From the University of Arkansas Special Collections website: The Sanborn Insurance Maps, comprising more than four thousand items, depict structures in Arkansas towns and cities between the 1880s and the 1930s. Some maps indicate the rise and fall of railroads in the state, while others show highways, political, topographic, or geologic features, tourist attractions or places of literary or historical interest.”

The maps are pretty interesting, and even more interesting to me are the old highly decorated cover pages. Somehow a few months back I was able to get at the collection without a login, but now, evidently you can’t. Good thing I saved a few pdf’s while I had the opportunity!

For people who don’t really have a grasp of what it took back in those days to sketch, pen, and print these intricate patterns, I’ve included a zoomed-in cross-section:

Below are more from Hot Springs:

Zoomed detail on this one:

While searching for more information about these maps, I learned a little more about the U of A Collections. They’ve got alot of stuff stashed away up there:

“Special Collections is the largest academic archives in the state, housing more than 1,600 manuscript collections, more than 200,000 photographic images, and more than 1,000 historic maps of Arkansas. The department houses the only complete set of Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps for Arkansas, a collection containing more than 4,000 maps depicting structures in Arkansas towns and cities between the 1880s and the 1930s.”

A workmate of mine clued me in a little-known piece of Arkansas motorsports history that can be viewed via google maps.

“From 1954-57, Memphis-Arkansas Speedway was a regular NASCAR stop. The drivers who would become stock car racing’s first legends tested their grit and machines on the high-banked 11/2 -mile dirt oval located a few miles to the west of West Memphis, near Lehi, Ark.”

“I remember going there a long time ago. We raced there in the summer and I went with Daddy,” seven-time NASCAR champion Richard Petty said about his racing adventures with his father, Lee Petty. “The track had a lot of banking, and I remember that they had two ponds on both ends of the speedway. They used that dirt for the banking.

On June 10, 1956, 28-year-old Iowa-native Clint McHugh died from injuries suffered from a crash during qualifying.

McHugh was driving close to 90 mph when he reached Turn 3. According to accounts from the time, McHugh swerved, flipped and tumbled over a guard rail and into a lake 50 feet below the embankment.

After a 1957 race, track owners Clarence Camp, Harold Woolridge and Nat Epstein ran out of money and sold the land to Clayton Eubanks Sr. in 1958. After the Eubanks family took over the facility, it was folded in as part of the farm.

“We raised catfish in the infield area of the track for a couple of years,” Parker Eubanks said. “Then we leveled out the grade and bedded rice and grew soybeans in it.”

“If the interstate would have been complete, it’s only a mile from Lehi to the off-ramp. They could have gotten onto the interstate and it would have been great”

Old Race results from the Memphis track