“A rubber-tired surrey,
A rubber-tired hack
We’re going down to Harrison
To ride the Booger back.”
We now have the “Booger” back and it is a pleasure to hear him comin’ ’round the mountain, bell ringing, siren tooting, with car-loads of lumber, mineral ore and Eureka Springs water for the outside world.
About the time of the opening of the new Arkansas and Ozarks line, Clyde Newman of Harrison had an article in the Arkansas Gazette which gave most of the above data and some additional information.
XII
THE JAMES BOYS ON PLANER HILL
Legend connects Frank and Jesse James with this locality in a humorous episode that is not mentioned in the biographies of these famous outlaws. These men sometimes rode into Arkansas and it is reported that they had an uncle who operated a tavern at the stage stop on Planer Hill, before the town of Eureka Springs was started. It is quite probable that they sometimes “put up” with their uncle when they considered it safe to do so. We have no historical records about their visits here for outlaws seldom keep diaries and prefer to keep their movements secret.
Several years ago an aged man visited Eureka Springs and asked Sam A. Leath, who was the town’s leading guide, to show him to a place on the old stage trail two or three miles south of the city. Finding the spot he was looking for, just off State Highway 23, and not far from Lake Lucerne, the old man told the following story: