El Dorado Commercial Historic District Walking Tour Brochure

A brochure that leads the reader on a walking tour through El Dorado, Arkansas. "...One local myth attributes the town's name to the slang expression used by wagon trains going westward: 'Where're you going? To your El Dorado?' - a reference to the legendary Spanish American city of untold riches, sought after 16th century explorers. The most colorful and least-repeated tale claims the name had to do with a strong drink, which could be obtained at first settler Matthew Rainey's store or the El Dorado Bar. Whichever is true, the town 3,000 lived up to its name when, in 1921, the discovery of oil - 'black gold' - transformed the community into a teeming boomtown whose population swelled to 30,000 by 1925. Within the first two years, 56 wells were producing a staggering 50,00 barrels per day. ...Prior to the oil boom, city promoters described El Dorado as being void of enticing saloons, gambling dens, and dance halls, any of which would divert the minds of young ladies from their work or corrupt young boys. Recruiters touted El Dorado as a good town full of good people, good churches, good business advantages and a good school. In 1910, one resident observed that El Dorado was a young town beginning to accept such progressive changes as electricity, running water, and sidewalks; that there was an aristocratic vein running through its citizenry, favoring cultural and artistic pursuits. The oil boom, however, inalterably changed the city. According to one account, the town 'thronged with a seething mass of conglomerate humanity...diamonds and costly furs rubbed elbows with oil-soaked khaki.' Legitimate business were joined by an influx of gamblers, moonshiners, dope-sellers, ladies of the evening, thieves and murderers who transformed areas of the city into colorful and sometimes violent little enclaves known as Pistol Hill, Shotgun Valley, Chicken Farm, and the infamous Hamburger Row. Tales are still told of piston-packin' White Hat Annie, of mules drowning in the city's muddy streets, and of rivers of oil streaming through the city's natural valleys - so convincing that nightflying waterfowl would mistake the glistening mass for a watery resting place. ...As the initial frenzy of the boom slackened, permanent building began. Strained beyond capacity, many downtown structures were razed and rebuilt because of their inadequacy to meet the oil boom's demands. A growing timber industry, poultry production and chemical plants joined oil as important additions to the city's economic base. However, the oil boom of 1920s and the considerable wealth it brought to the area continue to distinguish the city in most Arkansans' minds. Much of the city's extant brick-and-mortar history dates from those hectic years. Its oil boom architecture is symbolic of the city's past, present, and future prosperity. Although influence by the well-intentioned fads of interim eras, it has survived." Project funding was provided in part by a Historic Preservation Fund grant to the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, Department of Arkansas Heritage, administered by the State, Tribal, Local Plans and Grants division, National Park Service, Department of the Interior (grant number P17AF00048).

El Dorado Commercial Historic District Walking Tour Brochure

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