Little Rock Arkansas Genealogy

Biographical Sketch of Roscoe Simmons Cate

Roscoe Simmons Cate, an attorney of Muskogee, was born in Bradley county, Tennessee, on the 2d of September, 1876, his parents being William Lea and Joanna E. (Julian) Cate, the former an educator. Roscoe Simmons Cate obtained his education in the public schools of St. Louis, Missouri, and of Little Rock, Arkansas, while his professional training was received in the Benton College of Law of St. Louis, from which he was graduated in June, 1901. He first located for practice at McAlester, Oklahoma, and there followed his profession until 1908, when he became chief clerk to the superintendent of the … Read more

Slave Narrative of Jeff Bailey

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Jeff Bailey Location: 713 W. Ninth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 76 or 77 Occupation: Hostler [HW: A Hostler’s Story] “I was born in Monticello. I was raised there. Then I came up to Pine Bluff and stayed there thirty-two years. Then I came up here and been here thirty-two years. That is the reason the white folks so good to me now. I been here so long, I been a hostler all my life. I am the best hostler in this State. I go down to the post office they give me money. … Read more

Slave Narrative of Robert Barr

Interviewer: S.S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Robert Barr Location: 3108 West 18th St. Little Rock, Ark. Age: 73 Occupation: Preaching [HW: A Preacher Tells His Story] “I am a minister of the Gospel. I have been preaching for the last thirty years. I am batching here. A man does better to live by himself. Young people got the devil in them now a days. Your own children don’t want you around. “I got one grand-daughter that ain’t never stood on the floor. Her husband kicked her and hit her and she ain’t never been able to stand up since. I got … Read more

Cash, Neva Eliza Simms Mrs. – Obituary

Baker City, Baker County, Oregon Neva Eliza Cash, 87, a former longtime Baker City resident, died Jan. 9, 2003, at the Keiser Permanente Hospital at Santa Clara, Calif. Her funeral will be at 1 p.m. Saturday at Gray’s West & Co. Pioneer Chapel, 1500 Dewey Ave. Pastor Lenny Spooner of the First Church of the Nazarene will officiate. Vault interment will be at Mount Hope Cemetery. Neva was born on June 22, 1915, in Arkansas to Thomas H. and Maud Mills Simms. She attended school at Little Rock, Ark., and graduated in 1933. She married Alvin M. Cash on Sept. … Read more

Biography of Caleb S. Stone, M. D.

Dr. Stone has left the ranks of the many to stand among the more successful few in a profession where advancement depends solely upon individual merit. In other walks of life, especially in commercial circles, one may enter upon a business already established and carry it on from the point where others laid it down, but the physician must rely solely upon his knowledge and ability, and these must be acquired through close and earnest application. That Dr. Stone, of Wallace, is numbered among the leading physicians and surgeons of his section of the state is therefore evidence of his … Read more

Biography of Walter J. Arnold

Walter J. Arnold. The county engineer of Shawnee County, Walter J. Arnold has led an active and diversified career, and although not yet forty-one years of age has crowded into his life more experiences than the ordinary man sees in an entire lifetime. From gold mining in Colorado to chasing the insurgents in the Philippines is a long call, but unlike many men whose activities have led them to out-of-the-way-places, Mr. Arnold has been constantly advancing, and each new experience, each new employment, has brought him a little bit further ahead toward the goal of success. In his present capacity, … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Louis Wolsey

Wolsey, Louis; rabbi; born, Jan. 8, 1877, Midland, Mich.; son of William and Frances Krueger Wolsey; educated, public and High Schools, Chicago, University of Cincinnati, B. A., 1899, Hebrew Union College, B. H. L., 1894; rabbi, 1899; post-graduate University of Chicago and Western Reserve University; married, June 12, 1912, Florence H. Wiener, daughter of Abraham Wiener, Cleveland; rabbi Congregation B’Ne Isreal, Little Rock, Ark., 1899-1907; rabbi Euclid Ave. Temple, Cleveland, 1907-; during incumbency new temple built at Euclid Ave. and East 82d; Chaplain-General Arkansas State Guard, 1905; member American Association of Political Science, Religious Education Ass’n, Central Conference of American … Read more

