Beyond Bartholomew - The Portland Area History

By Rebecca DeArmond-Huskey

The book is centered on the area of eastern Ashley County. The towns of Montrose, Portland, Parkdale, and Wilmont now being representative of the area. It contains many old photographs as well as photographs of people who were interviewed. Family histories of early settlers contain about 1300 surnames which are indexed. Beyond Bartholomew can be of benefit to anyone interested in Arkansas history, the American South, and social history.

Subject List
Surname List

For a more detailed description of this book, check out the link above to the website.

Also see information about Bartholomew Bayou.

Family Maps of Ashley County, Arkansas

by Gregory A. Boyd, J.D. 340 pages with 101 total maps
Locating original landowners in maps has never been an easy task-until now. This volume in the Family Maps series contains newly created maps of original landowners (patent maps) in what is now Ashley County, Arkansas, gleaned from the indexes of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. But it offers much more than that. For each township in the county, there are two additional maps accompanying the patent map: a road map and a map showing waterways, railroads, and both modern and many historical city-centers and cemeteries.

Included are indexes to help you locate what you are looking for, whether you know a person's name, a last name, a place-name, or a cemetery. The combination of maps and indexes are designed to aid researchers of American history or genealogy to explore frontier neighborhoods, examine family migrations, locate hard-to-find cemeteries and towns, as well as locate land based on legal descriptions found in old documents or deeds.

The patent-maps are essentially plat maps but instead of depicting owners for a particular year, these maps show original landowners, no matter when the transfer from the federal government was completed. Dates of patents typically begin near the time of statehood and run into the early 1900s.

Books are different prices depending on the binding you select.