What Do You Think of When You Think of Arkansas?

A minor province of the state of Redneckistan?

Bill Clinton.

And the funny ways it’s pronounced.

Beautiful land, I love it. A pain to drive from Mo though. I want to go diamond mine this summer.

My only contact with Arkansas is having to take IH 30 & 40 across the state to get from Texarkana to Memphis about once a year. They do not make a good impression but I am well aware that they do not represent the state. So, when I think of Arkansas I think of a straight stretch of highway where my time is spent avoiding 18-wheel trucks who will invariably pull out into the right hand lane to pass another truck, backing up faster traffic, because they take several miles to accomplish this by refusing to go more than a couple of mph faster than the slower truck.

That and constant vigilance for speed traps set up by police in many of the smaller towns that are linked by the highways. This month, just outside of Lonoke I saw eight (8) police cars within a two mile stretch thinning the herd by pulling people over for speeding. Three of them were lined up, waiting, side by side at a crossing in the highway crossing. They were well hidden by trees and I can imagine them peeling off one after the other in formation. They trap the Eastbound traffic, pull into the next crossing and wait to trap the Westbound then return to their original crossing and repeat the cycle until they get bored I guess.

Beautiful country. Hills, my Lord, hills! Pine trees and woods. And poverty. You’ll be driving through this beautiful country and there, thrown in the middle of the woods, on down the hill, will be some shanty of a rickety, falling down house with hound dogs sniffing around and dirty kids climbing on top of a rusting 50 gallon oil can.

The diamond mine where you can pay a fee and look for diamonds…
There have been some nice diamonds found there.
My parents took us many times as kids.

@KNOWITALL we talked about going to the Crater of Diamonds SP on our next trip. We had planned to visit Hot Springs this trip since my wife retired and we are no longer constrained by jobs but…........ Maybe after this abortion of a shutdown ends,

If we still have a Parks Service after it that is.

@rebbel, it was named after the Akansa indians, and that tribe was most likely an offshoot of the Kansa indians, that Kansas is named after. Living in Kansas, we have stuff in the state that is called “Arkansas,” like the “Arkansas River,” and we pronounce it just like it reads. With Ark and then Kansas. People from out of state try to correct us sometimes and I’m like, “I don’t see no W in Arkansas, do you?!”
There is also a town called “Arkansas City.” Same thing. Someone on the radio pronounced it “Arkansaw City,” and we snickered.

@rojo Sounds great, hope you find something cool. I have a pink quartz my friend brought me from there. Really neat vibes.

@Dutchess_III Yeah, that’s how we learned it from the news shows when Bill Clinton was president.
Arkunsaw

Ar-Kansas. Flat land. Mid west.

ˆˆˆˆˆ It wasn’t flat in Hot Springs ! DOWN a steep hill to Walgreen’s. UP the hill to get back to the road. Loved it. Small mountains when we’d come out of a restaurant right there. Beautiful.

Oh, Arkansas isn’t flat @kritiper! It’s full of rolling hills. Much of Kansas isn’t flat, either. Or Oklahoma. Western Kansas and Eastern Colorado, flat as a pancake.

@Harper1234 I used to drive to Coleman’s Diamond Mines but never dug for diamonds. They have a gift shop loaded with quartz clusters. My daughter bought me a really big one about two feet long and five inches tall of solid quartz crystals. I think the place was in Jessieville but I won’t go into the fun of that tiny town. Fun for seniors anyway.
My stepson and kids spent hours digging for quartz and I have never seen such tall crystal points. Hundreds of dollars worth of quartz points in the middle of that hot summer.

Bad roads, especially in the country. Horrible paving.

Also, poverty. Poor people living in shacks.

@rebbel tha’s how we pronounce the state too, of course. We were raised to call it that. But everything else with the name we call it Ar kansas. It’s a Kansas thing I think.

I think of it as a miserable, dusty backwater but that is probably based on some movies I have seen. From the replies above it is much nicer than I thought.

@flutherother A lot of the Ozarks are truly gorgeous. Huge peaks and wet, dark hollers. Glittering caves and icy spring fed waters everywhere. You coasters could and do build mansions out here for your rent money lol. Cost of living is low.

I think of Bill Clinton, Hot Springs, the Ouachita Mountains. I think of it is as being green and there are a lot of crepe myrtles (from what I’ve seen on Street View).

I don’t know much about it. It is admittedly one of the states I think about the least.

It has a lot more trees than I thought and a lot more lakes. The weather seems quite pleasant too, just a bit hot for me in the summer.

Chuggabug…Wacky Races

My Mom’s birthplace.
The Ozarks are beautiful.

In Arkansas they have hills. Where I live, we have mountains.

I haven’t read the other answers.

President Clinton

One of the nicest friends I have who happens to be from Arkansas.

Hot Springs.

Nice people who tend to be conservative, but open to discussion.

whetstones!

Orval Faubus. The Ozarks. Razorbacks. Low tax mentality with the dirt roads, schools and infrastructure to prove it. Affordable. (Code meaning one of those places where people are “from” rather than headed toward)

^^^ And it’s crazy, because it is SUCH beautiful country that it could easily become a tourist destination.

I have to tell this true story again. I had the mower shop and a young man came in. He was tall and scruffy. Had on overalls and a warm plaid jacket. Ball cap turned around backward. Long, uncombed hair, scruffy beard.
It was around Christmas and just being friendly I asked if he had plans for Christmas.
He said, “Yeah, I’m going home, back east.”
I surreptitiously looked him over again. He did not, in any way, fit my stereotype of some who would be from “Back east.”
“Back east?” I asked.
“Yeah. Arkansas,” he said, dead serious, as far as I could tell.
I curled up a little inside with hilarity I had to choke back!

It IS pretty country.

First hillbillies.

And then The Clinton library which I would like to visit.

@Kardamom Clinton library is awesome.

It does sound like a great place to hunt ground squirrels with a .22 from the cab of a pick-up truck.

@kritiper Another road hunter? tsk tsk.

@KNOWITALL Don’t be so harsh! I use a pistol.