Biography of Ason Gittings Richardson

Ason Gittings Richardson. A Kansas pioneer whose name and services were especially identified with Harvey County, Ason Gittings Richardson was one of the strong and noble men of his time. He belonged to the old abolition class of the North, was a man of resolute character and would follow his convictions even in the face of extreme personal danger. He came to Kansas in 1870 and settled in Harvey County, when that district of Kansas was practically unsettled. His home was in Richland Township. The first religious services held in the county, conducted by Rev. Mr. Roberts, were at his … Read more

Slave Narrative of Henry Blake

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Henry Blake Age: 80, or more Location: Rear of 1500 Scott Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Occupation: Farming and junk, when able [HW: Drove a “Horsepower Gin Wagon”] “I was born March 16, 1863, they tell me. I was born in Arkansas right down here on Tenth and Spring Streets in Little Rock. That was all woods then. We children had to go in at night. You could hear the wolves and the bears and things. We had to make a big fire at night to keep the wolves and varmints away. “My father was … Read more

Slave Narrative of Rev. Wamble

Interviewer: Archie Koritz Person Interviewed: Rev. Wamble Location: Gary, Indiana Place of Birth: Monroe County, Mississippi, Date of Birth: 1859 Place of Residence: 1827 Madison Street, Gary, Indiana Occupation: Wagon-maker Archie Koritz, Field Worker Federal Writers’ Project Porter County-District #1 Valparaiso, Indiana EX-SLAVES REV. WAMBLE 1827 Madison Street Gary, Indiana [TR: above ‘Wamble’ in handwriting is ‘Womble’] Rev. Wamble was born a slave in Monroe County, Mississippi, in 1859. The Westbrook family owned many slaves in charge of over-seers who managed the farm, on which there were usually two hundred or more slaves. One of the Westbrook daughters married a … Read more

Slave Narrative of Boston Blackwell

Interviewer: Beaulah Sherwood Hagg Person Interviewed: Boston Blackwell Age: 98 Location: 320 Plum, North Little Rock, Arkansas Make yourself comfoble, miss. I can’t see you much ’cause my eyes, they is dim. My voice, it kinder dim too. I knows my age, good. Old Miss, she told me when I got sold—”Boss, you is 13—borned Christmas. Be sure to tell your new misses and she put you down in her book.” My borned name was Pruitt ’cause I got borned on Robert Pruitt’s plantation in Georgia,—Franklin County, Georgia. But Blackwell, it my freed name. You see, miss, after my mammy … Read more

Slave Narrative of Katie Rowe

Person Interviewed: Katie RoweLocation: Tulsa, OklahomaAge: 88 I can set on de gallery, what de sunlight shine bright, and sew a powerful fine seam when my grandchillun wants a special purty dress for de school doings, but I ain’t worth much for nothing else I reckon. These same old eyes seen powerful lot of tribulations in my time, and when I shets ’em now I can see lots of l’ll chillun jest lak my grand-chillun, toting hoes bigger dan dey is, and dey pore little black hands and legs bleeding whar dey scratched by de brambledy weeds, and whar dey … Read more

Expeditions of Fowler and James to Santa Fe, 1821

When Pike returned from his western expedition and related his experiences in Santa Fe and other places among the Spaniards, his accounts excited great interest in the east, which resulted in further exploits. In 1812, an expedition was undertaken by Robert McKnight, James Baird, Samuel Chambers, Peter Baum, Benjamin Shrive, Alfred Allen, Michael McDonald, William Mines, and Thomas Cook, all citizens of Missouri Territory; they were arrested by the Spaniards, charged with being in Spanish territory without a passport, and thrown into the calabazos of Chihuahua, where they were kept for nine years. In 1821, two of them escaped, and coming down Canadian and Arkansas rivers met Hugh Glenn, owner of a trading house at the mouth of the Verdigris, and told him of the wonders of Santa Fe. Inspired by the accounts of these travelers, Glenn engaged in an enterprise with Major Jacob Fowler and Captain Pryor for an expedition from the Verdigris to Santa Fe.

