Happy Birthday Cody

Home Made Pork and Beans

Recipe here

RIP Amanda

Amanda Kay Duty ~~ 1981-2004

Ugh

I'm almost positive these were the cabins we stayed a night in at the top of the mountains on our way to Ft. Smith. This was my first experience ever staying somewhere besides home. It was so fun and so beautiful there. When we woke up that next morning and looked out the window the mountains were breathtaking. There was a low fog that hung in the valleys while the mountains glistened with dew as the sun struck the foliage. I remember it as the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I think we stayed in the really tiny one because I remember the cabin being very small.

White River

We stopped at this river on our way down to Arkansas when I was a kid. We got to go into the river and it was the first time I had ever been in water except for a bath. I was terrified. My Dad kept telling me he was going to throw me into the deep part and he bet I would learn to swim really quickly then. He didn't seem to realize how long it takes a kid to get used to the feeling of water before even trying to go under or try to float. I am still scared of deep water.

This river flows north, it is a really strange thing to see.

More Mountain Pictures

We could see the mountains driving back through them on Monday. I think they would have been a lot prettier in Summer when they would have been all green. Still I'm glad I got to see them again.

Electric Trolley

I saw my first electric trolley today in historic downtown Ft. Smith. I had seen electric buses in St. Joe when I was a kid but I had never seen a trolley:

House in Ft. Smith

We drove around looking for the house I lived in while in Ft. Smith. This looks a lot like it only it was smaller and this one looks like it had been built onto several times. I don't remember a fireplace but that could have come later too. But like I said I was in 4th grade and that was a long time ago. The address for this house was 1401 N. 19th.

Wordless

We drove through a Federal Cemetery today, something I had never done before. It is awe inspiring to see the sea of white stones that almost seem endless. But it was the sight of these tomb stones, which numbered in the hundreds if not thousands that left me with no word to describe the feeling:




I guess I had never imagined just how many unknowns there were and that they sometimes would bury two soldiers together.

Peabody

This is Peabody the second school I attended because at Duval they said I was in the wrong school district even though Duval was 3 or 4 blocks away and Peabody probably over a mile or more. I also saw the street that always gave me nightmares about crossing it each day. I wasn't crazy or imagining things, it is a horrible 4 lane street that now has stoplights. It didn't back then and I dreaded getting my bike across there everyday I had to go to school. I always remembered Peabody being huge and it was. It is now the Adult Learning Center of Ft. Smith.

Duval

We found the first school I attended in Ft Smith while in 4th grade, which was Duval by researching the internet. It had originally been built on a whole city block on N. L between 15th and 16th. It has a plaque there now and new houses built on small lots:

Driving Through the Boston Mountains

Actually didn't seem that great like I thought they were as a child. Except it was summer and everything was green. Also it was snowing most of the way through and we really couldn't see anything until towards the end and it cleared up a little.







Lake Ft. Smith was nice, lying between the mountains in a valley below. There was not a single person there today:

Had the whole pool to ourselves:

The original Walton's in Bentonville:

Valentine Band