All of the above is true for once.  This is not advertising puffery!  It is truly one of a kind.  It is going rapidly even as we speak.  BUT with temperatures below freezing here it may be around for a few more days. I must admit that I've never even seen an igloo before.  Or an ice house.  Or a snow castle.  So when I drove by this one, I circled the block and came back with my trusty camera.  It is located on North Main Street in Searcy Arkansas. 02/15/2010

This photo was loaned to me by my friend Sherry, whose mother was Frances Hall Quattlebaum.  Frances was a colorful lady who was admired by the folks who lived in Searcy.  Frances passed away on Sept 15, 1999 and upon hearing of her death the newspaper editor received a call from a lady who called herself Georgia Holt. She was calling just to say how much she'd loved her friend Frances and how they'd played together as teenagers.  Georgia was born Jackie Jean Crouch near Searcy Arkansas. She came to live with her Aunt Zela Croom during the late 1930's when her parents separated.  She worked in the Croom Cafe, reportedly the only restaurant in Searcy at the time.  During that time she met Frances and they became good friends.  A quote by Georgia from the Daily Citizen Jan 1 1991 says,  ... 02/13/2010

An assignment for the 4-H Club in the 70's, if you took photography as a project, was to do a photographic sequence of events, wordless.  Here's one that is even funnier now than it was then.  It was done by my son using his friend as a model. Here's the young man unhappy with home life.  He grabs a suitcase and tries to get a ride.  That is Samsonite luggage which cost a lot of money then and weighed a ton.  No wheels were on luggage then. Remember walking through an airport with luggage like this?  Kids went barefoot a lot back then and wore really short  cutoff jeans that were cool in the hot summer.   Hey, he got a ride!  He's excited and runs for the ride.  It's probably "yours truly" driving that car in the peaceful country around Searcy Arkansas. If the tag says anything about a ... 02/11/2010

This old picture of a bridge just says that it is near Searcy Arkansas.  I'm thinking that it is the bridge that connected Judsonia with Kensett without folks having to drive miles around.  If so, it is the bridge that is now closed with the county trying to find the money to make repairs.  Being in Judsonia the other day, I took this next picture. I can't tell for sure if they're the same.  But here's the greatest photo of the bridge that connects.  It is a professional photo taken by Fred Garcia and is on First Security Bank's calendar this year.  The calendar features bridges across the state.  This reads Judsonia Bridge - White County.  Through truss bridge with center swing span over Little Red River on CR 66 at Judsonia in White County.  Built 1924 by the R. L. Gaster Constructio... 02/09/2010

We once had filling stations/service stations on every corner of Searcy Arkansas and other towns across the country.  They're dwindling. Here's one that is gone.  I'll let you see if you know where it was, Searcy readers, and report back to me.  A hint.  The house in the picture is still there.  It looks like one of the old Sears Roebuck houses that was a mail order house.  I did a blog on another one or two in Searcy and this one is similar.  This photo was taken by my son back in the 70's when he took photography for a project in 4-H.  I'm not taking a picture of what's there now because.......well, you can tell me..... While you're refreshing your memory, you might as well see if you remember this sign, a picture that he also took.  Yep, gone now.....   02/07/2010

  I wrote a blog about a spooky voice saying to me, "Have a nice dinner.  I will call you tomorrow."  It was from a landline text.  The voice is robotic and mysterious sounding because you don't know who it is from. A blogging buddy sent me this fantastic web link and you need to visit it just as I did. Click here.  You'll meet Julie who will say whatever you type in.  She'll say it in different languages and different speeds.  (I had to do slow for Southern speak, of course.)  If you get tired of Julie you can choose other characters and they will say what you type in.  There's a pretty handsome guy if you choose a boy's name. The eyes follow the cursor and my buddy says you can play with the cursor and make the eyes cross.  I can see parents using this to teach their kids a language..... 02/06/2010

This picture is so interesting.  This was loaned to me by Bob and Anita Fuller.  It shows a wrecker pulling in a wrecked car and dates around the 1930's.  In the background is First Methodist Church.  The filling station was called Pershing Service Station and is no longer there.  I have another picture of Pershing Filling Station on this blog. I need some of the Searcy experts to tell us what the two story building in the background was.  And is that a man back there in front of the church?  I do love this picture! 02/04/2010

