Cleburne County Seat

Heber Springs won its county seat by promising to build the courthouse. In August 1881 Max Frauenthal bought forty acres around mineral springs and formed the Sugar Loaf Springs Land Company. Residents wanted a county government because the trip to Clinton, in Van Buren County, was slow, so company officers pledged $6,000 for a courthouse and jail on condition that the seat stay at Sugar Loaf. Act 24 of 1883 created the county, and a wooden courthouse stood from 1884 to 1914. The brick one that replaced it cost an estimated $61,400, and the old building sold for $125.25.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Greers Ferry Dam and Lake — 2.9 mi
  The Corps of Engineers dam on the Little Red River that President Kennedy dedicated on October 3, 1963, with a visitor center, a trout hatchery below the dam and a lake of 340 miles of shoreline.
• Old Independence Regional Museum — 29 mi
  A Batesville museum in a 1936 WPA sandstone National Guard armory, telling the story of the twelve counties that once formed Independence County, with a research wing for local records.

More markers nearby

• Troops Raised In Cleburne County — steps away
• The Civil War in Cleburne Country — steps away
• White County Court House — 23 mi
• Guerrilla War on the Little Red — 25 mi