Hillary Clinton stood by her husband, Bill Clinton, 11 years ago as he was sworn in as president of the United States. Gracing her right hand was the Kahn Canary, a 4.24-carat yellow diamond, homegrown at Crater of Diamonds State Park near Murfreesboro.
Stan Kahn, owner of Kahn Jewelers at Pine Bluff, bought the rare, intensely yellow, triangular diamond shortly after George Steppes uncovered it at Crater of Diamonds State Park near Murfreesboro in 1977.
According to Kahn family legend, Hillary insisted on wearing the stone when her husband was inaugurated for the second time in 1997.
“We can’t have the inauguration without the Kahn Canary,” she supposedly said.
“It is flawless and extremely rare and very precious,” said Kahn, who twice served as president of the Jewelers Research Council and president of the Diamond Council of America.
The Emperor of Japan approached Kahn about selling the diamond in the 1990s as the centerpiece for his bride’s wedding ring, but Kahn refused to sell the stone.
“There’s not another diamond in the world like it,” Kahn said.
Steppes was lucky, but there was more than luck behind his remarkable find. It was only five years before the Kahn Canary’s discovery that the Crater of Diamonds became Arkansas’ 29th state park and — in the words of Greg Butts, director of Arkansas State Parks Division of the Arkansas Department of Parks & Tourism — “the only diamond mine in the world where you keep what you find.”
The Natural State
Crater of Diamonds is unique among the world’s parks, but nature lovers, canoeists and history buffs treasure other Arkansas state parks even more. From Hobbs State Park near Rogers to Lake Chicot State Park on the outskirts of Lake Village, the state park system showcases the reasons Arkansas can demand recognition as “The Natural State.”
The Arkansas Department of Parks & Tourism welcomes about 9 million visitors each year to its parks, about 60 percent from in-state and the balance from elsewhere. By estimating that each of those visitors spends an average of $54 a day, Butts said “that’s conservatively about $252 million spent annually outside the parks’ boundaries on overnight lodging, food, gas and other expenses.”
Tourism is recognized as Arkansas’ third-largest industry, and it’s estimated that about $3.9 billion is generated in revenue.
“I hear from Arkansans camping in other states that there are several states with bigger parks, but that doesn’t always mean it’s better,” Butts said.
There are 1,700 campsites within the state’s 51,000-acre park system, which is the 40th largest state park system in the country. Parks are located in all six of the state’s natural geographical divisions — the Ozark Mountains, Arkansas River Valley, Ouachita Mountains, West Gulf Coastal Plain and Crowley’s Ridge — and are further divided into four categories: natural resource, recreational, historical and cultural.
The park system, which includes 51 parks and museums, has been more than 80 years in the making. It began in 1923 with the donation of several parallel canyons, named Seven Hollows by early settlers, on the southwestern slope of Petit Jean Mountain. Seven years later, the state seized tax-delinquent acreage for a second park on Mount Nebo and established the state Park Commission.
During the Great Depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps completed construction at the state’s two parks, and four more parks were added to the system, including Buffalo River State Park. Later Congress designated the Buffalo as a National River.
While war raged in Europe and Japan, park acquisition and development stagnated. Then a bond issue in the mid-1950s resulted in park improvements and 10 additional parks.
By 1969, the system included 24 sites classified as State Parks, State Recreation Areas, Historical Monuments and Museums. But the system was far from a source of pride. In his 1971 inaugural address, Gov. Dale Bumpers described the parks “as a statewide embarrassment.”
As a result, the program entered a new era of professionalism and expanded to include planning and development, grants and aid, program services, administration and revenue production. Naturalists, historians and commissioned park rangers were placed at the major parks, and training programs, policies and procedures were put into place to oversee the parks, which continued to multiply.
Unfortunately, available dollars were not growing as fast as the park vision.
“It was a roller coaster ride without a permanent source of funding,” Butts said.
In 1985 the park system reported it needed at least $40 million just to repair and bring the parks up to quality level. The Legislature promised help, but other priorities got in the way.
“By 1994, the cost was up to $177 million,” Butts said.
The park system needed a dedicated source of funding, but it wouldn’t be until 1996 and the endorsement of Gov. Mike Huckabee that Amendment 75 to the state Constitution would provide a stable funding platform from which the park system could operate.
Arkansas voters narrowly adopted a 1/8-cent sales tax, with 45 percent of the proceeds earmarked for the long-neglected state park system, 45 percent for the Arkansas Game & Fish Commission, 9 percent to the Department of Arkansas Heritage and 1 percent to Keep Arkansas Beautiful.
From this funding, the state parks now receive about $20 million a year. The parks system also generates as much as $12 million annually from facility operations and receives another $12 million from the state’s general revenues.
The funding is being used to renovate and improve existing parks rather than to add to the number. For instance, the Mississippi River State Park was authorized in 1973 but still hasn’t been created.
Get Ready
The park system spent just over $3 million on rehabilitation on the Crater of Diamonds State Park. Of that, $1.17 million was spent building a 14,700-SF aquatic playground, Diamond Springs, which is scheduled to open for the Memorial Day weekend.
Located adjacent to the park’s diamond hunting area, the facility will give visitors the chance to cool off in a 4,166-SF wading pool with spray geysers, sprayers, water jets, animated waterspouts, cascades, water slides and water falls. A Diamond Discovery Center will open later in the year.
Thirty minutes from Little Rock, the Agricultural Plantation Museum at Scott now has a full-sized replica of an old-fashioned cotton gin, and an interpretative visitors building is nearing completion at the nearby Toltec Mounds. At DeGray Lake Resort State Park there’s a new convention center and PGA-rated golf course, and the Ozark Folk Center at Mountain View has expanded.
