Mayflower, Arkansas

History

Mayflower is a small town located along Interstate 40 southeast of Conway (Faulkner County) and northwest of Little Rock (Pulaski County). Located on the southwestern edge of Lake Conway, Mayflower is particularly known for its fishing. Like many of the smaller towns of Faulkner County, such as Vilonia and Greenbrier, Mayflower offers a rural lifestyle within a short drive of Conway and Little Rock, where many of its residents commute to work. It was incorporated as a town in Arkansas on March 6, 1928.

The area's earliest European settlers were Loyalists, known then as Tories, who moved westward in order to flee the Revolutionary War. Families such as the Flannagins and Massengills arrived around 1778 and settled near the mouth of Palarm Creek. However, local tribes of Native Americans had inhabited this region for centuries, principally the Quapaw. Yet, other indigenous groups were in this area now known as part of the Great Plains Cultural Area.

Like most of Arkansas, the land was heavily wooded and was therefore logged extensively until the turn of the twentieth century. Cotton plantations existed during the American Civil War owing to the river bottom's fertile soil. This would later give way to sharecroppers and modern farming. This presents the largest source of the local economy today, although some small businesses exist in the town.

From the History section of Mayflower, Arkansas on Wikipedia, under CC BY-SA 4.0.