I am Harry W. Sutton, the only living child of I. C. Sutton and Cornelia A. White Sutton. I was the fourth child born September 15, 1919 to the union, and was born in the big two story white house there in Lurton.

First a little history about my family. My father Irving Clarence, I. C. Sutton, was born July 14, 1890 in Salem, Oregon. His parents moved to Zion, Illinois when he was quite young. The move was primarily for the health of his mother and the healing qualities of the church in Zion. My father's schooling was all in Zion. He only completed the tenth grade and never went to college. He went to work for a company that built ditch digging machines and continued his education by reading and applying it to his job and became an engineer for the company at an early age. He then became a representive for the company and and was sent to all parts of the United States to train and or repair the equipment that was shipped to the various cities. In his travels he met my mother, Cornelia White, in Oklahoma and they were married March 23, 1910.

My older brother, Irving, was born December 30, 1910 in Oklahoma City. Charles, Lloyd's father, was born in Zion, Illinois April 5 1913. My sister, Mary Minerva, was born May 6, 1916. I was next, as stated above, then my brother Alburtus (Burt), he was born in Russellville, Arkansas, November 9, 1921.

Now, the reason for moving to the Ozarks. When my two older brothers were just babies, my father's work took him and his family to many large cities, primarily in the eastern part of the U.S. My father built a portable house that could be put together and taken apart using bolts and nuts and could be loaded on a flatcar on the train and shipped to where his job was, and their household goods were put in a boxcar and shipped along with the house. I am told that the second brother was extra healthy and weighed 30+ pounds when three months old. Mom got so fed up moving and lugging the baby that she told my dad she wouldn't care if she was 50 miles from a railroad. Well, to make a long story short, my dad took her up on it and made a trip to the Harrison Land Office in Harrison, Arkansas. While there a fellow came in and they were talking he said he had came in to list 60 acres that had a log house, a barn, a good spring and several acres of cleared land and good pasture. Dad told the man if he could get to a railroad within a reasonable time and if it wouldn't cost more than $5.00 to get there, he might be interested. Of course he was assured that was no problem and the property was approximately 50 miles from a railroad so a deal was made. The man's name may have been Brace because everybody called it the Brace Place.

Note: Land Records indicate that the original homestead patent was obtained by Harvey A. Brace.

Dad returned back to his job and spent about another year working, then made the move to the mountains. At this time, about the year of 1915, there was not any known roads or maintained highways to that part of Newton County, Arkansas. There were trails used by wagons and horseback riders and the closest and most direct route by rail to their destination was from St Joe, Arkansas. Upon their arrival in St Joe arrangements were made for three wagons to truck their belongings to the "Brace Place". The party consisted of mom, dad, Grandma White and the two young boys, along with trunks, luggage, baby buggies, a pump organ, mother's violin and numerous household goods, and the drivers of the wagons.

From St. Joe they crossed the Buffalo River at Wollem, crossed Horn Mountain, then Cave Creek and up Shuler Point to the Tarlton Flats on top of the mountain and on West of the Hamm place, which later became Lurton, about two miles to their new home. On the journey across the mountains they had to double up the teams to get the heavy loaded wagons up the steep grades. At this time I understand that Mom wasn't too sure she had made the very best of decisions about being 50 miles from a railroad. They did survive and dad tried farming for a year and said he nearly starved out.

The closest Post Office at that time was located at Moore, Arkansas, which was approximately 10 miles east as the crow flies and the mail was distributed by horseback to the homes. I have a letter in my archives at home, addressed to my dad at Moore, Arkansas from his company, asking him to return to work. This he did, but only for a short time.

In the meantime, as World War I was in full swing, the Bass and Cave Creek area had working lead and zinc mines, good creek bottom farming land and appealed greatly to the Hamm Family, and they made arrangements to make a move there and my dad went in debt to purchase their mountain property, which later became Lurton.

Note: This purchase consisted of 120 acres of land which Asa Calicutt Hamm had established patent to, under homestead cerficate no. 16490.

The move from the Brace Place, along with my new sister Mary, transpired and a new home was established. At that time the only buildings there were the two story home place, a barn, the general store building which was just outside the south front yard gate and the original Rosamond Sawmill building located between what later became the hotel and garage. It was in the old sawmill building that the first industry was established. The very first (the sawmill was no longer there) was a grist mill. Saturdays were "mill" day and people from far and near brought their grain in on horses, wagons, and later strip down motor cars. Primarily Model T's. The year was now the early '20's, and I can recall my brother Irving running the grist mill, grinding the grains to the various customer's requirements. Wheat into flour, corn in meal for cornbread or cracked for chickens, and most all other animals. Back to the sawmill. I have been told that it was used to cut a major portion of the rough lumber that was used in construction of the Sutton home place.

