| Allinder Rd Ann St Apple Ridge Rd Avant Lane - cemetery at the end. Bain Rd Blaylock Rd Bucko Rd Buckville Road Camp Story Rd - Girl Guide Camp Carol Sand Rd |
County Lane Duft Ln Farr Dr George Roberts Rd Godwin Rd Godwin Acres Tr Gooseberry Rd Haley Dr Jimmy Scott Rd Jones |
Linray Rd Lupine Rd Minton Rd Near Dr Nelie Dr Pembroke RD Rabit Trail Rd Seebee Ln Tobin cove Woodeker Circle |
Know a town's street-names, and you know half its history.
When Buckville went under the lake - someone went and had Avant changed to Buckville but the old timers still called it Avant. Go north on Hwy. 27 from Mt. Ida to Story, east on Hwy. 298, Possum Kingdom Rd. to Mt. Tabor Store (Buckville P.O. was now at Avant & Avant cemetery is about 3 miles south of Buckville P.O.) So Avant became Buckville and the only things there with the name the Avant Cemetery and the Avant Church. If you go to turn off 298 you see the sign Buckville 3 miles Avant 3 miles. One little gas-mom & pop store. These communities were in present day Garland Co. but were in Montgomery Co. till 1917. All points are now under Lake Ouachita. Source: "They Can't Go Home"
The community of Avant was named after the Avant family. In 1845 Thomas Avant b. ca 1809 TN with his wife Judith and children along with several of his wife's relatives moved first to Dallas Co. AR in 1845. By the late 1850s Thomas with most of his children moved to Montgomery Co, AR. Children:
Abner
John Wessie married Martha A. Lorance
Isabella M. married Theorick M. Lanaer/Lainer
Mary Jane married 1. John W. Wright 2. S.H. Copeland
Moses Marshall married Milly Caroline "Tinnie" Lamb
Nancy Avant.
Isabella and Theo and some of their children are buried in the Avant Cemetery. Moses and Milly are thought to be buried there but it is not known where. Thomas & Judith Fite Avant's final resting places unknown. There are several unknown graves in the Avant Cemetery. And several were not marked, as it was found when one burial was to take place, they were going to bury James M. Minton by his wife (Maryann Judith Avant) she had died 5 years earlier. They dug down and found a old grave, so they moved over and found another one! So there are two graves in between them.
Decoration Day is the first Sunday in May for those who have ancestors or relatives buried in the Avant Cemetery. Listen to the preaching and singing then at noon leave the cemetery and head for the Avant Church for a pot luck dinner. If you went to school at Avant they have a reunion the first Saturday in May held at the Avant church and they have a pot luck dinner also.
The Avant baseball team, 1909? Photo courtesy of Sandy who found it picture at
her mother's house with the names
written on the back in someone else's handwriting.
What does F2 T.8. 6 tenth Ball Team mean? Is it a plot reference??
Or does it read 1st. 8. 6 TENTH BALL TEAM
Wm. Allen "Bill" Abbott (he was 17 in 1910), catcher
Arthur Cornelious "Neil" Breshears (he was 17 in 1910)
Wm. Pink Godwin (b. 18 Dec. 1874) would make him 35 in 1909.
Will Qualls, pitcher
Albert Godwin b. ca. 1892
George Breshears - not a brother to "Neil"
Wesley Godwin b. ca. 1900?, d. ca. 1919, buried in the Avant Cemetery.
Ed Robins
Jim Pitts - became a school teacher at White Plains west of Buckville.
This same photo appears in They Can't Go Home, page
They Can't Go Home: A History of Northwestern Garland County, Arkansas, including the Towns of Buckville and Cedar Glades by Wendy Bradley Richter and Inez Halsell Cline. Published 1990. Sold out June 2001, but Wendy had the book reprinted in 2003. The price has gone up to $37.50 plus $2.50 shipping, if mailed. The cost of printing is much higher than it was 13 years ago. You can contact Wendy at Arkansas History Commission & State Archives.
FARMING COMMUNITY GATHERS TO RECALL LIFE BEFORE LAKE OUACHITA
The Augusta Chronicle 11 June 2000
It's been 48 years since the new Lake Ouachita reservoir inundated Manuel Bradley's family homestead, but his memories still come flooding back. He remembers acres of cotton that had supported the family for generations and his grandfather, a former Confederate soldier, chopping wood. He still remembers the day people scrambled to take pictures of the first car in town, a gurgling Model T. "We had a wonderful life. We didn't think it was then, but it was," said the 86-year-old man, who briefly stops his story to savor the images. Today, Mr. Bradley will gather with others chased from their homes around Buckville and Cedar Glades when Arkansas Power & Light built a dam across the Ouachita River 10 miles downstream in southwestern Arkansas. The reservoir now stretches about 40 miles long.