They say you can't safely walk the streets of New York in a fur coat or you might get violated in some way. Wonder what New York would think of this remnant of the past.  Look at these fashionable Searcy ladies walking in Hot Springs Arkansas.  Two of them have their fur collar pieces which consisted of whole skins. Now this was a long, long time ago.  I put the picture on my blog a few weeks back and said to note the gloves and hats and heels.  They were dressed perfectly for the time.  I have just discovered one of these fur collars.  It consists of four skins that includes eyes, nose, feet, ears. The special features are getting a little beat up or moth eaten but the skin is still pretty. It has a nice little clasp to fasten around the shoulders. I wonder if they even make and sell t... 02/03/2010

This photo was loaned to me by Anita Hart Fuller, one of our blogger queens.  Anita has a vast knowledge of Searcy as it was before it got so big.  She loves Searcy but lives 40 minutes away.  I ask her why she does not move back and she says, "Searcy has changed too much."  Hubby says this is an International truck and the numbers means something about the allowed weight of the truck and contents.  She is great at explaining the old photos and I'm going to expect her to tell us all about this one.  Go, Anita!!!   02/02/2010

Sometime last year Charles Buell's Raven came to Searcy Arkansas with devious intent. Charles, known as Charlie B, is a home inspector in Washington state. My cat took Raven out with a few scrunches.   Nutsy, who is a certifried home inspector trained by Steven Smith in Washinton state, has become my godson, vindicated my cat from having done anything wrong. Look who has come back, doubled!  We've had another snowed-in few days and some people may call us wimps but life comes to a standstill in the South when we have ice and snow.  We're smart, though, and could probably learn how to handle it.  But we're also too smart to want to learn. So having nothing else to do, I saw him stalking around the back yard.  For proof that he was here, I snapped this picture and plan to send off for Nut... 01/31/2010

When folks went out to eat 45 or 50 years ago they went to Bill's Grill on East Race Street in Searcy Arkansas.  I found this old post card showing it as it was when it was so popular.  I remember going there when I arrived in Searcy in the late 60's.  They had a manager out there named Earnestine who made you feel so welcome.  She had a special dessert that was warm chocolate cake with chocolate syrup and ice cream.  Ummm!  If my memory is right, she became owner of the property.  Later she was a very successful manager of Searcy Country Club. Note this tiny little two lane highway in front of the restaurant.  Now the highway in front is a 5 lane "danger strip" and you take your life in your hands if you try to get a picture.  So I went to Googlemaps and found this one.  I think this i... 01/30/2010

I have driven by these structures so many times but not with a blogger's mind.  Now with a blogger's mind, as you drive along your vehicle comes to a screeching halt and you make a fool of yourself snapping a picture of something that appeals to no one.  Except possibly someone out in blog-land. That's what happened two days ago.  Look at these house treasures.  Why put these up? For home inspectors to practice their skills?  For builders to see the real wood that went into old houses?  For the new tin roof folks to see what original tin roofs looked like? (Do the new ones make the rain sound as loud as the old ones?)  For the artists to blow up a detail and see a magnificent idea for an abstract painting?  And finally, for my Searcy-familiar friends to tell me if they know where they a... 01/28/2010

A TRIBUTE TO A LOVELY MOTHER-IN-LAW. When I first met my future husband he kinda liked me, as he said, because I reminded him of his mother.  What!  That didn't seem to be much of a compliment to me.  After having been in the Duncan family for over 40 years now I can say with assurance that it was probably the nicest compliment he ever gave me. His mother, Wyndelene Holmes Duncan, peacefully passed away January 26, 2010.  She was a lovely person and just as her son, my husband, says... she was a kind and gentle person who didn't have a mean bone in her body....ever.  So I'm using my real estate blog today to pay tribute to her.....a very fine lady who made my life and many other lives happier.    01/26/2010

Notice the brick and rock work on this house.  There are hundreds of houses in our area of Arkansas with this finish.  You see them on the side of the highway, on older streets in Searcy, on the main streets of Searcy if they haven't been torn down, and in surrounding towns. The construction looks complex to me.  Someone once said there was a rock man who did this as his specialty.  If my blog buddies know who he was, give him credit.  I have looked and looked for this house and can't find it in Searcy Arkansas.  I have discovered this light writing on the back. Oran James - Heber Springs Ark.  It is not my writing and it is on the back of the floor plan which matches this house.   01/23/2010

