something came up about reading the Bible and not really being absorbed in the circus. She was a very religious person and she and the Major were always supportive of the Baptist church.
With their savings they started a store in Hornersville and another in Etowah. In both places he sold Buster Brown shoes for boys and girls. When Major Ray want a pair of shoes for himself or Miss Jenny, he had them ordered them specially made from the Brown Shoe Co in St. Louis.
Being a good customer of the company he naturally grew acquainted with the officers of the Company and the idea of him being Buster Brown was concocted.
While operating the store at Hornersville, a salesman came in and told him the Brown Shoe Co was on the look out for a small person to represent Buster Brown, so Major Ray was hired.
He usually wore a cap and had a Little Lord Fauntleroy suit of blue velvet. His dog Tige could wink and he always went with Buster Brown. One of the first visits was to the Worlds Fair in New York where he was such a success that an addition to the Pavilion had to be hastily assembled. They were known nation-wide and many Buster Brown Products were from this Brown Shoe advertisement.
Tige was there too, He always smiled and winked at what Buster Brown did for he was a wise dog. After the initial surprise of first seeing and shaking hands with the real Buster Brown, people always wanted to know who he really was and were very curious about him.
During his lifetime he visited the relatives at Etowah many times. Hardin Meadows and Harley were Miss Jennie’s Rays brothers. Mrs Jennie Sharp was named for her small aunt who died in 1915.

THE OBITUARY OF OUR GARDEN POINT CEMETERY BENEFACTOR: DEWEY
William Chapman Dewey, 52, prominent attorney, lumberman, and landowner died at the Methodist Hospital in Memphis on Sunday, January 7, 1940.
With him at the time of his death were his wife, Mrs. Louise Taylor Dewey and his brother, Curtis Dewey.
He was secretary of Chapman Dewey Lumber Co of Marked Tree and a director of the old Kansas City and Memphis Land Although the lumber business occupied much of his time, Mr. Dewey continued his law practice and had offices in the Exchange Building. He had a large law library and proved his ability as an attorney by passing the bar while still a student at the Virginia Law School from which he received his B.L. degree.
An active church worker, Mr. Dewey had served for many years as senior warden at St. Luke Episcopal Church, and had taken an active interest in Civic affairs.
Born in Kansas City MO, Mr. Dewey came to Memphis with his parents when he was five years of age. He prepared for college at Concord, Mass and continued his education at For a number of year he was associated with the late Judge Allen Hughes in the practice of law in Memphis following his admission to the Tennessee Bar in 1913. He was the son of the late William Curtis and Eula Dewey, and followed his father into the lumber business. He married in 1917. Mr. and Mrs. Dewey had two sons, William C. Dewey Jr., and Edward C Dewey. Mr. Dewey was an ardent sportsman and was especially fond of hunting. He was a member of the Mansha Club, PSI Fraternity.
Funeral services were held at the residence by Rev. Charles Stuart Hale, pastor of St Luke's Episcopal church. Burial was in Elmwood Cemetery.
Active pallbearers were John Phillips Jr., W. Burr Chapman, Harold Scott, James J Pleasants, Sam P Walker, Dunbar Abston. J Pervis Milnor, Vance Alexander and J E McCadden.
The judiciary and directors of the Shelby County Bar other prominent Memphians were honorary pallbearers.

JAMES MOSES BRACKETT
“JIM’ BRACKETT pioneer citizen dies at age 91
James M “Jim” Brackett, 91, retired farmer and pioneer resident of the Lepanto-West Ridge area for over 56 years, died October 1, 1968 in Pontiac, MI where he had lived for the past year with his daughter, Mrs Jean Easterling, during a long illness.
Born in Cleveland County, NC, Mr. Brackett worked in St Louis and Memphis helping to erect buildings. He came to the Lepanto area in 1907 and homesteaded 138 acres in the vicinity of Brackett’s Bridge on highway 135 four miles north of Lepanto. The first bridge across the Little River there he designed and helped to build and it was named for him. He also operated a sawmill in the area.
He was married in 1918 to Miss Ethel Pyatt, a Lepanto school teacher. Later the couple moved to the West Ridge community where Mr Brackett farmed, designed and constructed the spacious home in 1937 where he and his family lived and what is known as Brackett‘s corner.
Builder, homesteader, draftsman, farmer, Jim Brackett left a mark of progress in whatever he undertook and the mark of a respectable citizen.
He leaves one son: Glenn Brackett of Wyandotte, MI,; three daughters, Mrs Jean Easterling of Pontiac, MI, Mrs Jimmie L Woods of Memphis and Mrs Ruth Carpenter of West Memphis.

