Smalltown downtowns wane over time

As we grow older, it is natural to think back on the past and what was and what might have been.

We recognize that memory is selective, fortunately, and we are more focused on the good than the bad as our minds wander back to earlier days.

There is a positive side to that process as we remember fondly the way things were in what, generally, was a simpler and perhaps more innocent era.

On the other hand, there is a downside to actually living in the past -- not seeing the beauty and opportunity of today because of a remembrance fixation.

We recently had a conversation with a couple who were describing what it was like decades ago on Saturday night in their hometown here in Northeast Arkansas. The portrait being painted was indeed wonderful and we could easily see why they miss those earlier days with the streets packed with townspeople and rural residents coming in for their weekly shopping and visiting.

No doubt most of us have either experienced or heard about such a smalltown downtown Saturday night atmosphere -- and there is a sense of loss that such a world no longer exists. The bustling scene has been replaced by townspeople staying home to watch television, taking trips to nearby larger cities for shopping and dining or perhaps spending a weekend at the lake or other recreational outlet.

The fact is we are a mobile society and the gathering together in hometown settings has declined for a number of reasons.

Before we get too carried away with the "good old days" theme, once again we should balance our view and understand that most people worked harder, had far fewer personal or household amenities and, on a material level, lived more difficult lives. We also should note that the bustling Saturday night scene was due, in part, to the fact it was the only day of the week a lot of people had the opportunity to gather in the downtown business district -- the rest of the week they were working on the farm or, in earlier days, in the timber.

But none of that can detract from what truly is a community scene that sincerely is longed for and can be held up as a better time in many ways.

Of course, the mechanization of farming was a key factor in altering smalltown life as the need for labor disappeared in rural Eastern Arkansas.

Changes in entertainment patterns also were a big factor in the decline of the smalltown culture.

"Live theaters began to give way to motion pictures in the 1920s," writes Carl H. Moneyhon in a section of a book entitled "The Arkansas Delta".

"Motion pictures still attracted people to towns, but their importance was relatively short lived. Radio was already shifting entertainment into the home. Television in the 1950s made that transition complete. Motion picture theaters had often gone the way of the live theaters in the 1950s. Accompanying their decline were the dwindling crowds in town seeking entertainment. In their absence, the restaurants, the soda fountains, and all of the other retail businesses that profited from the presence of town crowds generally disappeared as well."

One simple way of putting it -- people were staying home watching "Gunsmoke," and later "Bonanza," rather than gathering in the downtown for social interaction, movies or the soda fountain.

The towns of the Arkansas Delta still survive, and some are holding their own, but it is indeed a different world, for better and for worse. Long gone are the throngs gathering downtown on Saturday night to share news of the preceding week, take in a movie, sit at the soda fountain, shop at one of the multitude of small local groceries and mercantile stores or just "see and be seen" in a familiar social setting.

Those days are in the past -- and we understand the sense of loss for those who grew up in that different and, in many ways, more favorable time.

--REK