Let me back up just a might here. I was about to leave out one of the most important episodes. My mother decided we needed mail service in the area and made application to the postal department for a post office. She was required to submit five names for the department to make a selection from. One of the names was the married name of her half sister, Lurton, and it was selected. So now we have a Lurton on the map.

Next still in the mid '20's, my dad began making chairs in part of the sawmill building. They were mostly of the "Ladder Back" variety and began to hire his first full time employees. The Nichols family from the Big Creek area were the first. The "chair factory" consisted of a wood turning lathe and Henry Nichols was an expert at turning out the various chair parts. It was a great pleasure to see the chips fly from the raw stock and it looked almost like magic the way Henry could duplicate the parts. Dad assembled numerous special machines for boring, sawing, mortising and even designed a special crude tool for making the white oak quot;splitsquot; used in weaving the chair bottoms. Hickory bark was also used for that purpose. In fact I have a school chair at home that was a product of those days and it has a hickory bark bottom in it and the chair is as solid as when it was first made. The Nichols family occupied several tents on the bench that was above the chair factory and were the first permanant settlers in Lurton proper.

Work had began on Highway 7 and even though it was a very crude road it could be traveled from Russellville to Harrison. Lurton being half way between the two towns became a place for people to spend the night. Today you can travel between the two towns in a little more than two hours, but back then by the time you were pulled out of numerous mud holes and fixed several flat tires, it made Lurton an admirable place to spend the night. Highway 7 was completed before Highway 65 and people traveling from Harrison to Little Rock by car had to use # 7. Jasper Mountain was a bugger and also the mountain to "Bugger Hollow" to the south was about the same. As a result our home became more or less a hotel and we kept lots of travelers. Also around this time Freeman Springs had built a resort hotel and became a very popular place.

Even though Lurton itself didn't have a lot of people living right in the area at this time, the 'woods' were full of people in all directions in a very small radius and business was good. One of the first homes to be built was by my mother's cousin, Lloyd Spencer. It was a summer home and was located directly across the road and up on the hill above our well. (Yvonne and I lived there when we were first married). My dad then built two rent houses in the same area and things began to happen. My dad's brother Jayson 'Jay', moved in the area and built the garage, service station and cafe just to the north of the chair factory, this was in the mid '20's and the community got together and constructed the new school and community building and more new homes were built on the hillside above the road and more tents were also lined near the houses. Also the general store was moved across Highway 123 and reconstructed into a large general store and carried just about anything people needed. The postoffice was also going great. The store bought all kinds of roots, like ginsang, mayapple and many others kinds that I cannot remember and shipped them to their destination by parcel post. The store also bought cream and had testers for determining the amount of butterfat which also determined the grade or quality. Also eggs and about anything that was of value was purchased from the farmers and either shipped by parcel post or delivered to town and exchanged for other products or sold outright.

I would like to put specific dates on all this but the best I can do is to generalize the time. However, we are now approaching the year 1929. That is the year of big changes. The early part of '29 was very prosperous for my father and he was looking forward to making Lurton a well known village.

Note: View the Lots and Blocks of the City of Lurton that I. C. Sutton Invisioned.

He hired the county surveyor and layed the town of Lurton into lots and blocks and streets and had maps and blueprints published and put on county records. Also, 1929 was the year my dad made arrangements to purchase a rough turned handle mill that was located at Bass, Arkansas from the W. E. Bruner and Sons Handle Company that had their main plant located at Heber Springs, Arkansas at the time. A building was constructed just west of the home place and the equipment was moved from Bass to Lurton.

As stated, the early part of 1929 was very prosperous for I. C. Sutton. The handle factory was up and running and parts for the chair factory was now turned out on the semi-automatic lathes rather than by hand and the chairs were still assembled in the same old plant. Payment for the handle factory was made to the Bruners with hickory handles in the rough and made to government specifications and to their orders. The general store took on a partnership by selling half interest to Elmer Hamm.

