A legacy that endures

Eureka Springs’ rugged natural beauty and crowds of potential buyers have attracted artists and galleries since its earliest days.

Its reputation as an arts mecca really took off in the middle of the 20th century when prominent artists such as muralist Louis Freund, jeweler Elsie Freund, and Regionalist painter Glenn Gant moved to town and started promoting sidewalk art shows that stretched for blocks.

The Eureka Springs Guild of Artists and Craftspeople interviewed the Freunds, Gant, and other local creators in 1994 to preserve that history.

Doug Stowe, now a revered elder of the local art scene himself, emceed the hour-and-a-half-long conversation. Woodworker Tommy Thomas, watercolorist Ginny Edwards, painter Hal Mallet, multimedia artist Ken Addington, sculptor Henry Menke, and writer Crescent Dragonwagon also participated.

The interviews gave me a better perspective of several of the people I’m writing about in my upcoming book, Welcome to Eureka Springs: The I-Sh*t-You-Not History of America’s Quirkiest Town. They even provided some choice anecdotes, such as Elsie describing how bad a shape Carrie Nation’s Hatchet Hall was in when Louis bought it for $250 in 1939.

Anyone interested in how the town became an arts destination might enjoy the discussion, available on YouTube as “Building a Legacy of the Arts”.

Anyone who just wants a quick laugh can check out Crescent’s description of a photo published by the Seventies counterculture rag Down Home at 1:04:45.