Editor's note: The new combined City Hall/School Administration building is the third building to serve as City Hall for Pea Ridge. The history of the former building is shared by former newspaper editor, Billie Jines, and will run for five consecutive weeks.
The historic concrete block building housing the Pea Ridge City Hall has just undergone major remodeling. It has served, however, as the seat of city government here since its purchase in late 1970.
For many decades, though, this once double building, two buildings side by side, had served this community in a variety of ways. Take, for instance, when part of it housed Vogt's Dry Goods Store. It was opened about 1947 with Imogene Lasater as manager. The store carried both ladies' and men's clothing, as well as other dry goods. When the store had operated about two years, the owner, Robert Vogt, sold its stock to Eva Patterson. She moved it to a building erected immediately east of the old post office in the next block.
Most people, with whom this writer discussed the building, mentioned first the name of Charlie Tetrick, the produce he operated and his other businesses in parts of the structure. There were his feed store and hatchery, some point out.
The produce was where the public brought chickens, eggs, cream, rabbits, strawberries and other products to sell. Or where they came to buy. The sawdust heaped high in one area was what kept ice from melting as it awaited customers.
One boy, now a senior citizen here, remembered the very hot day when he got to buy 25 pounds of ice. He put it in his burlap sack and headed out the two miles up Jacket Road. By the time he got home, much of the ice had melted, but the family retrieved enough to make ice cream in their hand-turned freezer.
An older woman, whose family lived a few miles from town when she grew up, reminisced about the selling of produce there. Sometimes when the family needed an extra quarter or two, she and her sister were told to take a hen to the produce to sell. It was not the walk into town that they dreaded. It was the fear that some of the boys they knew might be sitting on the whittlers' bench nearby and see them having to bring in a hen to sell.
For a time, Emmett Spriggs ran a moving picture show in part of the building. No plush seats, those days. But boards placed on blocks made an acceptable seating place for such welcome entertainment in the pre-television era.
Charles Hardy recalled the Chevrolet dealership owned by Ben Doke that was housed in the building. He said the business had gone through the 1928 models and started the 1929s when it closed down. George Wells was the mechanic, but not in that building. He worked in a building east of that one across the alley.
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Editor's note: This article is first in a series. It was written by Billie Jines, former editor of The TIMES of Northeast Benton County. It is the history of the building which served as City Hall for many decades prior to the recent construction of the one on Weston Street.
Editorial on 09/27/2017