A mule sale barn and a concrete road are among the nine Arkansas properties nominated this year for the National Register of Historic Places.
Also on the the nominations list are two houses, two churches, two downtowns and a clubhouse, according to a news release from the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program.
The program's state review board nominated the properties when it met Wednesday, said Frances McSwain, director of the program.
The O.D. Gunn Trade and Sale Barn at Quitman, population 762, is one of the more unusual properties nominated this year. Quitman is in Cleburne County, 28 miles north of Conway.
Quitman Mayor Cyndi Kerr said the barn was built around 1910 and served as a sale barn primarily for mules until sometime in the 1940s.
"From what the locals have told me, it was almost like a gathering place," Kerr said. "Everybody went there, whether they were going to buy horses or mules or not."
Locals still call it the Gunn Mule Barn.
The National Register nomination expanded on the historic significance of the mule.
"During the first quarter of the 20th century, mules were essential to the agricultural economy of the South, with over 4.5 million mules in the greater southern region by 1925," it said.
"At the highest point of mule use in Arkansas during the 1920s and 1930s, over 360,000 animals were thought to have been in Arkansas performing agricultural work such as pulling up stumps, breaking ground, tilling soil, hauling lumber and firewood and serving as transportation, including their use in pulling streetcars across the state."
The Gunn family used the barn for storage for many years before giving it to the city around 2012, Kerr said.
It's a wooden barn with metal sheeting on the outside and painted red, said Kerr. The barn also has a metal roof.
Kerr said the architectural beauty of the barn is more impressive from the inside than the outside.
"It's really breathtaking when you walk in," she said.
Last year, the city began using the barn as a farmers market on Saturdays and will do so again this year, beginning the first Saturday of May. It's free for vendors to set up shop in the barn. Besides produce, quilts, chickens and ducks were sold there last year.
"We make them stay outside," Kerr said of the livestock.
Quitman also leases the barn for weddings. Kerr said two weddings have been held there so far this year. The barn has electricity but no plumbing or air conditioning.
"You could do rustic, you could do shabby chic, you could do country chic," Kerr said of the barn's potential as a wedding venue.
The city charges $100 per wedding and will use that money for improvements on the barn.
Kerr said she wanted to get the barn on the National Register so it would qualify for grants for restoration and maintenance.
Another unique nomination this year is the Walnut Ridge Army Airfield access road at College City in Lawrence County. It's a .738-mile-long, two-lane concrete road constructed in 1942. It contains the original 1942 concrete throughout with some patchwork that was done later, according to the nomination. The concrete road runs along the current alignment of Fulbright Avenue from U.S. 67 east to the intersection of Stafford Lane.
Other properties nominated this year are:
• Gustave B. Kleinschmidt House at Little Rock in Pulaski County, a 1907 Queen Anne-style cottage with colonial revival-style details
• Sylvan Hills Country Club Clubhouse at Sherwood in Pulaski County, built in 1963 and designed in the Googie style of architecture
• First Methodist Church Education Building at Hot Springs in Garland County, an L-shaped midcentury modern-style structure built between 1963 and 1965
• Warren Commercial Historic District at Warren in Bradley County, featuring buildings dating to 1890
• Oscar Chambers House at Fort Smith in Sebastian County, a one-story midcentury modern-style residence built in 1963-64
• Little Springs Missionary Baptist Church at Poughkeepsie in Sharp County, a vernacular "giraffe rock" structure built between 1943 and 1946
• Berryville Commercial Historic District at Berryville in Carroll County, featuring buildings dating to the 1880s.
The board also listed the following properties on the Arkansas Register of Historic Places: Lee Theater at Little Rock, Mount Olive A.M.E. Church at Mount Olive in Bradley County, Mount Salem Church and School near Paris in Logan County and W.D. and Kate McGaugh House at Gentry in Benton County.
The Arkansas Register recognizes historically noteworthy places that are not eligible for listing on the National Register.
Mark Christ, a spokesman for the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, said the agency should hear back in a couple of months about whether the nominated properties are accepted for inclusion in the National Register, which is the official list of America's historic places worthy of preservation. The National Park Service oversees the register.
Metro on 04/08/2016