The annual reunion fulfills a promise residents made to one another: No matter how far we're scattered, we'll always be a community. Although it wasn't built until 1952, the Blakely Dam was conceived in 1909, and Mr. Bradley can't remember a time when people didn't talk about it. "The fellow who carried the mail told me one time that two things were going to happen for sure - the dam was coming and the world was going to come to an end," he said. From the time the dam was completed, it took a year for the lake to creep over the remnants of homes and barns. As people watched the water rise across their yards, streets and farmland, they told one another the lake would not destroy the close- knit community that had developed on the mountainside since the early 1800s. "It was a farming community. If a farmer became ill, and his crop needed to be plowed, people would come from all over to help him out," said 81-year-old Pauline Pitts. "It was just a big community family. We are very, very close." Every year since then, former residents of Buckville and Cedar Glades have gathered at the Buckville Baptist Church for a "Bucktown USA" reunion, sharing a pot luck dinner and their memories. "It's every second Sunday in June. No announcement needed," said Wendy Richter, Mr. Bradley's daughter. "We always said that if anyone ever took a drink out of the Buckville branch of the Ouachita River, they would never forget that Buckville was their home," said Mr. Bradley's wife, Gladys, who also grew up in the Buckville area. Before the lake covered the town, residents moved the church and cemetery to a nearby hill top. "When the dam started up and they had to move all of the bodies, I think that was the saddest part," said Ms. Bradley. The number of original Bucktowners is dwindling. Most are now in their 80s, and several died this year.
Two things are for
sure: The dam and the end of the world
Dam Won't Break Scattered Community
By Melissa Nelson NELSON 10 June 2000
AVANT, Ark. (AP) - When Manuel Bradley thinks about his family homestead - swamped by a growing Lake Ouachita 48 years ago - his memories of Buckville come flooding back. He remembers acres of cotton that suppported the family for generations. He remembers his grandfather, a former Confederate soldier, chopping wood outside the two-bedroom family home. He remembers the day the first car rolled into town, causing locals to scramble for pictures with the gurgling Model T. "We had a wonderful life. We didn't think it was then, but it was," said the 86-year-old, who briefly stops his story to savor the images. This weekend, Bradley will gather with others chased from their homes at Buckville and Cedar Glades when Arkansas Power&Light built a dam across the Ouachita River 10 miles downstream. It fulfills a promise townspeople made in 1952: No matter how far we're scattered, we'll always be a community. Throughout his childhood, Bradley lived with one certainty - his world would one day be beneath tons of water. He can't remember a time when people didn't talk about the dam. "The fellow who carried the mail told me one time that two things were going to happen for sure - the dam was coming and the world was going to come to an end," Bradley said. Although plans to build the Blakely Dam were conceived in 1909, it wasn't built until 1952. The Bradleys and other families began to drift away from their homes throughout the 1940s as speculation came closer and closer to reality.
From the time the dam was completed, it took a year for the lake to creep over the remnants of homes and barns. As they watched the waters spill through their front yards, streets and farmlands, they told each other the water would not destroy the close-knit community that had developed on the mountainside since the early 1800s. They held the first "Bucktown USA" reunion in 1952 for former residents of Buckville and Cedar Glades. And, every year since, they have gathered at the Buckville Baptist Church to share a pot luck dinner and a lifetime of memories. "It's every second Sunday in June. No announcement needed," said Wendy Richter, Bradley's daughter. The water took their land, it didn't take their sense of community. "We always said that if anyone ever took a drink out of the Buckville branch of the Ouachita River, they would never forget that Buckville was their home," said Bradley's wife, Gladys, who also grew up in the Buckville area. Before the lake covered the town, residents moved the church to a nearby hilltop next to the local cemetery. Tombs that would have been under the water were unearthed and moved, as well. "When the dam started up and they had to move all of the bodies, I think that was the saddest part," said Mrs. Bradley.
Today the rickety white wood frame church and tiny cemetery on the northern banks of Lake Ouachita are the only proof that the towns of Buckville and Cedar Glades ever existed. Much of what had been in Buckville is now in Avant, on high land above Lake Ouachita. From the nearest state highway, however, the road to Avant is still called Buckville Road. "Some of the best bottom land anywhere in the country was taken for that dam. When I think about it still makes me mad, but that's progress I guess," said 79-year-old Emogene Loyd, whose land was taken for $35 an acre. She'll attend Sunday's reunion as she has most of the last 48, with fried chicken and a baked turkey breast in tow, but with "a little sadness" in her heart because the number of original Bucktowners is dwindling.
Most are now in their 80s, and several died this year. Their children, grandchildren and great grandchildren have taken their place as keepers of a legacy buried beneath 90 feet of water. But only the original Bucktowners remember what life was like before the lake covered the town. "It looked like an old western town, you could have made a movie out of it," said 85-year-old Marcus Phillips. He remembers hitchhiking in wagons along the road between Cedar Glades and Buckville.
Pauline Pitts, 81, hasn't seen Buckville in more than 50 years, but said she can envision it clearly.
"My dad had a farm about three miles down the river and he raised corn. It was a farming community. If a farmer became ill, and his crop needed to be plowed, people would come from all over to help him out," she said. "It was just a big community family. We are very, very close." Pitts rarely misses a Bucktown reunion, but as she's gotten older she said she's had to scale back on the amount of food she brings for the pot luck dinner. "This year, I'm just going to take a Petit Jean Ham, some deviled eggs, potato salad, baked beans and a dessert," she said. Loyd said she'll miss the cherry pie her cousin's wife used to bring because her cousin died this year, but Mrs. Bradley will be there with her popular stuffing, new potatoes, candied yams and okra. At the Bucktown Cemetery next to the church, there's only room for those with ties to the original community. Gary Meredith of Hot Springs visited the Bucktown Cemetery last week to place flowers on the graves of his grandparents, Frank and Hannah Robbins. He remembered going to the Buckville reunions as a child and hearing the stories of the old-timers. "I guess we are the old ones now," he said. "We are the ones who are left," he said while inspecting the stone markers at the plastic- and silk-flowered gravesites. Although his grandparents had to leave Buckville, they always considered it their home, he said. "They were just like anybody, they wanted to go home to be buried."