Now & Then — Roaring River was the place for family outings

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

A few days ago I heard a KURM Radio remote broadcast reporting on the opening of trout fishing season at Roaring River State Park. It set me thinking about how years ago Roaring was THE place to go for family outings. Even before we became familiar with Lake Atalanta’s park and picnic grounds, east of Rogers, we would go to Roaring River for our picnics, cookouts and other family outings.

For anyone who may not be familiar with Roaring River, it is located not far over the line into Missouri, about 10 miles east of Seligman. (Around Pea Ridge, no one had to name which state line was being spoken of. If you mentioned “The Line,” everyone just understood that you meant the Missouri line. It all had to do with Benton County’s being a dry county and Barry and McDonald counties not being.) Roaring River has long featured the fish hatchery at the mouth of the great spring which feeds thestream.

At home, my fishing creek was Otter Creek. In Otter Creek, while one might occasionally find a big fish, most of our fish then were little perch or other small varieties. At Roaring River you could see thousands and “millions” of fish, trout of all sizes. As a boy, I thought the Roaring River Fish Hatchery was one of the wonders of the world.

I could hardly imagine so many fish, its vast tanks chock full of trout, from fingerlings to 16 inchers. I loved to watch the churning of the water when the attendants threw food to the fish.

These days apparently, hundreds of fishermen come out for the opening of the season at Roaring River. I guess to me that is a reason not to go that day.

I don’t think I could enjoy fishing with fishermen shoulder to shoulder and elbow to elbow on the stream. I’ll go later. Actually I’m not much of a fisherman, and I’ll probably just go to see the fish and to marvel at the water flow from the great spring. Back when I was a boy, going there in the late ’40s, we had all heard that the great spring at Roaring River was so deep that no one had ever found the bottom. I had a huge respect for that vision of deep, deep blue water, and I had no desire whatsoever to try to find the bottom of the bottomless spring. Divers have probably fathomed the depths over the years, but I’m content to wait for the movie when someone makes it.

Many Pea Ridgers have seen the movies made by Bill Thuman back in the late 1940s, including his 8-mm movie strips of the Pea Ridge Centennial celebration of 1950. It is interesting to me that those old amateur movies also showfamily outings of several Pea Ridge families, such as Mr. and Mrs. Thuman and Luther and Gertie Martin.

Luther Martin was one of our town’s grocers in those days. His grocery store was at the southwest corner of Pickens and Curtis, where Easley’s Hardware began.

One of my Roaring River memories was of a thirdgrade class outing in 1948.

It was a birthday celebration for JoAnn Putman. Her mother made the arrangements for the trip, for the picnic food and snacks, and the school provided a bus to take our whole class on the outing. I’m thinking they probably don’t do “field trips” like that these days. Nearly all of us kids on that outing had waterguns. Little yellow, red, blue or orange plastic squirt guns that held maybe a half cup of water. Our little water shooters didn’t shoot much of a stream, but it was enough for us go give eachother a thorough dousing.

We had plenty of time and opportunities, so by the time we were getting on the bus for home, there was not a dry thread on any of us. I’m sure that not even a pool party could be any wetter than that great birthday outing at Roaring River.◊◊◊

Editor’s note: Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history. He is vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.

News, Pages 5 on 03/16/2011