|
NEWS ITEMS
Pike County Arkansas Genealogy Trails 1873 PIKE COUNTY TIDBIT DIAMONDS DISCOVERED IN ARKANSAS (1906) 1873 PIKE COUNTY TIDBIT Contributed by Frances Cooley There
is a man in Pike County fifty-five years old, who has been a resident
of that county forty-five years. He is the father of eleven
children. Has never been three hundred miles from home--neither
have any of his children. Never drank ardent spirits, or swore a
profane oath--neither have any of the children. Never were in
debt, or saw a railroad until a few days since-neither have the
children. The other day he hitched up the team and took the
entire family to Arkadelphia to see the railroad. The Standard
says this is a most remarkable family, and wants to know where another
family can be found like it. We give it up. (Source:
Little Rock Daily Republican, Sept. 2, 1873.)
DIAMONDS DISCOVERED IN ARKANSAS (1906) Contributed by Kim Paterson On August 1, 1906, John W. Huddleson picked up on his farm, near the mouth of Prairie Creek and about two and a half miles southeast of Murfreesboro, Pike County, two glittering pebbles. These he sent to Charles S. Stifft, founder of the firm of Charles S. Stifft & Company, Jewelers, of Little Rock, who pronounced them genuine diamonds. The stones were later sent to New York, where they were examined by experts and cut and polished by the well known' firm of Tiffany & Company. In the rough, these first two diamonds weighed about three carats each. A company was shortly formed to prospect for diamonds and John T. Fuller, a mining engineer, who had been connected with the De Beers Company, of South Africa, was employed to examine the Pike County field and report. Mr. Fuller said in his report that "the diamond-bearing rock occurs in South Africa in what is there locally known as a 'pipe', which is the neck, or vent, of an old volcano, filled up solid with diamond-bearing rock. This rock is technically known as peridotite, a rock of bluish green color, and known in Africa as Kimberlite, or more popularly as blue ground. That the diamond-bearing rock found on your property in Pike county is peridotite is unquestioned. That it occurs on the property in a 'pipe' similar to its occurrences in South Africa has been, to my mind, sufficiently demonstrated". In 1908 the Arkansas Diamond Company was organized with an authorized capital stock of $1,000,000, for the thorough development of the diamond field. A modern reduction plant was erected and up to 1920 over five thousand diamonds had been taken from the small area covered by the peridotite formation. The largest of these diamonds weighed eighteen carats and another weighed eleven carats. There are four small areas of the peridotite and the Kimberlite Diamond Company is also operating in the field. Source: HIGH LIGHTS OF ARKANSAS HISTORY by DALLAS T. HERNDON, SECOND EDITION, COPYRIGHT, 1922, Second Special Edition Printed for Distribution by THE ARKANSAS HISTORY COMMISSION, pg 152-153. Return to Pike County Index 2007 Arkansas Genealogy Trails |