Why was Sulphur Springs omitted?

Editor,

A special promotional 91-page booklet came stuffed inside the Sunday, July 26, 2015, Democrat Gazette. I found an interesting story on page 67 of that booklet. However, the story left out one important piece of "History, small-town charm found along Arkansas 59," my hometown of Sulphur Springs.

Maybe it's time to cause a rebellion like the people of McDonald County, Mo., did in the 1960s to get some attention and recognition for our town. As I remember the event, McDonald County's leaders voted to become an independent state and seceded because the Missouri Department of Tourism left their county off its Missouri recreational and tourism map.

I remember back then when we had to show our McDonald County Visas to border guards armed with civil war muskets at the state line on Hwy. 59 before they would allow us to drive on into Noel to attend high school.

For those who don't know much about Sulphur Springs. The town sits four miles north of Gravette along Hwy. 59 and south of the Missouri border two miles. It's also a small town, and it has "small-town charm." It also has a rich history reaching back to the 1840s.

The Kansas City Southern Railroad, from the late 1890s into the early 1900s, carried upwards to 1,500 people a day and turned-about back north in Sulphur Springs. During that time, within Sulphur's one square-mile borders, there were seven major-sized hotels. The largest was the five-story Kilhburg Hotel. It still stands above Hwy. 59. From its front porch, you can get a "birds eye view" across the valley's 10-acre city park and lake.

The Kilhburg was also the home of John Brown University, Wycliffe Bible Translators winter residence and the Shiloh Farms Baking company. Walter Eaton established on Sulphur's southeast side The Ozark Colony in 1921. Also, Native Americans such as Algonquin Confederacy Chief Cannasatego chipped arrowheads along Butler Creek's shores before Sulphur was thought of as a "small-town with charm."

The town's historical worth came when word traveled that Sulphur Springs was the place where visitors could find healing waters. There weren't remedies around the 1900s for many common ailments. Bathing in the cool waters of Butler creek during summer's heat, drinking clean, cool and refreshingly-good-for-you Lithia Spring water added to the healing mineral water treatments provided visitors within the town's three bathhouses. This was the best medicine money could buy in those days.

That's why people came to our town. If searched for, one can live again the same "charm" felt by thousands of tourists during Sulphur's long history under its old forest trees and natural spaces of healing waters within the town's city park today.

Our town is very important to us who live here. Some residents are like me. We were born here. Some of us came back to retire in Sulphur Springs because it has that special "small-town charm."

So, why wasn't Sulphur Springs represented by Melissa L. Jones' in her Sunday promotional paper article?

Larry Burge

Sulphur Springs

Editorial on 08/05/2015