Rising from the depths

Monte Ne memories surface at Shiloh Museum

With snow on the ground, a promise of more to come and wind chills dipping low, it might seem ironic anyone would come to the Ozarks to cool off. But that’s what many did in the early 20th century.

William Hope “Coin” Harvey built his fanciful Monte Ne resort on a spring in an Ozark valley, southeast of the town of Rogers. His hotels featured yards and yards of wide porches to catch the breezes and admire the views.

Allyn Lord, director of the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale, spoke Feb. 18 as part of the museum’s monthly Sandwiched In series. Lord currently researches Harvey for a biography she plans to publish as a book.

Harvey got involved with various ventures from mining to promotion to politics, Lord explained. He had very definite ideas on economic policy — including “bi-metallism,” having the U.S. government back the dollar with both gold and silver. He published his ideas in an 1894 book, “Coin’s Financial School,” which earned him the nickname “Coin.”

“He was interested until something else came along,” she said. “[Nowadays] we call them ‘entrepreneurs.’”

Harvey was tapped as the Democrats’ vice presidential candidate, with his bi-metal platform, in the 1860 election. The Democrats lost the election and pulled away from that platform, moving on to other issues of the day.

“He was disappointed,” Lord said. “No one would listen to him, and he felt what he had to say was important. He pulled away.”

But the failed campaign was the start of Monte Ne.

“He stumped in Northwest Arkansas,” Lord said. “He loved Northwest Arkansas. It was beautiful. He said it had ‘no big cities and no rich people.’”

In 1900, he bought 300 acres. “It was a lush area along the White River,” Lord described. “It was down in a valley. It was spring-fed. It was cool.

“Resorts were big,” she continued. “With no electricity at the time, there were no fans, no air conditioning, no ice. People went to the resort to cool off.”

Harvey’s land laid near the community of Silver Springs, which had a grist mill, an auditorium and a saloon.

“So why did he change the name from his beloved silver?” Lord asked. “The U.S. Post Office was getting Silver Springs confused with Siloam Springs, and they asked him to change it.”

Harvey chose the name Monte Ne — “Monte” being the Omaha Indian word for mountain and “Ne” the Italian word for beautiful.

‘Monte ne’

In 1903, Harvey built his first hotel, a frame structure called the Hotel Monte Ne. Lord showed a picture of one of the rooms, which had wallpaper, carpeting and transom widows — all typical of the era, she said — and big wrap-around porches to be cool.

He dammed the creek to create lagoons, the biggest known as Big Lake. He built a five-mile railroad spur from the Frisco railroad depot in Lowell, which provided easy travel for guests from Chicago, St. Louis and New Orleans.

It ran down through the lush valley and would stop at the log depot by Big Lake.

“He was a showman,” Lord said. “He imported gondolas from Italy and trained boys to push them along the lake like they did in Italy. They would help you with your luggage and take you down in front of the hotel in the gondolas.”

Monte Ne grew to include horseback riding, golf, picnics, foxhunts, concerts and much more. Lord showed a picture of Monte Ne guests holding rackets near a net. “I don’t know if they’re playing tennis or badminton,” she told audience members, who concluded it was badminton. “OK, I’ll call it badminton from now on,” she said.

Monte Ne also boasted the first indoor swimming pool in the state — although it had an open skylight and was filled by that cold Ozark spring. “You had to be pretty brave to be in that pool,” Lord said.

She also pointed out that men and women swam together at Monte Ne — a relaxing of the day’s rules of comportment. “It must have been a racy place,” she said.

“It was all about the social,” Lord said. “People went to see who was there and to be seen.”

In 1903, Harvey hired St. Louis architect A.O. Clarke to design the Arkansas Clubhouse for the middle of the resort. Examples of Clarke’s work during the time still stand throughout the region.

Harvey also planned four more large hotels, designed by Clarke and named for the states surrounding Arkansas. Missouri Row opened in 1905, made from 8,000 logs and boasting 565 feet of porches. Every room had a chimney and a toilet, and ceramic tiles were on the roof, Lord said.

Oklahoma Row was next, opening in 1910. Each of the rooms included a fireplace, electricity and a toilet. Harvey also built a three-story tower made of 1,800 cubic feet of Portland concrete.

“He loved Portland concrete,” Lord shared. “He thought it would last throughout the ages. And that tower is still standing.

“The tower rooms were just hotel rooms,” she continued. “It was never the honeymoon suite, although some honeymooners probably stayed there.”

Beginning of the end

Harvey used $10,000 of his own money for Monte Ne and raised the extra funds by selling stock in the resort. “But in the 19-teens, the world changed,” Lord said. “And that change affected Monte Ne and other resorts. Who knows what that change was?”

The automobile. “Cars made people independent,” Lord said. “They could go wherever they wanted and stay as long as they wanted. They didn’t want to stay in one place for long periods.”

“Auto-camping” became the popular pastime.

In the 1920s, “he’s 69, and he’s a little more feeble,” Lord said. “And he began thinking of his legacy. He was living in a cabin across the lake from the depot and Oklahoma Row.”

Harvey’s vision was an obelisk and capstone built out of cement that would remain standing in what he believed would be the world’s cataclysmic end, Lord said. “He thought the hills would crumble to dust and fall into the valleys.” Harvey called the monument a pyramid, borrowing the cultural popularity when King Tut’s tomb was opened in 1922.

“A little vault — hermetically sealed — would hold Harvey’s writings telling the truth about what had happened,” Lord said. “They would tell how the world used to be and what caused its downfall. Then they would dig lower to another vault, where he would place objects depicting the culture of the day: an encyclopedia, a Bible, a sewing machine.”

A retaining wall was built on a spit of land in the lake, and construction of a horseshoe-shaped cement amphitheater was begun on the other side.

Harvey’s depleted funds and the stock market crash of 1929 spelled the end of his grand Monte Ne resort. Missouri Row burned in a fire, and much of the rest of the property was sold off, at various times holding the Ozark School of Theology and a girls’ camp.

“What remains today is the retaining wall and the amphitheater,” Lord said. “The pyramid was never built. There’s no treasure, no gold coins, no car. He put any money he had into building it, and he was not a big fan of cars. He and his wife had both been hit by cars.

“People refer to the amphitheater as the pyramid, but it’s not.”

In the late 1950s, the U.S. Corps of Engineers was given control of the properties, which have been heavily vandalized and are unsafe. Before the White River was dammed for flood control, the buildings were bulldozed and the few remaining are under the water of Beaver Lake, Lord said

But when the lake level falls, the resort rises from the depths, still showcasing its grandeur to those who visit.

Laurinda Joenks can be reached by email at [email protected].

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