Written by David Holsted, published in the Harrison Daily Times on October 8, 2020

In the early part of the 20th century, Mrs. A.B. Wilson and her sister, Mrs. W. George Clark, witnessed the first train coming into Harrison.

More than 50 years later, they witnessed another first.

Wilson, 92, and Clark, 91, were among the estimated 4,000 people in attendance on June 29, 1957, at Harrison Municipal Airport to celebrate the inauguration of air service to the community. At 1:10 p.m., a Central Airlines DC-3 Centraliner arrived in Harrison from Little Rock.

Harrison mayor Dene O. Hester was the first to step from the plane. Jean Fowler, Miss Harrison of 1957, then cut a ribbon, officially opening the airport to air service.

Five minutes later, the first regularly scheduled Central Airlines flight arrived from St. Louis. Among the passengers was Dr. W. A. Hudson of Jasper. He had made reservations a year earlier to be the first paying customer to fly into Harrison. Hudson made the trip from Detroit, where maintained a home.

Central Airlines was founded as a “local service” air carrier by Keith Kahle in the 1940s. It served Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. It was headquartered at Meacham Field in Ft. Worth, Texas. Among its hubs was one in Fort Smith. In 1967, Central Airlines merged with Frontier Airlines.

Kahle, who also served as the airline’s president, was at the ceremony. He was presented with souvenir baseball bats that were made in Harrison.

Among the speakers that day was Winthrop Rockefeller, who was the chairman of the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission. Rockefeller had flown into Harrison from his farm atop Petit Jean Mountain. Described as a “tall man wearing a big hat and boots,” told the crowd that he had travelled more than a million miles by air.

Rockefeller emphasized the importance of air service. The commission, he went on to say, had received a number of rejections from manufacturers who liked certain cities in Arkansas, but did not come because of a lack of air service.

Lena Frances Flower Shop had the distinction of having the first paid freight shipment aboard the flight. The store received a shipment of flowers from Los Angeles. Lena Frances reported that the flowers were in extra fresh condition.

Written by David Holsted, published in the Harrison Daily Times on October 1, 2020

A little bit of Boone County was found throughout Europe and the Pacific during World War II.

The Erwin Brothers Saw Mill, located in Harrison, produced thousands of walnut gun stocks for the military in its fight against the Axis powers.

According to Raymond B. Erwin, writing in the Boone County Historian in 2004, Carl and Dewey Erwin established a saw mill at the end of East Stephenson Avenue sometime in the early 20th century. Carl ran the Harrison mill, while his brother ran a second operation in Cotter.

Carl had served with the 20th Engineers in France during World War I. His duties included being in charge of installing the machinery for saw mills that were powered by steam engines. Lumber was sawed to repair and build docks for the Army land supplies and to provide lumber for barracks and warehouses. They also cut railroad cross ties.

Raymond Erwin went on to say that, over the years, the Erwin Saw Mill cut wagon timbers, wagon tongues, coupling poles and hickory axles for the Springfield Wagon Company and the Bower Wagon Company of Harrison. It also cut wood for ski poles, skis, Model T wheel spokes, wagon wheel rims, plow handle strips and pieces for Singer sewing table legs.

“In 1953, the lumber industry in and around Harrison had a combined payroll of over $2 million,” according to the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History. “Men were employed in cutting and milling logs and, increasingly, turning wood into finished products such as gunstocks and furniture.”

During World War II and the Korean War, Erwin Saw Mill cut and shipped over half a million walnut gun stocks. According to many firearm experts, American Walnut has been the primary gunstock material for all guns in the U.S. from the 1700s to today. Walnut is hard, dense and resilient. It resists warping, suffers little shrinkage and isn’t prone to splitting.

In a Harrison Daily Times article on April 6, 1944, it was stated that Erwin Brothers had processed and delivered walnut wood for about 150,000 rifle and machine gun stocks.

“The demand for this material is definitely tapering off,” Carl Erwin was quoted. The curtailment, he went on to say, had caused a decided drop in the local market for walnut logs, which had been unusually good up to that point.

“This let-up in government purchases,” the Daily Times said, “is not taken as an indication of belief that the end of the war is in sight, but merely that the supply of this material now built up is sufficient for present needs.”