Gorham, Sarah A. – Obituary

Mrs. Gorham’s Death Recalls Mate’s Murder Mother of Wolfe Creek Farmer Passes While Visiting Relatives in Texas – Lived in Mexico Mrs. Sarah A. Gorham, mother of Jack Gorham of North Powder and Mrs. Enolia Brothers of Cove, died at the home of her neice, (sic) Vesta Green, at Slidell, Tex., July 26, last. The funeral took place in that city July 27, at the Methodist church, of which she was a member nearly all her life. Mrs. Gorham and her family for many years made their home in old Mexico and her death recalls the murder of her husband, … Read more

Slave Narrative of Lucretia Alexander

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Lucretia Alexander Location: 1708 High Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 89 Occupation: Washed. Ironed. Plowed. Hoed “I been married three times and my last name was Lucretia Alexander. I was twelve years old when the War began. My mother died at seventy-three or seventy-five. That was in August 1865—August the ninth. She was buried August twelfth. The reason they kept her was they had refugeed her children off to different places to keep them from the Yankees. They couldn’t get them back. My mother and her children were heir property. Her first master was … Read more

Slave Narrative of Henry Banner

Interviewer: S. S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Henry Banner Location: County Hospital, Little Rock, Arkansas [HW: Forty Acres and a Mule] “I was sold the third year of the war for fifteen years old. That would be in 1864. That would make my birthday come in 1849. I must have been 12 year old when the war started and sixteen when Lee surrendered. I was born and raised in Russell County, Ol’ Virginny. I was sold out of Russell County during the war. Ol’ Man Menefee refugeed me into Tennessee near Knoxville. They sold me down there to a man named … Read more

Slave Narrative of Amsy O. Alexander

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Amsy O. Alexander Location: 2422 Center Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 74 Occupation: Track laborer, Track foreman, Railroad builder [HW: Helps Build Railroad] “I was born in the country several miles from Charlotte in Macklenberg, County, North Carolina in 1864. “My father’s name was John Alexander and my mother was Esther McColley. That was her maiden name of course. “My father’s master was named Silas Alexander and my mother belonged to Hugh Reed. I don’t know just how she and my father happened to meet. These two slaveholders were adjoining neighbors, you might say. … Read more

Governor Houston at His Trading Post on the Verdigris

In February, 1828, the vanguard of Creek immigrants arrived at the Creek Agency on the Verdigris, in charge of Colonel Brearley, and they and the following members of the McIntosh party were located on a section of land that the Government promised in the treaty of 1826 to purchase for them. By the treaty of May 6, 1828, the Government assigned the Cherokee a great tract of land, to which they at once began to remove from their homes in Arkansas. The movement had been under way for some months when there appeared among the Indians the remarkable figure of Samuel Houston. The biographers of Houston have told the world next to nothing of his sojourn of three or four years in the Indian country, an interesting period when he was changing the entire course of his life and preparing for the part he was to play in the drama of Texas.

Slave Narrative of R. B. Anderson

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person Interviewed: R. B. Anderson Location: Route 4, Box 69 (near Granite), Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 76 Occupation: Grocer, bartender, porter, general work [HW: The Brooks-Baxter War] “I was born in Little Rock along about Seventeenth and Arch Streets. There was a big plantation there then. Dr. Wright owned the plantation. He owned my mother and father. My father and mother told me that I was born in 1862. They didn’t know the date exactly, so I put it the last day in the year and call it December 30, 1862. “My father’s name was William … Read more

Slave Narrative of Joseph Samuel Badgett

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person Interviewed: Joseph Samuel Badgett Location: 1221 Wright Avenue, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 72 [HW: Mother was a Fighter] “My mother had Indian in her. She would fight. She was the pet of the people. When she was out, the pateroles would whip her because she didn’t have a pass. She has showed me scars that were on her even till the day that she died. She was whipped because she was out without a pass. She could have had a pass any time for the asking, but she was too proud to ask. She never … Read more