WILDY
Ed Wildy Cut a Road to His Farm
Today, Fourteen Years Later, Paved Roads and Master Farming Greet the Visitor by Stanley Carpenter
The Progressive Farmer Dec 22 1928

Ed Wildy of Etowah lives 15 miles west of Osceola, at the end of the Osceola-Little River hard surface road. It was in 1914 that he brought his bride down from the Corn Belt of Illinois, and took an extra man along to help him cut the saplings out of the proposed right of way for this road just ahead of the four mules that drew his wagon and carried his few household belongings and his wife to the couple of hundred undeveloped acres on Little River that form the nucleus of the Wildy farm today.
The elder Wildy, a successful Illinois farmer, had come South a few years before, at the insistence of a local real estate dealer, and seeing ahead the ultimate development of the fertile Little River section of Mississippi County, had invested in a partially cleared tract, but the one crop system and the absentee landlord problem had made the venture unprofitable.
“There’s no question about the land being as good as you’ll find anywhere, but you can’t make anything out of the land unless you live on it.” The elder Wildy complained, and Ed then 23, proposed that it be lived on then and persuaded the present Mrs Wildy that the future would surely justify the hardships that are the lot of men and women who grow up with a new country.

Fourteen Years of Improvement
That was 14 years ago. Yesterday I drove out the Wildy farm to look at Earl Wildy’s club acre. Earl is 12, the eldest of Ed Wildy’s four fine boys and one of the best corn club members. Ed was at home and the three of us drove over the farm.
Of the 200 original acres, 80 acres were in the woods in 1914. That had been cleared and an adjoining 240 acres bough since that time, make 440 acres of cleared land in the tract. A forty lying near by is still in the woods. That has been purchased recently.
On hundred and sixty acres of the farm is planted annually to staple cotton, which for the past 14 years has made an average yearly yield of seven-eighths of a bale to the acre. Mr Wildy is recognized as one of the leading cotton farmers in a county that leads the South in point of acreage production, yet his acreage in cotton is never more than his acreage in corn, and represents not more than a third of his cultivated land at any time.
He used little commercial fertilizer, but never plants cotton on a field that has not the previous year grown a leguminous crop. He grows only improved varieties of cotton, works the crop with improved farm machinery, and plants seed that are seldom more than two years away from the breeder. It is his policy to plant only such acreage to cotton as he can properly cultivate and harvest early in the season with the available supply of labor.

Has Always Lived at Home
A few years ago the Mississippi County Chamber of Commerce compiled the statistics showing the alarming quantities of food and foodstuff shipped annually into the county, and launched a county-wide live-at-home campaign, inaugurating a five year program of safe farming with cotton holding its prominence as the one most profitable cash crops in this section of the country, but profits only when produced as a part of a balanced program calling first for the growing of all the food and feed stuffs consumed by the men and mules who make the crop.
The campaign was one of the successful agricultural campaigns ever promoted in Mississippi County and marked the beginning of a safer and saner program of farm development than had ever been practiced before, but the most convincing arguments put forth by promoters of the campaigns were simple reference to a few outstanding farmers in the county who, for years prior to the campaign, had practiced the tenets of the live at home program, looking upon the system not only as safe farming and business, had comfortable living as well.
Among these few outstanding farmers was Ed Wildy of Etowah. Balancing his 160 acres of cotton on one side are 160 acres of corn with soybeans drilling into every row of it and on the other side 90 acres sowed to alfalfa, oats and clover which furnish feed for the work stock on the place and pasturage for the drove of hogs from which Mr. Wildy derives an annual income of approximately $2000 besides supplying all the pork and lard necessary for his home use. The hogs on the Wildy place are made to harvest their own food. They are allowed to “hog off” the soybeans and corn and Mr Wildy has found that after alfalfa is two years old, 15 to 20 shoults to the acre can be pastured on it with materially affecting the yield.
There are still many farmers along the Osceola-Little River Road who cling to the fallacy that they can buy feed on which to grow cotton. To these farmers Mr Wildy always less corn and hay to sell, and the proceeds derived from these crops each year are according to his records, sufficient to provide for his living expenses and pay the taxes on his place, regardless of whether he makes a bale of cotton. He receives an average price of $30 per ton for all his alfalfa hay and buyers come after it.

