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Booneville is a city in Logan County, Arkansas, United States, and the county seat of its southern district.[1] As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 4,117. Booneville sits comfortably nestled in the Arkansas River Valley between the Ouachita and Ozark Mountains. Booneville supports a community center, a senior citizens center, a community hospital, a municipal airport and new school facilities. Hunting, fishing, camping, hiking and other outdoors activities are readily available in nearby national forests and state parks. Booneville can be easily found at the intesection of State Highways 10 and 23
[edit] Early historyOne of the oldest towns in western Arkansas, Booneville was founded about 1828, when Colonel Walter Cauthron built a log cabin and opened a general mercantile store near the Petit Jean River in what was then Crawford County. According to Cauthron family tradition, he intended to name the settlement Bonneville, in honor of his friend Captain Benjamin Louis Eulalie de Bonneville, with whom he shared an interest in exploring the Arkansas Territory. However, an error in spelling resulted in the recording of the name as Booneville. Another story gives the town's name for frontiersman Daniel Boone, who settled in southern Missouri in his later life. He was a good friend of Benjamin Logan, a soldier and politician from Shelby County, Kentucky. Colonel James A. Logan (1791-1859), for which Logan County gets its name, was a member of this same family. Logan was a member of Arkansas's first state legislature. He is buried in the Logan Family Cemetery, near Sugar Grove, Arkansas (a small community a few miles southeast of Booneville). In 1898, the Choctaw, Oklahoma and Gulf Railroad, later acquired by the Rock Island Railroad, constructed a line between McAlester, Oklahoma and Little Rock, Arkansas, passing through Booneville. Booneville became a crew change point for the railroad, and crews from both Little Rock and Hartshorne would lay over in several railroad hotels between runs. A railroad eating house was established at Booneville by the John J. Grier Hotel Company, which held the franchise for railroad hotels and eating houses along the Rock Island. Until the Rock Island's demise in March 1980, the railroad was a major factor is the town's economy. Booneville's eating house/depot was recognized as historically significant, but efforts to preserve the structure ended when the unoccupied building burned on May 28, 2001.[2] The frame and foundation of the railroad depot can still be seen behind the post office on First Street. [edit] Education
From its early days, Booneville has supported education. In 1874, as a response to needs for higher learning in western Arkansas, the Fort Smith District of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, authorized the establishment of the Fort Smith District High School in Booneville, forty miles to the west. Local church members donated the land, building materials and labor. The school, located on South College Street, was to be supported by student tuitions. Students came from towns all over western Arkansas to board with Booneville families and attend a school that offered an advanced curriculum, including Latin, German, advanced mathematics, literature and music. The school functioned until the early 1900s. After the school closed, a group of residents and business leaders formed the Booneville Education Association and acquired nine acres of land in the northwest part of town. The new school was called the Booneville Co-Educational Institute and also offered a more advanced curriculum than the public school around. Graduates were admitted as sophomores at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. In 1920, state funds were made available for the support of public high schools and the school's property was transferred to the Booneville school system. The building continued to be used as the city's high school until a new building was built in 1929. The old Co-Educational Institute building was used as the Booneville elementary school for several decades after that.[3] [edit] State Tuberculosis Sanatorium
The Arkansas State Tuberculosis Sanatorium was established in 1909 about three miles south of Booneville. Once fully established, the sanatorium was the relocation center for all white Arkansans with tuberculosis. By the time the facility was closed in 1972, it had treated over 70,000 patients. The main hospital, named the Nyberg Building after Leo E. Nyberg, a former sanatorium patient and state legislator who sponsored the bill funding the construction, was completed in 1941. The facility became known worldwide as one of the most successful and modern hospitals for the treatment of tuberculosis of its day. The sanatorium complex was self-sustaining, with dormitories, staff entertainment buildings, a chapel, laundry, dairy, water treatment plant, independent telephone system, and even a fire department. At the height of its use, the complex employed nearly 300 staff members. At one point, the total population of the center was greater than that of Booneville, in the valley below. With the introduction of more effective drug therapy, the patient population began to decline. Eventually the sanatorium was closed in 1973. The campus is currently used as the Booneville Human Development Center, a state-run residential program for adults with mild and moderate mental retardation and other developmental disabilities. [edit] GeographyBooneville is located at (35.139650, -93.921272).[4] According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 4.1 square miles (10.6 km²), all of it land. [edit] DemographicsAs of the census[5] of 2000, there were 4,117 people, 1,619 households, and 1,109 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,010.0 people per square mile (389.6/km²). There were 1,863 housing units at an average density of 457.0/sq mi (176.3/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 96.62% White, 0.05% Black or African American, 1.12% Native American, 0.27% Asian, 0.05% Pacific Islander, 0.17% from other races, and 1.72% from two or more races. 0.87% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. There were 1,619 households out of which 34.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 51.3% were married couples living together, 13.3% had a female householder with no husband present, and 31.5% were non-families. 28.5% of all households were made up of individuals and 16.2% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.48 and the average family size was 3.01. In the city the population was spread out with 28.0% under the age of 18, 8.1% from 18 to 24, 26.4% from 25 to 44, 20.0% from 45 to 64, and 17.5% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 36 years. For every 100 females there were 88.9 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 82.1 males. The median income for a household in the city was $26,627, and the median income for a family was $31,012. Males had a median income of $25,238 versus $20,092 for females. The per capita income for the city was $13,076. About 13.1% of families and 18.4% of the population were below the poverty line, including 22.0% of those under age 18 and 23.9% of those age 65 or over. [edit] 2008 Meat Packing Plant BlazeOn March 23, 2008, Easter Sunday, a series of explosions destroyed the Cargill Meat Solutions plant, which employed approximately 800 people, making it by far the town's largest employer. On May 2, 2008 Cargill announced that the plant would not be rebuilt. [edit] Notable Natives
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