Old Independence Regional Museum

The Old Independence Regional Museum is in Batesville, the original seat of Independence County. The museum serves the twelve counties of northeast Arkansas that were part of that county in 1820, among them Sharp, Jackson, Poinsett and Woodruff. It grew from a planning committee of the Independence County Historical Society in 1991 and a nonprofit board led by Twyla Gill Wright. Its home is the old National Guard Armory at 9th and Vine streets, a 10,000-square-foot military Gothic building of native sandstone that the Works Progress Administration built in 1936 for Company L. The owners gave it to the museum after the board raised $400,000, and the museum opened on September 12, 1998, after about $1 million was raised.

Its collections hold about 19,000 items, including nineteenth- and twentieth-century photographs, textiles, tools and the transcribed public records of the twelve-county region. Thirty volunteer docents lead tours and help researchers in a large research wing. The permanent exhibits are Where the Delta Meets the Ozarks and Region on the Move, and the 2006 additions cover twelve county courthouses, the Civil War in the region, a 1930s rural home, National Guard Company L and Native American culture. Temporary exhibits and events change through the year, and the museum is updating most of its displays.

The museum is at 380 South 9th Street.