Here's another one of the old interesting home pictures given me to a lady whose husband had passed away but who had a hand in building the houses, drawing up the plans, etc.  I have not been able to locate this house.  It may be gone.  Perhaps some of my blogger friends will remember it. The house has grown shrubs and trees and makes me wonder whether the man was reliving his history and going back to the scene of the construction and making memos. I understand that.  I drive around town now and say to myself, "I sold that house way back in the 80's.  And there's one that I sold in the 90's."  I'm enclosing the floor plan also.     01/21/2010

I waved at my neighbor last week. Their car is in the driveway. Their dog still barks.  Their cat visits my yard.  They obviously still live beside me. Tonight, I looked up their number in the phone book and dialed it.  I needed to ask them a neighborhood question. "The number you have dialed has been disconnected." There it has happened again!!  Those neighbors have probably decided that the landline is no longer needed.  They have cell phones.  Why pay that extra expense monthly for a landline? As a matter of fact, hubby asked me two days ago if we REALLY need a land line?  My reply was that as long as I'm in real estate, I want a land line as a means to be found if anyone needs me. I'm wondering if we have a solution to this newly-forming problem.  Will cell phones be listed somewher... 01/21/2010

This house is no longer in Searcy.  It was removed in order for "things modern" to be built.  I'm not sure exactly where it was but my sources say it was between the West Arch street Church of Christ and downtown. Sources also say they think it may have been called the Yarnell house?  They say with assurance that it was Mildred Wilbourn's (now deceased) grandmother's house.  And they say with assurance that it was a magnificent old house.  I'll bet this picture got snapped because of the unusual-for-Searcy-Arkansas snowfall. Perhaps a few comments from you folks out there can set the record straight. Wonder if this was the same snowstorm? 01/20/2010

We've had a little distraction in Searcy Arkansas real estate.  It has now been blogged about by the Arkansas Realtors Association and I'm copying the blog below.  The blog was written by Ethan Nobles and can be located here.   I am taking the name of the person who was found guilty off because.....well, just because I don't feel right having a name on my blog.   A few weeks ago, a Realtor® over in Searcy sent in a disturbing account about which she wanted to warn other Arkansas agents (and, indeed, real estate professionals throughout the country). We at the Arkansas Realtors® Association (ARA) held off mentioning the reports of rather disturbing behavior until we got some proof of a conviction. Why? Well, one has to be worried about liability and such like in this day and age and we'r... 01/18/2010

  Who are these important Searcy people from 1934 gathered for a photograph.  The copy of this picture was given to me by the same lady who gave me old house pictures that I've posted.  I loved the picture then and I love it now.  She wrote the names on the back....or someone did.  If I have a ? I couldn't read the writing.  This was the Kiwanis Club.  Unless I'm mistaken, this was a men's only club and the women in the picture had chores to do but were not members.  Correct me if I'm wrong.  1.  Mrs. Myers, pianist. 2.  A. J. Stephens, Sinclair agent. 3.  B. C. Huddleston, ?. 4.  Doyle Kelso, teachers & coach. 5.  Elmo Taylor, lawyer.  6.  M.P. Jones, newspaper. 7.  Dr. Porter Rodgers, doctor. 8. California visitor.  9.  O. W. Holmes, Penny's store.  10.  A. H. Royston, insurance.  11.... 01/17/2010

I wrote a blog a few weeks ago about a cat who came to our back door, appeared to love us, visited often, and ate a lot. We thought the gods had sent us another cat to take the place of our guard cat who'd become famous because of Nutsy and Raven and possoms and skunks and traps.  She just disappeared and a day or so later this cat came calling.   We named him Elvis because we'd look up and Elvis would have left the porch. (Elvis has left the building....) Well, now Elvis has left us. Here's my theory of what happened.  When our cat disappeared we'd just bought her some savory more-expensive food.  With her gone, we fed it to Elvis.  Elvis licked his chops and begged for more and more. Elvis ate all the expensive stuff.  Being cheap we went to the dollar store and bought a big bag of ch... 01/16/2010