Eureka! A Lost Town Found

“Where the misfits fit,” said the artist. “That’s the motto of Eureka Springs.” It’s not a motto you’ll find in any of the brochures describing the tourist attractions of this gem of a town in the Ozarks. But in the middle of a long weekend here, I had a sense of what he meant. With about 600 artists among fewer than 2,000 permanent residents, Eureka Springs is a town where artists run restaurants and B&Bs; as well as galleries, and where a painter or writer is likely to feel right at home. (This one sure did.)

I’d come to northwest Arkansas primarily to take in the big War Eagle Fair, a pioneering crafts fair held twice a year at a farm 25 miles south of here. Though other towns were closer to the fair, Eureka Springs sounded the most appealing.

Eureka Springs was a popular health resort from the 1880s to the 1920s, celebrated for the supposed healing powers of its waters. During the 1930s, economic depression and changing tastes sent the resort town into decline, and it slumbered through the 1940s, ‘50s and ‘60s. Renewed and restored over the past 20 years or so, it has become known as a hub of Ozark crafts, art and turn-of-the-century architecture. Today the entire town is on the National Registry of Historic Places.

It turned out to be full of places to stay--more than 200 of them--including a dazzling array of B&Bs; in restored Victorian houses and several century-old hotels. I chose one of the more modestly priced hotels, the Basin Park, built in 1905, in the middle of the small downtown.

Eighty percent of Eureka Springs is forested, and its streets are looped along the side of a steep valley like strings of Christmas tree lights. This was the view that greeted me as I drove into town during late twilight early in May, after a three-hour drive from the Tulsa, Okla., airport, which my travel agent had estimated to be less than two hours.

By the time I signed in at the Basin Park, the hotel dining room was closed. But a short walk brought me to the Plaza Restaurant, one of the desk clerk’s recommendations. After enchiladas and a glass of wine in its Upstairs Cantina, and conversation with some fellow travelers, I strolled along South Main and Spring streets, which are lined with shops and galleries housed in late 19th century buildings. Most of them were closed by then, but I did come upon an opening party at a new gallery, which along with art and crafts offered pink champagne, cookies and a rock band.

Back in my room, which was charming and comfortable (tall windows, a wicker rocker, fireplace), soaking in the commodious, old-fashioned tub, I decided that Eureka Springs definitely had promise.

After a sound night’s sleep against a background of rain, I began Friday with the modest breakfast (bagels, cereal and coffee) that was included in the room price. It was served in the big, minimally furnished sun room, where stained glass window tops warmed the dull light of the rainy morning.

Reluctantly, I set out to get my car from the hotel’s guest parking lot down the hill. After an hour’s drive on wet and winding roads, I rolled over a narrow iron bridge into the War Eagle Farm. I spent the morning absorbed in Ozark crafts and had lunch in the picnic tent. As the rain lifted, I walked back across the bridge to tour the War Eagle Mill, the only working grist mill in Arkansas and an exact reproduction of an 1873 mill on the site. It’s like a small museum, with a gift shop that specializes in freshly ground grain. And this weekend, it was host to two more crafts fairs. By the time I started the drive back, I felt gorged with crafts.

Eureka Springs cools considerably in the evening, even, I’m told, in summer, but I was comfortable having dinner on the hotel’s open-air balcony overlooking Spring Street. A singer-guitarist was performing, and I lingered there, watching the changing colors of twilight over the rooftops and hillside, and, finally, nightfall, long after the music stopped.

It was Friday, and many of the shops were open late, so I visited a few, looking for postcards and souvenirs. I ended up with three big bars of dogwood-scented soap, locally made at the Hog Scald Hollow Soap Works, with labels stamped S*O*A*P--a clean four-letter word.

After Saturday morning breakfast, once again in the Basin Park’s sun room, now appropriately sunny, I walked up Main Street to the town museum, a three-story stone building from 1889, which in past lives had been a store and a brothel.

One of the pioneer settlers credited with “discovering” the springs in the 1850s--the Native Americans, of course, had been coming here for centuries--was Dr. Alvah Jackson. He drew on the water of his Basin Spring to treat soldiers from both sides during the Civil War. But it wasn’t until 1879, when, at Jackson’s suggestion, Judge J. B. Saunders of nearby Berryville came here for treatment of a skin disease, that word of its healing powers spread widely. Soon other cure-seekers flocked to the springs, creating a boomtown of luxury hotels and bathhouses that thrived until the 1930s.

May is Arts Month in Eureka Springs, and outside the museum, I caught the end of a parade that kicked off the festivities. After it passed, I stepped aboard a town trolley for a tour that passed one charming, idiosyncratic house after another.

“The Historical Society rules with an iron hand,” the guide said. “They don’t tell you what colors you have to paint your house, but they do have to approve the colors you pick. And they like each house to have at least three colors, without any white. There’s a good example,” he said, pointing out a mostly mauve house from the 1880s, now the No. 5 Ojo Inn.

Other sights included a motel with cottages built of rocks, a house known as the Witch’s Hat and what our guide called the Pepto-Bismol House (“some people love the color”).

The population of Eureka Springs declined to about 800 in the 1960s, our guide said, and hippies moved in. “They must have thought they’d found paradise, with all the empty Victorians.” He attributed Eureka Springs’ resurgence as a tourist town to the Great Passion Play, now in its 30th year, which is performed from late April through late October by a cast of 200 in a 4,100-seat amphitheater.

After the trolley tour, I drove 4 1/2 miles south of town to Quigley’s Castle, billed in its brochure as “the Ozarks’ strangest dwelling.” More than just strange, I’d say; I’d call it magical. It is the product of the obsessiveness and artistic vision of Elise Quigley, who in 1943 enlisted her five children in tearing down the family home in order to force her husband to build one of her own design--a house in which “you felt you were living in a world instead of in a box.”