Income From Four Major Sources
Thus the Wildy farm in reality produces four major cash crops - cotton, corn, hay, and hogs. In addition to this, about twenty-five of good grade cows and calves are kept on the pasture, furnishing milk and butter for the family’s use, milk to feed the flock of the pure-bred Barred Rock chicken that is Mrs. Wildy’s particular project, and beef for the family consumption and for the market.
Mr. Wildy’s theory of profitable farming in the delta is basically the theory advocated by Dan T Gray of the College of Agriculture. It is not the oft-preached theory of small acreage intensely cultivated in small qualities of diversified crops, and cotton eliminated but the broader plan of more cotton on fewer acres and more acres-to buy and corn, with the labor problem solved through improved farm machinery.
And on the Wildy farm the hay and corn yield compare favorable with the well-above-the-average cotton yields, alfalfa producing an average of 4 tons to the acres, clover 3 1/2 tons, and corn averaging 40 bushels to the acre over a period of ten years. The hay crop is harvested with the latest improved machinery, and other farm equipment includes, beside the necessary cultivator, etc, a tractor and trucks.
Mr. Wildy attributes his success with alfalfa to three things; - he always sows on well-drained land, in a well-prepared seedbed, and used good seed. He prefers fall seeding on land that has grown a crop of soybeans or cowpeas during the summer.
When the soybeans or peas are cut and ready to be raked into windrows, in order to conserve the moisture already in the soil his disk harrow follow the ---rules. In this way, after the hay is taken off, the ground is not exposed to the sun at all until it is disked. He finds that by following this method, with just an average season there is sufficient moisture in the soil to bring up the alfalfa. Seeding is done at the ratio of 25 pounds per acre and as near to the 15th of September as possible.

Value Steadily Increasing
The Wildy farm represents an investment of approximately $80,000. The 480 acres of land conservatively estimated at $125 per acres would total $60,000; the other $20,000 is invested in livestock, machinery and building improvements on the place, including the thoroughly modern and convenient farm home.
In 1914, 120 acres of the original 200 acres tract was in cultivation, but the tract was otherwise unimproved. Instead of paying his father the rent on the land for 11 years Ed Wildy returned to the place in the way of improvements the approximate amount of rent ordinarily paid for land in the Little River section of the country. This arrangement continued until three years ago, when as a result of continued improvements, the place had practically doubled in value and the elder Wildy deeded the tract to his son for the consideration of $2.00 per acres per year to be paid annually during the lifetime of the elder Wildy. This amount represents a small annual rate of interest on the original investment and assumes Ed Wildy ultimate ownership of the property he had developed.
The rest of the present investment represents Mr. Wildy’s individual accommodations and it had derived solely from his farming operations, because he is engaged in no other business activities.
The Wildy farm is all “made land,” build up during the years of the annual Mississippi River overflows before the present system of levees was constructed, and the original fertility of the soil. Mr. Wildy has maintained through a cropping system that calls for 60 per cent of his cultivated acreage to be sowed leguminous crops each year. He compared his land to a bank account, which no matter how big it may be, if it is constantly drawn on and no deposits made, will eventually be depleted. He avoids this outcome by depositing added fertility to his soil each year through the leguminous crops he sows.
Mr. Wildy’s record shows that he makes an annual return of 10 per cent on his investment. Of this, 2 per cent is regularly returned to the farm in the way of improvements, which includes the clearing each year of some woodlands. At present only 40 acres of the 430 that he owns is woods. As this is cleared the timber is sawed at a small sawmill operated on the place and this lumber is used for the construction of farm buildings.

Comfortable Attractive Home
The Wildy home is complete in every detail and provided all the conveniences of a city home, including electric lights, running water, and furnace hear, with the added attraction of a year round garden, an orchard, and vineyard. Laborsaving devices in the home include an electric washing machine and iron, vacuum, kitchen sink and drain board.
Mrs. Wildy manages her home quite as capably as her husband runs the farm. A flock of 150 Barred Rock hens supplies eggs for the table and for market; and broilers for home use and for the market.
Between 400 and 500 quarts of canned vegetable, fruits and meats are in Mrs. Wildy’s cellar at the beginning of each winter. They represent the surplus from the garden, orchard, and livestock projects, preserved by means of a steam pressure cooker. The cellar also yields a supply of potatoes, peanuts, turnips and beans, and still, during the growing season the garden plan calls for the reservation of two rows down its length where flowers are cultivated along with the vegetables to provide cut flowers for the house without disturbing the group planting around the place.
Mrs. Wildy teaches a class of girls in the Etowah Sunday school and is active in the work of the local School Improvement Association. Mr Wildy is director in the Etowah School and a commissioner in the Etowah Road Improvement District. The eldest of their four boys is an enthusiastic 4-H club member and already a good farmer.

