Diamond find kindles memories of Arkansas travails
By John David Powell (11/09/07)
The discovery this week of a 4.38-carat diamond at the Crater of Diamonds State Park in Arkansas brought back the following fond memories, which first ran in a column in 1987.
(Hot Springs, Ark.) -- All is peaceful. Here, within the friendly confines of the Arlington Hotel, one can sit back and forget the troubles of the day. This is just the place for me.
One would think that I would know better by now. There's something about Arkansas and me that doesn't hit it off. Oh, the occasional trips to visit in-laws are all right, for the most part. The little side trips and excursions into the interior are the killers, though.
I had decided to be a nice guy and take the family, along with Uncle Larry, a close friend from Texas, to Murfreesboro, the only diamond pipe mine in North America. If you are lucky, you might pick up a few semi-precious rocks. If you are really lucky, you might find a teeny-tiny diamond in the mine's blue dirt.
Some folks have walked away with some good-size stones, so the thrill and anticipation of joining their ranks loomed large for our troop as we prepared for our trek. Besides, my wife has this weird fascination with diamonds, and I figured why not make the little woman happy.
We loaded down the trunk with a cooler full of goodies. At least I thought we had a cooler full of goodies. That was just another wonderful surprise that lay waiting to spring upon me. Then, just before dawn, we piled into the car and headed off to find our fame and fortune in diamonds.
We drove west to Arcadia then turned to the north on La. 9. Athens was beginning to stir as we passed through. By the time we hit Homer, the sun had eased over the horizon and was casting golden colors across the fields and trees. As we said good-bye in Haynesville to civilization as we know it, a prickly sensation passed across the back of my neck. We had entered into strange lands.
Breakfast in Magnolia was uneventful. Nevertheless, I hurried my passengers along, not wanting to stretch my luck too far. The next leg of the trip went so well that I began to relax and even mentioned to my companions that our luck appeared to be changing.
It was.
Just outside of Blevins, Ark., we had to decide whether to continue along Ark. 24 about 35 miles, or take Ark. 195 to 301 into Crater of Diamonds State Park, which would be about 18 miles or so. My Rand McNally map described the first choice as “other principal road, paved,” and the second choice as “other road, paved.” We all figured, “What the heck,” and took the second choice.
Bad move.
A sign jumped out from behind a tree a few miles later. PAVEMENT ENDS, it read. At that point, the car fell off the pavement and onto what appeared to be a large path hewn out of the forest. I drove a few hundred feet and stopped. There was no sound. There was no sign of civilization. I opted to turn around, but my Arkansan wife said to push onward because, surely, the road picked up just ahead.
As I drove on against my better judgment, I looked in the rearview mirror. Uncle Larry was staring out the window, trying to memorize the countryside in case he had to make it out on foot. My daughter found refuge on the floor.
Several slow and agonizing miles later, miles on dirt and rock that look virgin to steel-belted radials, we passed what appeared to be a house. I couldn't go slower and I wouldn't stop. It might have been my imagination, but I thought I saw men with long beards, women with long beards, children with long beards, and someone shouting, “Lookie there, Luke. We got us some fun fer tonight.”
I drove on.
Just when I thought we were hopelessly lost, just as Uncle Larry was preparing to bail out and take his chances on his own, my tires touched pavement. We were saved. For about a mile. This time when the pavement ended, we found ourselves in the middle of a hedgerow going through the middle of a field. I have pictures to prove it.
After what surely must have been someone's lifetime, we again touched real road and skedaddled as far away from Ark. 195 as we could.
Crater of Diamonds State Park was a nice place. Of course, after that experience, the Black Hole of Calcutta would have looked inviting. There's nothing extraordinary about the park or about the mine, for that matter. To me, it looked like some farmer's plowed field with a lot of field hands out working in it. But to Sharon, this was Paradise. Shows you what living with me must be like if a plowed field is paradise.
So there I was in the hot sun, sitting on a mound of dirt I had just sifted, when it suddenly hit me. I had arisen before dawn, driven several hours, traversed a land that time and Rand McNally forgot, only to pay somebody good American money to sit in a pile of dirt. How does this happen to me?
There are other stories to tell, like that cooler full of goodies that turned out to be the unmentionable remains of soggy peanut butter sandwiches. Or the near stampede when my five-year-old screamed out, “Hey everyone, I found a big diamond.” Twice. But, those tales will have to wait for another time.
My only solace now lies in the fact that I am safe until morning, unless another rockslide hits the hotel. My wife wants to go to some place tomorrow that calls itself the world's largest rock store. This must be where people go when they don't find anything at the diamond mine. I can't wait.
John David Powell is an award-winning writer and Internet columnist, university lecturer, and contributor to the Christian History Project.
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