On the top of Mount Magazine, home to 90 species of butterflies, the park system has partnered with the U.S. Forest Service to build a visitor center, a 60-room lodge and 13 cabins. The $32.6 million price tag supports Butts’ opinion that “it’s an exciting project.”
The first five miles of the 73.2-mile Delta Heritage Trail that winds through the Delta is complete, and Lake Dardanelle State Park has a world-class weigh-in pavilion for fishing tournaments and a $3 million visitor’s center.
“Dardanelle is now a major bass-fishing hot spot with 50 tournaments annually,” said Joan Ellison, public information officer for the park system.
Dedicated funding is allowing the system to expand its educational programs and now includes an outdoor laboratory at Dardanelle and high-speed connections to the local schools.
At the parks, recreational opportunities are expanding to include kayaking, hang gliding, eagle and owl watching, rock climbing, horseback riding and geocaching, the high-tech treasure hunting using Global Positioning System satellites.
“Camping is closest to my heart,” Butts said. “But our park system is so much more than campsites. These are special places that must be protected for the generations to come.”
The Diamond Rush
It has been nearly 100 years since John Wesley Huddleston unearthed two diamonds, one of 3 carats and one of 4.5 carats, on an August afternoon on his farm near Murfreesboro. Shortly thereafter Huddleston sold his 160-acre farm for $36,000.
In the years that followed, the diamond field drew thousands of treasure-seekers in a mad surge that resembled a miniature California Gold Rush. It also drew several commercial ventures that ended in failure, lawsuits and suspicion of arson.
What was below the surface of this diamond field has always been a mystery, so beginning in 1990 the mine was tested in two phases for its commercial viability. The program was financed entirely by private mining companies at a total cost of $3.9 million. Phase I testing indicated that the field contains more than 46 million cubic yards, has a surface area of 80.3 acres and extends at least 669 feet deep. It is the world’s eighth-largest mine in surface area.
The site is the eroded surface of an ancient, diamond-bearing volcano with a martini glass-shaped pipe. Scientists estimate it erupted approximately 95 million years ago under an ocean that then covered Arkansas.
Phase II testing program revealed that the soil on the surface contains more and larger diamonds than does the subsurface. From 9,000 tons of ore, 210 diamonds were found weighing a total of 45.748 carats.
An independent New York diamond broker valued the diamonds at between $1 and $100 per carat, averaging $12.30 per carat — not enough to justify a commercial mining operation.
“The testing program basically determined that it was better operating as a park because the majority of the diamonds were near the surface,” according to Joan Ellison, park public information officer.
Since the site’s discovery, more 75,000 diamonds — nearly a third found since the park’s opening — have been unearthed on the 37-acre plowed field in southwest Arkansas.
In addition to the Kahn Canary, other notable diamonds include
• Uncle Sam, at 40.23 carats the largest diamond ever unearthed in the United States;
• Amarillo Starlight, 16.37 carats;
• Star of Arkansas, 15.33 carats; and
• Strawn-Wagner Diamond, a 3.03-carat stone that was cut to a flawless 1.09-carat gem that received the highest quality rating from the American Gem Society.
Diamond-hunting at the Crater of Diamonds does not guarantee a find, according to Bill Henderson, assistant superintendent of the park for the past 15 years. But more than 600 diamonds are found every year by the nearly 50,000 annual visitors to the 800-acre site.
There are three ways to look for diamonds: surface hunting; using a screen to sift through dry lamporite, the diamond-bearing soil; or washing the soil through a screen.
“Some people work as hard as if they were on a construction job, and others sit in the shade and look around in the dirt,” Henderson said.
In the park’s visitor center, the $34,000 Strawn-Wagner Diamond is on display for inspiration for the visitors who come from Arkansas and across the United States, Europe and Canada.
Most of the Crater’s diamonds are clear, white, brown and yellow. Other semi-precious gems and minerals found at the park include amethyst, garnet, peridot, jasper, agate, calcite, barite and quartz.
Crater of Diamonds is located two miles southeast of Murfreesboro on state Highway 301. The park staff provides free identification and certification of diamonds. Park interpreters present programs about diamonds, the geology and history of the park, and its diversity of plant and animal species. The park offers 59 campsites, picnic sites, a cafe, a pavilion, hiking trails and interpretive programs.
State Park System
Arkansas Museum of Natural Resources
Arkansas Post Museum
Bull Shoals-White River State Park
Cane Creek State Park
Conway Cemetery State Park
Cossatot River State Park-Natural Area
Crater of Diamonds State Park
Crowley’s Ridge State Park
Daisy State Park
DeGray Lake Resort State Park
Delta Heritage Trail
Devil’s Den State Park
Hampson Museum State Park
Herman Davis State Park
Hobbs State Park-Conservation Area
Jacksonport State Park
Jenkins’ Ferry State Park
Lake Catherine State Park
Lake Charles State Park
Lake Chicot State Park
Lake Dardanelle State Park
Lake Fort Smith State Park
Lake Frierson State Park
Lake Ouachita State Park
Lake Poinsett State Park
Logoly State Park
Louisiana Purchase State Park
Mammoth Spring State Park
Marks’ Mills State Park
Millwood State Park
Moro Bay State Park
Mount Magazine State Park
Mount Nebo State Park
Old Davidsonville State Park
Old Washington Historic State Park
Ozark Folk Center State Park
Parkin Archeological State Park
Petit Jean State Park
Pinnacle Mountain State Park
Plantation Agriculture Museum
Poison Spring State Park
Powhatan Courthouse State Park
Prairie County Museum
Prairie Grove Battlefield State Park
Queen Wilhelmina State Park
South Arkansas Arboretum
Toltec Mounds Archeological State Park
Village Creek State Park
White Oak Lake State Park
Withrow Springs State Park
Woolly Hollow State Park
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