My Uncle Jay Sutton decided to move to Corpus Christi, Texas. He sold the cafe and garage to two separate parties. Andrew Smith bought the garage and 'Big' Joe Hefley bought the cafe. This brought into the area a lot of different people and more families. In a short time, perhaps two or three years, Andrew Smith bought a farm in the Tarlton area and sold his garage to his brother Mitchell Smith and shortly thereafter Mitchell bought out the Hefleys and probation days lifted and he began selling beer and put a partition (to seperate) the garage and put in a juke box and Lurton became a very popular place, especially on weekends.

The cafe ceased to be and Mitchell's brother-in-law, Harry Tatro having moved to Lurton and living in a tent up on the hill purchased some lots and built the hotel just south of the garage and dance hall. Tha Smith's and Tatro's are my nephew Lloyd's uncles. The hotel is in sad shape today but is still standing.

Even during the worst depression years the handle factory kept growing and adding more varieties of handles. The hickory handle line known as the striking tool line was the first line and consisted of handles for axe, hammer, pick and sledge, each with with it's own varieties, ex- axe= single bit, double bit, hatchet, scout, etc. The farming and industrial tool line was also added, which included hoe,rake, shovel and specialities from special orders. These were primarily made from ash timber. A salesman was hired an covered most of Arkansas and Oklahoma and sold to hardware stores, coal mines and shipments were made each week from the railroad depot in Russellville. Generally the shipments were on Saturdays and usually several people would ride to town on the truck to shop or just for the ride. There wasn't any truck lines operating at the time and the products were shipped to the nearest depot. Families with handle making experience were moved into Lurton to improve the operations. The Nolen family is one that comes to mind.

When WW II began the company ceased practically all local business and began making handles for the military full time running two shifts and empolying up to 60 people from many miles around. Handles were packed in wooden crates and a government inspector spent full time there for several years. Again the crates were hualed to Russellville and loaded on the train for their destination and were shipped to bases or military store rooms all over. It was very difficult to keep employees because the shipyards in California and the defense plants in Kansas City were paying very high wages (up to 75 cents and $ 1.00 per hour) and there were regular trucks hauling people especially to California. As soon as our employees could muster enough cash to get away, they left. I guess it wasn't all bad. A lot of the people leaving their homes decide to sell, lock stock and barrel. My dad was their scapegoat. He needed timber to keep his operation going and people began coming to him to sell their belongings. Dad had a man hired to scout land and determine the amount usable timber on their property and made an offer to that effect. When all was said and done he had accquired a little more than 14,000 acres of the Ozark mountain area.

It was after the war and things were getting back to normal and HWY 7 was under construction and being paved. In the late 1940's the source of raw material getting more scarce a sawmill sight was purchased in Harrison on the banks of Dry Jorden Creek and ajacent to the Harrison Stock Yards and a mill was put in and began cutting squares for the Lurton plant. The year was 1946. We had trucks and trailers daily transporting the raw proudcts to Lurton and bringing finished products to Harrison for shipments. In addition to the railroad there were now truck lines that handled drop shipments so freight could use both. That was the beginning of the move to Harrison. A tomato canning factory near the sawmill went out of business and was used for a time to raise turkeys which didn't last too long. In 1952 negotations were made on the buildings and 18 acres of land. The building was re-vamped and wired for electricity to accomidate the machinery from Lurton.

Now, all the machines at Lurton were operated with lineshafts, countershafts and flat belts and each machine had to be adapted for and installed with electric motors for the new plant. It took time, first a dust collecting system from scratch. We never stopped operation at Lurton until the very last, then we continued to make baseball bats for another year after all the other machinery was moved. I was living in Harrison at the time and each weekend we would decide what machine we would move next and I would determine how to install electric motors and make a scetch, take it to the machine shop in Harrison and make the neccessary bases to install the electric motors. As a result we were making handles in both locations and before long all the essential machinery was running in Harrison and many of our employees moved with us and became residents of Harrison, Arkansas.

The old general store in Lurton had ceased operation many years earlier and a new store was built just south of the hotel by W A Thompson and was later purchased by my brother Irving Sutton and the postoffice was moved there also. After we moved our operation to Harrison it wasn't long 'till practically everything in Lurton ceased to operate and Lurton became a ghost town.

Please note all of this is written as I remember it and there could be mistakes and or omissions since I used no notes. Just sat down and wrote!!!

That was great Harry Sutton! Thanks and glad you "Just sat down and wrote".