Tidbits of Arkansas and African-American history
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Century-old store building marks Woodruff County community
The old Revel General Store, built in 1907 in the Revel community
in
Woodruff County. I took the photo in March of 2006. In looking back
at the
photos I took of the store, I noticed that it had snowed a few days
previously!
The old Revel General Store building is over 100 years old and is
still
standing in the tiny community of Revel, in Woodruff County. I visited
with
John W. Revel back in 2006 and he told me quite a bit about the
community named
for his family. Here is part of the story I wrote for the Arkansas
Democrat-Gazette's Three Rivers Edition:
The small farming community of Revel in Woodruff County, located on
Highway 260
south of the larger cities of McCrory and Augusta, was founded by John
W.
“J.W.” Revel, grandfather of John W. Revel who still lives there on
the Revel farm.
The community carries on its farming roots and is marked by a
historical
building that has been there nearly a century.
John Revel, who was born in Woodruff County and raised in Memphis and
Revel,
made his home in Revel as a young adult to operate the family farm
that had
been started by his grandfather, J.W. Revel. He recalls hearing many
of his
grandfather’s stories, including the one where his grandfather walked
to
Arkansas from Illinois after the Civil War.
“My grandfather said he remembers walking home from the war,” Revel
said with a
chuckle. That wouldn’t be an experience one would quickly forget,
especially
considering the one that preceded it. A North Carolina native who
moved to
Shelby County, Tennessee with his family, Revel, who then spelled his
name
Revell, enlisted in the Confederate Army along with three of his
brothers. He
was captured by the Union and was held as a prisoner of war for nearly
two
years at the Alton Federal Military Prison in Illinois, according to
Woodruff
County Historical Society publications.
“When they turned him loose he walked back to Arkansas,” his grandson
John
Revel said. It was after J.W. Revel’s release in 1865 that he walked
back to
the South and settled the land that came to be known as the Revel
community. He
first rented farmland and then purchased it, a total of about 1,800
acres.
“He homesteaded 1,800 acres of land,” Revel, who now lives on what
remains of
this property, said.
****
Mr. Revel was full of memories and I thoroughly enjoyed visiting with
him and
seeing his model train station he built himself.
The website www.arkansaspreservation.org has a piece about the old Revel store and several
other
historical buildings in Woodruff County.