CARL HEARD
APPLIES MECHANICAL ‘KNOW-HOW’ BUILDS OWN FARM MACHINERY
Sturdy and skillful hands guided by a mechanical ‘know-how’ have enabled Carl Heard, a comparatively small farmer of 570 acres in South Mississippi County to make the economic transition into mechanized farming. . He builds most of his own farm machinery.
The machinery that Mr Heard has turned out of his well-equipped machine shop on the farm, only for use on his farm has been geared in construction to meet the small farmer’s needs.
“Too often,” he explains,’ the larger type of farm machinery, in my opinion, is best adapted for the thousands of acres farmer who can meet the economic cost. But for my needs from an economics standpoint, I have built the type of machinery that will do the job for my farm, at my own price.

This machinery includes such equipment as a recently completed earth-moving machine, a heavy-duty disk carrying frame that he built three years ago. a land leveler built in 1952. a portable gasoline driven grain elevator, erected in 1950. and there are other pieces of small machinery around the farm such as sub-spoiler ditching plow and innumerable others.
Mr. Heard who began farming in 1939 when he acquired 220 acres and then rented 320 watched carefully the trend toward mechanized farming and added. “I read everything I could get my hands on to meet the challenge.”
It was immediately following World Ward II when so many of the veterans were returning to farms where farming methods had changed during their absence in the war years, that Mr Heard read the advice given then by the noted economist, Roger Baboon.
“I can’t remember the exact words he used,” Mr Heard said but recalled that Mr Babson advised that the successful small farmer of the future would be the man who acquired the ‘know-how’ for mechanized farming.
Mr Heard was more fortunate in one respect, than most smaller farmers, he had gained through the experience as a millwright in southeast Missouri and Poinsett Counties and around cotton gin machinery, the basic knowledge of machinery.
By combining the mechanical ‘know-how’ and the experience he has had since farming, Mr Heard has developed his land to the extent that it is well-drained and he had put back more into the land than he had taken out. As a result, his farm is one of the better farms of South Mississippi County.
This new earth-moving machinery enabled him to fill in low places on other parts of the farm that hold water following a rain.
The machine was built for approximately $400 exclusive of his labor. “I tried to build this machine with the small farmer in mind to work in sand and black dirt. A $5000 machine of a larger type might do more but my machine is more practical for a small farmer. He can’t afford to have $5000 tied up in a machine working his own land.”
Mr Heard said the most important thing for a small tractor to load dirt is to be able to control the depth of cut. This machine has dual truck tires just in front of the blade so as to be able to keep the machine from digging in too fast.
The machine weighs about two tons and has an overall length for about 14 feet. It has a three and one third yard capacity. He used an old truck frame of a two-ton truck chassis, two rear ends off of two old trucks, about some plate steel, both new and used that for around $100. He built hydraulic cylinders from discarded parts.
“This was a big saving,” he said referring to the hydraulic cylinders, “for if I have purchased new material, it would have cost $160 just for the cylinders alone.”
He used two old outmoded cylinders from a cotton picking machine that he owned and acquired two more cylinders of similar type from another farmer for $5. To complete the hydraulic installation he purchased two values for $56, hose and piping for $47. He added that any big heavy-duty row-crop tractor could easily handle the machine.
The heavy-duty disk carrying frame that he built, carried up to a $3000-lb disk. It too was built our of old junk scrap-iron, and other than the tires, plus his labor, it cost about $50. It is 10 feet, six inch disk and frame about 12 feet.
The land-leveling machine was built at an approximately cost of $300, also of junk accumulated here and there. It weighs about 3000 pounds, has a 10-foot blade on it and a 31-foot span.
He bought one of the first self-propelled combines to appear in the area a number of years ago and to off-set the cost he did about $8000 worth of custom work that first year most for late Mr A. C. Spelling of the Etowah community.
To facilitate the harvesting of soybeans, Mr Heard built a portable gasoline driven elevator in 1950. All of these machines are shown in pictures accompanying this article.
Because he has the machinery to aid his farming efforts, Mr Heard had 15 acres of wheat last year and after harvesting and selling it, turned around and planted it in soybeans and harvested 45 bushels.
Mr Heard has one permanent man who works on the farm and aids him in his machine shop, and two others who held with the farm work. In addition he owns two row-crop tractors and one heavy-duty tractor. Off of one 29-acre plot of cotton last year he harvested 34 bales despite the rained-out year of 1957. This was done, Mr Heard pointed out, because he was able to get the most out of the land that he had built up through cross-plowing, land-leveling and ditching operations through farming stepped-up by his additional home-made machinery.
From his acreage, Mr Heard and wife Georgia have lived well. Their oldest daughter, the former Shirley Heard, now Mrs Glenn Brackett of Fayetteville, NC is a graduate of University of Arkansas and how teaching home economics in Fayetteville, NC, their other daughter, Christine Heard is a junior at Keiser High School.
The advice of Roger Babson to apply “know-how’ in modern mechanized farming, has enabled Carl Heard to know how his future farming operations will emerge on the black side of the ledger that he carefully keeps for his own satisfaction and to the Government’s satisfaction.