The result was Quigley’s Castle. Its originality is immediately evident in the rocks, which Mrs. Quigley had been collecting since childhood, that cover every surface, from the mailbox to birdbaths to all four sides of the two-story house.

Her vision extended to the interior design: There is a 4-foot earthen gap between the rock walls and the edge of the living-space floor, so that decorative plants can grow in the ground. Light pours in through a dozen 4-by-6-foot windows. Many plants reach the second-story ceiling, giving the upper floor the feeling of an elaborate treehouse.

A granddaughter of the Quigleys and her husband seem to take great pleasure in showing visitors around, and invited us to stay as long as we liked. Wishing I could stay for weeks (or at least hours), I lingered till closing.

That evening, I ate well at the Bavarian Inn, but as it turned out, I could have skipped dinner and eaten my fill at the Arts Month receptions being held by many of the galleries in town.

“People come here to heal,” the proprietor of a crafts store had told me, and some, including her, have their own “personal springs.”

Late Sunday afternoon, after another day at the War Eagle Fair, I was ready for a little healing. I treated myself to “the works”--$59 for a whirlpool mineral bath, eucalyptus steam treatment, clay mask and one-hour massage--at the Palace Hotel and Bath House, built in 1901. The bath, in a claw-foot tub, turned out to be less than relaxing because I couldn’t figure out how to get my legs out of the way of the whirlpool contraption. But being steamed in a turn-of-the century wooden barrel was a lot of fun.

After dinner at Center Street South, a bar and restaurant specializing in Mexican food, I went around the corner to the Roxy, a former theater converted to a cafe with books, board games, a pool table and easy chairs. I passed up Scrabble in favor of conversation with a witty young disk jockey from Fayetteville.

Back at the Basin Park around 11 p.m., the little lobby was full of folks sitting on the floor singing country music. “Here, have a beer,” someone said. I joined the circle for a few minutes and found out that, no, this wasn’t a regular feature of Sundays at the Basin Park, just an informal gathering of newly arrived conventioneers.

My last morning in Eureka Springs brought some tough choices. Reluctantly, I passed up the botanical gardens in favor of a look at Pivot Rock, which is balanced on a base one-fifteenth the size of its top. Though the rock is not quite the colossus I’d imagined, I had a delightful walk on the nature trail that leads to it. Finally, I headed for nearby Thorncrown Chapel, which several Eurekans had told me was a must-see.

Like the Quigley Castle, the chapel is a monument to one person’s vision. In the early 1970s, retired Southern California schoolteachers Jim and Della Reed (from the Long Beach and Los Alamitos districts) built a retirement home on a lovely wooded mountainside here. Soon their extra-wide driveway was attracting tourists, who would park there and picnic, hike and litter. The Reeds talked about installing a gated fence, until one day, as Della remembers it, “Jim came back from the mailbox and said, ‘The Lord wants me to build a glass chapel to give those folks something uplifting to do with their afternoons.’ ”

Jim Reed’s vision was of a chapel in which worshipers would feel at one with the natural surroundings. As designed by architect E. Fay Jones, it works. Once I was inside, I had trouble leaving; I’d tear my eyes from the woods outside the glass walls, only to feel my gaze drawn skyward by the pine beams rising above the skylight.

Later, on the road to Oklahoma, I had the feeling that I was seeing the passing landscape through the chapel’s invisible walls.

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GUIDEBOOK: Springing for Eureka

Getting there: The closest airport is at Fayetteville, Ark., about a 90-minute drive over curve-filled roads. Tulsa, Okla., is nearly twice as far but offers more choices in airlines and rental cars. United has direct service from LAX to Tulsa; Delta, American, Southwest and Continental have connecting flights. Restricted fares start at $184 round trip.

Getting around: An all-day trolley pass costs $3, as do the guided trolley tours. Parking is scarce; ask about guest parking when making hotel and B&B; reservations.

Where to stay: At many of the restored historic lodgings in town, children are not welcome.

The Grand Central, 37 N. Main St., telephone (501) 253-6756, was built in 1883 for railroad executives. Rates start at $95 for studio suites.

The Basin Park, 12 Spring St., tel. (501) 253-7837; the rate for a double ranges from $48, November through April, to $89 in October.

The Palace Hotel, 135 Spring St., tel. (501) 253-7474, has eight suites. Rates: $127-$146.

The Assn. of Bed & Breakfasts, Cabins & Cottages lists many area accommodations. Write for a brochure, P.O. Box 27, Eureka Springs, AK 72632, or call the vacancy hotline, tel. (501) 253-6767.

Seeing some sights: Quigley’s Castle, four miles south of town on Arkansas 23, is open daily except Thursday and Sunday, April through October. Admission, $5. Tel. (501) 253-8311.

Thorncrown Chapel, two miles west on U.S. Highway 62; tel. (501) 253-7401; open daily. Nondenominational Sunday services are at 7:30 a.m. June through October.

The Great Passion Play, east on U.S. 62, is performed nightly except Monday and Thursday from late April through late October. Tickets, $15.25, $14.25. Tel. (800) 882-7529.

The War Eagle Fair will be Oct. 15-18 and May 7-9. It is on a farm on U.S. 412 in the town of Hindsville. Admission is free. Tel. (501) 789-5398.

For more information: Arkansas Tourism Office, 1 Capitol Mall, Department 7701, Little Rock, AR 72201; tel. (800) 628-8725 or (501) 682-7777, fax (501) 682-1364.