In 1938, Mrs. Scoville gave the property to Phillips University of Enid, Oklahoma, to be a Christian center where individuals and groups might come for spiritual refreshment, and for study and training. The project has made rapid growth during the fifteen years it has been operated as a service institution. It now has an assembly hall and dormitories where groups may come for a day or a week, or longer. As many as 100 persons may be cared for at one time. Rev. and Mrs. George P. Rossman are directors and managers of the project.
The big attraction at the present time at Inspiration Point is the Fine Arts Colony held for six weeks each summer. It is directed by Professor Henry Hobart, of Phillips University, and provides instruction in music (piano, organ, voice, theory, band and orchestra instruments), drama, speech and painting. The opera workshop produces a light opera each summer, which is taken on tour after having been produced locally.
Groups begin coming to Inspiration Point in April and continue until November. Tourists are welcome at the Castle at all times of the year and they come by the thousands to see its unique construction and to view the articles of antique and historical interest left by Mr. and Mrs. Scoville. The view of the White River Valley from “The Point,” which includes the ranch of Dr. and Mrs. Ross Van Pelt, is one of the finest in America.
The Castle at Inspiration Point
XXII
DISTINGUISHED VISITORS
Eureka Springs has had many distinguished visitors during its seventy-five years of history. Some of them made only brief visits to our scenic city while others spent several weeks and returned from year to year. One of them who thought of Eureka Springs as an earthly paradise was the chewing gum king, William Wrigley, Jr.
Mr. Wrigley first visited Eureka Springs in 1902 and put up at the Thatch Hotel where he spent most of the winter. He returned in the autumn of 1903 and spent about three months at the Chautauqua Hotel, later moving to a cottage on Linwood Avenue. It has been said that no greater admirer of scenic beauty ever came to the Ozarks than William Wrigley.
His greatest pleasure was to get out on the trails on horseback with Sam Leath, then acting as guide in charge of the Eureka Springs Bureau of Information and the Crescent stables. A canyon five miles west of the city was named after him for this was one of the spots he especially enjoyed.
The chewing gum king, whose net income was $1,125,000 in 1904, took a liking to Eureka Springs and proposed to buy all the land within a radius of three miles of the city and make it into a public park if the city authorities would agree to keep it policed and free from junk and garbage. The hills and valleys were then covered with vast growths of virgin timber which Mr. Wrigley wished to preserve. But the city government turned him down and he went to Catalina Island, off the California coast, where he spent millions in development. Many noted writers such as Zane Grey and Mary Roberts Rhinehart located on the island as a result of his project.