“BOB” WILMOTH

The Lepanto News Record
ROBERT “BOB” WILMOTH
Robert H. “Bob” Wilmoth nearing, 20, was driving a yoke of oxen pulling a long-wagon when he jogged along trails shadowed by virgin timber that led him to South Mississippi County in June 5, 1897.
Towering Strength
Only the remote sound of a timber man’s saw cut through the stillness of woods when “Bob” Wilmoth, towering with strength, over six feet tall, braced muscular arms to crack a whip by the stubborn oxen in an effort to spur their gait.
Beyond the woods of Etowah, then known as Jackson’s Island, was a logging camp, his destination where for the next fifteen years he was to engage in contract rafting and running of timber down Little River to the Chapman Dewey Lumber Mills at Marked Tree.
Today, belying his eighty years, Bob Wilmoth is still actively engaged in managing his grocery store that grew out of a commissary established at Etowah in 1912 to serve the loggers who were reluctant to make a day’s travel to Lepanto or Manila, now a short drive, the nearest points their grocery buying.
Bob Wilmoth sank his roots deep in the alluvial south Mississippi County soil that Government geologist once compared only to the fertile soil along the river Nile in Egypt. He made the transition from the timber era to the agricultural period of today by acquiring the ownership of 488 acres of land and renting 165 to farm a total of 653 acres, now assisted by his son Robert Jr.
Around the commissary and now the brick store of Bob Wilmoth has revolved the life of Etowah, during the past forty-six years. Former timber men turned farmers, mostly retired and their descendant still gather around the potbellied wood stove in the store to swap community news and discuss current national problems confronting the farmer and businessman.
A Logger, Timber man
Although Bob Wilmoth has been a merchant and farmer for forty-six years, he would rather remember the day of his youth as a logger and timber man. One event that remains indelibly impressed in his mind was in the fall of 1897 when he and a fellow timber man Will Davidson drove a yoke of oxen and log wagon to Marked Tree that took a period of two days. En route back to Jackson’s Island from Marked Tree with two yokes of oxen, the men had reached the vicinity of which is now Potters Bridge where just south of the area was Buck’s Ford when night descended.
Mr Wilmoth recalls how he approached David Buck owner of the only trading post in the area encompassed in a two-deck houseboat that also housed the post office that the itinerant preacher Buck had established.
Stopped at Buck’s Ford
The two men asked Preacher Buck if they could tie up their oxen and log-wagon for the night to the landing. And the venerable gentleman said, “yes, on one condition” and the two timber men exchanged telepathic, questioning glances, as they waited for the “conditions.”
“My wife and I would like for you to have supper with us and spend the night” the proprietor of Buck’s Ford said, inviting them into the houseboat.
We slept that night on a pallet alongside the mail pouches, Mr Wilmoth remembered. “And after supper we all went down to a clearing where Buck’s son-in-law, Jim Wilson was holding a revival meeting for the folks up and down the river. In the clearing was a little schoolhouse where the Bud Johnson land is located. “That little clearing around Buck’s Ford and the schoolhouse was the only opening for fifteen miles,” Mr. Wilmoth reminisced. “And when we started back, we passed through what is now Lepanto but then was the tallest canebrake you ever saw and swampy. no one lived that that vicinity.”
Bob Wilmoth said he ran his biggest raft of logs in 1898 to Marked Tree; 525,000 feet of logs mixed with cottonwood, cypress, gum and ash.
“Frank Ricketts was a partner in the contract with me. We had to cut the timber in the winter then when the waters rose in the spring; we ran the raft of logs for delivery to the Chapman Dewey Lumber Mills in Marked Tree. I think we received $1.50 per thousand feet.”
He explained how they sank the cypress and cottonwood alongside on each side of the log rafts to keep the hardwood of gum, sycamore and oak from sinking.
Mr Wilmoth said that such steamboats as the “Mohawk,” “Ike,” “Donaldson,” and Captain Marshall’s boat “Edward” plied the Little River and St Francis river waters when he came into the area.
“I first came to Arkansas in 1893 and settled for a short while in the Mangrum community northwest of Caraway. I was 18 and had come to the Jonesboro area to visit relatives the previous year from Tupelo, Mississippi where I was born.” He was first a logging superintendent for the Pierce brothers of Jonesboro who had logging contract’s Islands from the Big Lake area to be run to Marked Tree.
Mr. Wilmoth said he purchased his first holding in Jackson Island from Gus Smith, father of Bud and Ross Smith of the Hatcher community.
Jackson’s Island named for “Uncle Frank” Jackson whose step-granddaughter, Mrs Charlotte Porter still lives at Etowah, had died before Mr Wilmoth settled in the area, but he knew Taylor and Marion Jackson, brothers of “Uncle Frank” who had long been dead.
Mr Wilmoth served as assistant to the first postmaster Marion Jackson when Etowah post office was first established. He has served as a director on the board of the Etowah School; he is now president of the Etowah Gin Company, and a devoted member of the Masonic Lodge and a 32nd degree Mason.
Mr. Wilmoth’s first wife died and shortly thereafter he was married to Miss Myrtle Harrison. They have nine children: Robert, Jr., Jane, Sue, Katherine, Andy, Bettye, Billie Sue Sally, and Carolyn.
The strength and foresight that led Robert “Bob” Wilmoth to Jackson’s Island in 1897 has enabled him to read the fruits of his labors, to bask in the happiness of his large family, and to merit the respect from his neighbors and friends who think there is no like Bob Wilmoth.

BOB WILMOTH FAMILY

Osceola Times March 7 1996
Bob and Caroline Wilmoth were pioneer settlers in the Etowah area. Mr Wilmoth came to the area in 1898. He had logging interests and with his crew, he cleared a great deal of land out that way. Later he opened a commissary. Wilmoth’s store became a landmark in the area.
The Wilmoth’s had nine children, all girls except the boys, Robert Jr, and Andy. The family lived in a large rambling house on the left side of the curve going into Etowah. It had a large porch and they enjoyed passing the time of day with people. Mrs Wilmoth had help with her brood in Charlotte Porter, who ran the house, cooked, gardened, or whatever was necessary. It was a happy household, full of fun and laughter.
The school and church was a short distance away, making the community self contained. The streets were dusty and unpaved and in the summertime, the kids wore no shoes.
Etowah had a small post office, run in the 40’s, 50’ s and 60’s by Jennie Sharp who was from one of the pioneer families. There was a pool hall, a barber shop, and of course, a beer hall. Dr. Lunsford and Mr Sharp were deputies and sworn to uphold the law.
E.H. Stephens worked for Mr Wilmoth as a bookkeeper for several years. His pay was $100 a month and he drove back and forth to Osceola. Remember this was middle of the depression and you were lucky to get a job.
On Saturday nights, Mrs Emma, who owned the picture show in Osceola would send a film out by my father and it was be shown at the store or the gin. A white sheet was used as the background. It was a wild and wonderful time, everyone clapping and hollering for their favorite, who was Hoot Gibson.
After the show was over the benches were pushed back against the wall ad a dance was held. It was a fun time for everyone.
Etowah people were loyal and almost fierce in their bid for independence. A family in need was looked after. Welfare didn’t exist, so the citizens of this community took care of one another.
The Wilmoth’s were loving parents and they wee concerned about education for their children and saw to it that they all graduated from school, which by the time they grew up, was relocated to West Ridge. The closing of the school at Etowah signaled the demise of the closeness of old Etowah.
When the school closed so did the pie suppers, the basketball games and the children’s plays, called operetta’s at that time. No longer could the mother walk over to the school and see about her child. The good ole days were gone. Yes, they have a rather new post office a few houses and trailers. People at Etowah can now enjoy the new hard-surfaced road into Lepanto or Osceola. Some afternoon , take a drive out to Etowah and Reminisce a bit.

