Hot Springs Arkansas
An Unexpected but Pleasant Surprise
You can find adventure anywhere
Check out our video on this surprising town and unsung National Park. Two days was not enough to do it justice and we will be back.
What is "hot" isn't just the water
What was intended to be just a casual stopover in a state campground on our route to other destinations, turned into a surprise gem. In our planning to return to New Jersey for our son-in-laws bootcamp graduation, we decided to make a stop in Arkansas. We travel by the 3-3-3 rule: Don't travel more than 300 miles in a day, arrive at your destination by 3 o'clock, and stay at least three nights. This rule helps prevent fatigue and allows you to enjoy your surroundings as you travel the country by road. The route we chose was going to take us though Arkansas and on to Tennessee so we selected a campground near Interstate 30: Lake Catherine State Park. The selection of this stop was simply because it fell in the 300 mile range and we would be able to arrive there by 3 o'clock. It was only after we arrived that we discovered what a gem we found.
Hot Springs National Park
To say that Hot Springs National Park is one of the more obscure of our national parks, is a bit of an understatement. When we checked in to the campground at Lake Catherine, we asked the camp host for recommendations for us to explore, short answer Hot Springs. I had heard of Hot Springs, but only as one of our many national parks and I honestly knew nothing about it.
The locals refer to it as the first national park (it is officially listed as the 16th) as it dates back to 1834 when President Andrew Jackson signed into law establishing the area around the forty-three natural springs as a Federal Reservation. Not to be confused with Indian Reservation, the federal reservation was for the purpose of preserving important lands for the general public use. The hot springs were viewed as a place where people could go to soak in the waters of the springs to recover from any number of diseases and injury. It was viewed as important to preserve the area from private interests which could prevent public access the waters so the reservation was established. After the National Park Service was established, the reservation was by statute transferred to the management of the Service.
Bathhouse row
The Sanitarium of America
Over the years, large permanent structures replaced the wooden huts originally installed to allow people to bath in the waters of the hot springs. These houses became known as bathhouse row and served as the focal point for people to come to seek healing and restoration. It's notoriety of a place of healing became particularly acute after Mary Baird Bryan (American suffragist and wife of William Jennings Bryan) arrived confined to a wheelchair and left four months later able to stand and walk with only the assistance of a cane. Only two of the structures serve as bathhouses now as the rise of modern medicine brought about the decline in bathing, but the buildings and surrounding area are preserved very much like it would have been in the height of bathing during the 1920's through the 1940's. The bathhouses now serve other purposes such as a museum, gift shop, and even a brewery that uses the natural spring waters for the beers it produces and sells.
It Wasn’t Just About The Water
A History Of Gangsters and Baseball
Hot Springs was not only the focal point of healing in the first half of the 20th century. It also was the retreat for gangsters and the original locale of Major League Baseball Spring training.
Hot Springs served as the retreat for famous gangsters such as Al Capone, Lucky Luciano, and Owney Madden as well as bank robbers such as Bonnie and Clyde. Despite the hot springs being a federal reservation and later a National Park, the area attracted much of the underworld as the local politicians were on the take. The feds would be awaiting such individuals if they were to enter the Federal lands, so tunnels were developed under the streets that the gangsters could use to slip into any one of the bathhouses. Once inside, the operators of the bathhouses conveniently chose not to let the feds know who had arrived. Al Capone and Joe Kennedy discovered that the local moonshine was of an excellent quality and they utilized the remote surroundings and the complicit local government to operate and supply their national bootlegging operation.
Before the Pineapple and Cactus Leagues for baseball spring training, most of the league would send their teams to Hot Springs. The thought was the natural environment and the springs would be an ideal location to send the boys to sweat off the amoebas and alcohol they had consumed over the long winters. There are many sites around the Hot Springs area where you can see the remnants of the golden era of baseball.
