HOT SPRINGS, ARKANSAS
In 1832 President Andrew Jackson made Hot Springs the first place to be set aside as a federal reservation. It was, in effect, America’s first national park. Early in the Nineteenth Century people began coming to the springs to take baths in the thermal waters from forty seven springs which gush forth around a million gallons of hot water very day. It is thought that the Spanish explorer Ferdinand de Soto was the first European to visit the area, which was known by Native Americans in the region as the “Valley of the Vapors.” Fifty years ago when I was a young teacher, books used in American history classes referred to de Soto as the “discoverer of the Mississippi River.” One of my great grandmothers was Cherokee. I wondered how writers of textbooks could ignore the obvious fact that the indigenous people on the continent obviously knew the river was there.

By the early Twentieth Century, Bath House Row on Central Avenue was a European-style spa lined with bath houses. People came from all over the world to take the baths. During the period known now as “prohibition,” Hot Springs was a jumping place. It was definitely not “dry.” Entertainers and gangsters from cities like Chicago were regulars at the race track and speakeasies.

A couple of my uncles spent time in prison for making and selling the moonshine sold in Hot Springs. A couple of other uncles didn’t spend time in jail only because they didn’t get caught.

A visit to Hot Springs is a trip back in time.