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MORE ABOUT 'BOB' WILMOTH

Shirley, here is the tribute that Esther Bindursky wrote about Dad at his death of which I spoke about to you. It certainly is a sweet thing she did. We knew nothing about the article until it was printed in the Lepanto-News Record. I don't know if you would want to put it on the Garden Point site or not. I will also e-mail you information about Esther and her credentials. Sally

Esther Bindursky wrote this remembrance of Robert Wilmoth at the time of his death July 26, 1966.

A MAN, in every sense of the word, whose life and character merited the respect of his family, friends and neighbors, and whose body was once as strong as the trees he felled to clear the land where he lived for 69 years, passed from the familiar scene Tuesday. ‘Bob’ Wilmoth and Etowah, were synonymous in South Mississippi County. ‘Bob’ Wilmoth was Etowah and home, to countless pioneers and late-comers and to innumerable residents now in other parts of the nation, for around his home, land and store, revolved the community life of Etowah. As a family man, community leader and citizen, whose word was “his bond,” ‘Bob’ Wilmoth had no peer. His love of people, from the youngster and the teenager, to young adults, and those who sought his advice, drew all into his warmth of friendliness. His, was a hard and rugged life of the pioneer developer, who lived out a lifetime in one community that he loved…through the timber era and the transition into one of agriculture…an experience which will not be duplicated today. Few men have lived such a full life and lived to see the fruits of his labors, as ‘Bob’ Wilmoth, and this entire area, has lost a friend, who has earned his rest. He was a good man. E.B.

WILDY BARN
Osceola Times February 5, 2004
Wildy Barn Listed on Historic Register
The Edward Samuel Wildy Barn at Etowah in Mississippi County has been listed on the National Register of historically significant properties, Arkansas
Historic Preservation Program director Ken Grunewald announced.
The Edward Samuel Wildy Barn at 1198 S Arkansas Highway 136 is a two-story, three bay, gambrel roof structure built in 1915 and surrounded by a windmill, silo, two water troughs and several associated concrete pads.
“The Wildy Barn is built from cypress wood that was abundant in Mississippi County at the time of it’s construction, the National Register nomination says. It is one of the few barns still standing in northeastern Arkansas in its original condition. The barn sits on the original home site (selected for its higher elevation) of the Wildy farm.”

Etowah Mayor Wins AG Community Service Award
Osceola Times November 25, 2004
Charles “Bo” McCollum, AG Community Service Grand Winner, wears many hats to serve Etowah.
It is not unusual to serve as a volunteer firefighter or EMT in a small community or to take an active role in the city’s government. However, Charles “Bo” McCollum, the 2004 Chairman’s Award winner for Community Services, does all three and also holds down a full-time job in the packaging department at American Greetings Osceola facility.
McCollum has donated more than 11000 hours in service to the community of Etowah. In addition to his work as a volunteer firefighter and EMT, he also serves as the town’s elected mayor. According to Glovie Guy, packaging manager, an McCollum’s nominator, it’s his wonderful spirit of community, as well as his rive truly make a difference, that is so inspiring.
“Bo had won several award and certificated for his efforts. While I know this is one of his proudest moments, his greatest satisfaction should come from knowing that he is almost single-handedly responsible for improving the quality of life in Etowah,” Glovie Says.
This improvement is clearly apparent at the Etowah volunteer fire department, where McCollum is not only a proud member, but was also instrumental in its founding. Since helping create the department, he has taken the initiative to obtain greater training for his group and has gained funding to build a fire station, install fire hydrants and purchase vital fire fighting equipment. His leadership may be best exemplified, however by his work as the town’s volunteer mayor. As mayor, McCollum has single-handedly secured major grants to develop community parks, improve the local cemetery and upgrade the town’s water and sewer systems. His tireless efforts to improve water and sewer system were rewarded with a $1.6 million grant, and as a result work on the improved systems will be completed by the beginning of 2005.
In all that he does it seems that McCollum simply can’t help but go that extra mile., Never satisfied with what he has accomplished, he is always working to make everything around him better. This tireless devotion is not lost on his co-workers at Osceola. “Bo is just not-stop,” Glovie says. “His enthusiasm and energy are contagious and the community of Etowah and American Greetings are very lucky to have someone like him.

