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Five Arkansas Properties Put on Historic Register

1 min read

This month the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program named five properties to the National Register of Historic Places.

Two of those properties are in south Arkansas: the Magnolia Colored High School Historic District in Magnolia and the North Washington Street Bridge in DeWitt.

The others were around the state: the Evans-Neuhart House in Plainview (Yell County); the Arkansas Christian College Administration Building in Morrilton, which is the original home of Searcy’s Harding University; and the Spring River Bridge at Mammoth Spring (Fulton County).

According to the National Register nomination, the Magnolia Colored School was “the center of transformation in education for the black students of Magnolia in the 1940s through desegregation in 1969.”

The school was built in 1915 and for many years was one of two schools in Magnolia that would accept African-American students, the other being Columbia Baptist Academy, built in 1919.

Most of the remaining buildings were constructed in the 1940s and 1950s when the school experienced rapid growth.

The school closed in 1969 following desegregation, and some of the buildings fell into disrepair or were razed. Several, however, still stand and have served various purposes over the years.

The other south Arkansas property, the North Washington Street Bridge in DeWitt, is an example of early concrete bridge-building techniques. It was built in 1910.

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