More Pictures of the Past in Corning

I love looking at old photographs~ memories of the past, of a lifetime that was much more difficult than today, but at the same time, so much more simple. Men worked hard to earn a meager living and women stayed home to take care of their children and keep house.

Today I just wanted to share some of these amazing photographs that I have come across, of the area of Corning, Arkansas, during the time that our grandfather, John Thomas, would have been growing up there.  I love to let my imagination run wild....thinking of what life must have been like for him back then.   Muddy streets, horses and cattle, the local mercantile.....

This 1910 photograph shows what the weary traveler saw around 1910 as he alighted from the Iron Mountain train and faced westward for his first good look at his new home.  Across a muddy street stretched southward a row of wooden buildings that bespoke the primitive architecture of the village.  At the extreme right, a sheet iron store building housed the Joseph Steinberg Mercantile and the Canfield tool shop. Next, a two story establishment was the J. O. Langdon Restaurant, flanked by the lean-to one-story bowling alley.  On the corner, as it has been since the beginning of the town, the Staley Drug Store.




















The following picture is of the third County Courthouse.  The first courthouse was built in 1873 and was later sold to M.L. Watts to become the general merchandise store known a "C.O. Watt & Co. in 1884.  The second courthouse was built in 1881 on the court square where it served until 1900 when it was irreparably damaged by an earthquake.  Finally this third courthouse was constructed in 1900, where it stood until it was destroyed by fire in 1963. Due to this fire, a lot of records were destroyed along with the majestic building.