ESTHER BINDURSKY: Our Historical Record Keeper*

Esther Bindursky (1905–1971)
Esther Bindursky, editor of the weekly Lepanto News Record for thirty-four years, was an award-winning journalist and photographer known for her perceptive feature and column writing, newsworthy pictures, and selfless community service.
Esther Bindursky was born on January 28, 1904, in Drew, Mississippi. Her father, Meyer Bindursky, born in Bessarabia (which was divided between Moldova and Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union), was a merchant, and her mother, Minnie Iskiwitch, a native of Poland, was a homemaker. Bindursky had three brothers.
Shortly after her graduation from high school in 1922, she moved with her parents to Lepanto (Poinsett County). As a young woman, she played the piano for silent movies in the Lepanto movie theater. When the devastating Flood of 1927 struck the east Arkansas Delta, she became secretary of the Poinsett County American Red Cross chapter and then became a caseworker for the Arkansas Emergency Relief Commission.
In her role as a flood relief worker, she supplied information to the Memphis, Tennessee, Commercial Appeal, which served as a daily newspaper for east Arkansas. In the early 1930s, she became a correspondent for that paper, reporting from her home in Lepanto. She began with reports of natural disasters, highway fatalities, violent crimes, and obituaries and later progressed to feature stories carrying her byline. In 1937, Guy Graves, who was publishing two weekly papers in Poinsett County, established the weekly Lepanto News Record and asked Bindursky to be its editor.
From 1937 until her death in 1971, Bindursky was the only staff member of the paper. She wrote all the news, features, society stories, and obituaries. She designed and sold ads, took pictures, and wrote a column titled “This One’s On Me,” with the frequent subtitle, “Draggin’ Main.” She often assumed the duties of printer in making up pages.
She was a charter member of the Arkansas Newspaper Women when it was founded in 1949 and was its president in 1950. This organization was a precursor to the Arkansas Press Women.
Her mastery was evident in the first-place awards she received from national and state press organizations. These included a National Editorial Association award for community service; awards from the National Federation of Press Women (NFPW) for photography, advertising, and feature writing; and awards from the Arkansas Press Association and Arkansas Newspaper Women for column and feature writing, general excellence, typography, photography, and community service. This recognition led to Bindursky being invited to be the featured weekly editor at the University of Missouri’s Journalism Week in 1956.
In addition to reporting on local events, she wrote features for the Commercial Appeal and the Arkansas Gazette. In 1937, the national Literary Digest magazine gave a full page to her coverage of Lepanto’s annual fall event, the Terrapin Derby. Her story about a young Lepanto man, Staff Sergeant Jimmy Hendrix, who won the Congressional Medal of Honor, ran as a feature in the October 20, 1945, issue of the Saturday Evening Post.
She was also a skilled photographer. One of her nationally circulated news photos of a nun who survived a 1955 train wreck in Marked Tree (Poinsett County) that killed five people won a first-place NFPW award and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
Bindursky used vacation time to attend national editorial and press organization meetings, and she developed a nationwide circle of friends and admirers. In 1960, the National Editorial Association invited her to be among the first group of American journalists to visit eight European countries, including the Soviet Union. When Lepanto civic leaders learned of the invitation, they secretly raised the tour cost, $1,575, and surprised her with it at the annual Chamber of Commerce dinner, at which she was named Woman of the Year.
During the delegation’s visit to Russia, she had her picture taken in front of a golden door at the Palace of the Czars and said of it, “My father, who once had to serve in Czar Nicholas’s Army… would have gotten a bang out of that solid gold door. Strange, the Russians, who abhor money as a dirty, capitalistic menace, should guard and treasure this memento of the past.”
Bindursky died of lung cancer in Memphis on April 23, 1971. Her death was reported in a three-paragraph obituary in the April 25, 1971, issue of The New York Times. She is buried in the Memphis Temple Israel Cemetery. She had never married and had no children.
For additional information:
Jernigan, Gail, and Sue Chambers. A History of Lepanto. Lepanto, AR: Museum of Lepanto, 1989.
Kenny, Catherine. “Draggin’ Main with Esther Bindursky.” Arkansas Times 13 (March 1985): 40–43, 71–72.

* Shirley here: I could not amassed the volumns here had it not been for Esther Bindusky and The Lepanto New Record. Though it of interest to those who read or subscribed to the paper to understand we had one of the best.

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