There was an old Linder in this township, but it was located about two miles south of the present settlment of Spring Hill. This first Linder was located on a cross-roads.
The John Love family had settled here, as had the family of Jim Robinson. They first called their settlement Lone Pine for the single pine that stood on the area.
William Bryant Love was born and reared in the old Linder community, on the banks of East Vadron Creek in 183?. He established the first store there in tiny hamlet.
The B.V. King bridge was very near this place. W.C. Watkins was appointed a commissioner in 1878 to oversee repairs to this bridge. At the October term of county court he reported that the $200 private contract let to B.V. King had "put said bridge in good repair".
July 7, 1879, B.V. King appeared in county court asking for a contract with the county "for the privilege of taking tolls for the term of 40 years in compensation therefore of keeping King's Bridge and the public road from that place to Conway in the low and muddy land for the distance of one and a half or two miles extending from the Cadron south to the edge of Beaverfork bottom."
The inhabitants of the adjacent area were unable to keep the road in repair and in a passable conditon and it was necessary to keep both the bridge and the roadway in a state of repair at all times.
King was to erect a toll gate at his bridge. He had 22 months to bring the bridge and road into a state of repairs. The contract was given and entered in the court records Oct. 27, 1879.
His fees: 6-horse wagon, $1; four-horse wagon, 75 cents; two-horse wagon, 50 cents; two horse arriage, 50 cents; one-horse carriage 35 cents.
A man on horseback paid 15 cents. Loose horses and cattle paid 5 cents a head. Hogs, sheep and goats crossed for two and a half cents each. These rates were for non-residents of Faulkner County. The rate for local citizens was somewhat lower. It should be noted that this contract was soon annuled and plans were prepared by A.P. Robinson for the construction of county-owned bridges in this area.
It soon became necessary to petition for a post offce. Their petition for a Lone Pine post office was turned down, for Arkansas had another post office with this name. The office was opened April 30, 1884, under the name of Linder on April 30, 1884 with Hiram B. Love as postmaster. This office was closed April 30, 1914.
In later years the settlement of Linder was moved to about three miles east os Spring Hill. Here was the cotton gin of Jim Lea and also the Bailey gin.
Nov. 27, 1914, eleven East Fork Township men were tried before Justice of the Peace G.M. Easterwood on a charge of playing poker. After the jury acquitted one defendant, the magistrate dismissed the other 10 cases.
Very near New Linder - - for the settlers about this place remembered the original Linder - - at Salem place, about two or three miles north, the first oil well in Faulkner County was drilled on a tract of land owned by G.L. Bahner. This was a great speculatiion on the part of Bahner and an Eastern drilling firm who began the well on Sarrett Hill. E. A. Becker of Pittsburg, PA., was in charge of this operation.
Forner County Judge Roy Sims, in his youth, worked at this oil well site delivering pipe stems and other needed supplies from Conway in his wagon. He used a fine team of mules for the magnificent salary of $9 per day.
April 10, 1923, it was announced that the well at Linder would be sunk only another 200 feet. By April 16 it had reached a depth of 3,514 feet. A small gas formation, however, was found in the deep sandstone formation at 3, 745 feet. This gas formation proved to be only one foot thick. In its time this Linder well was the deepest ever driven in Arkansas.
By May 1 the well was 3,930 feet. When the drillers in a black shale and then abandoned as dry. Today no trace of this community exists. The area is lightly scattered with rural farm homes of modest size.
