Mount Nebo State Park

Mount Nebo is a flat-topped mesa above the Arkansas River Valley. The French called it Magazine, for its resemblance to a barn, and it became a landmark for river navigators. Local folklore says Louis C. White's wife renamed it Nebo after the biblical mountain from which Moses saw the Promised Land. The Summit Park Hotel opened on top in 1889, and many guests came by steamboat. At one point up to 5,000 people lived on the mountaintop as summer residents. The hotel burned in 1918, uninsured after a remodeling, and was never rebuilt.

The town carried on. In April 1924 its women ran for office, some against their husbands, brothers and fathers, and elected a female mayor and council, the first all-female town government on record in Arkansas. In 1926 the Dardanelle Chamber of Commerce proposed a state park, and in 1928 the state received 500 acres it held for delinquent taxes, which made Mount Nebo the second state park. The Civilian Conservation Corps built the trails, cabins, bridges and a large pavilion from mountain logs and stone until it left in 1935. Cabin 1 was the first cabin rental in the state park system. About fifty private homes remain on top, many owned by descendants of families from the late 1800s.

The park is a certified Trail of Tears National Historic Trail site. The state park service says the mountain overlooking the river witnessed the removal of all five nations sent west along the water route, and the Rim Trail looks out over that river.