I m among that fortunate group of Arkansans who read Mike Trimble s stories and columns in the Arkansas Gazette. Running out to the driveway to pick up that morning s Gazette was part of my routine as a boy growing up in Arkadelphia. The Gazette s "Arkansas Traveler" column was one of the first things I read.
Before the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built the McClellan-Kerr Navigation System (from 1963-1971), it was sometimes possible to cross the Arkansas River by foot by dodging the snakes, 15-foot brush and deposits of what Otus the Head Cat called carnivorous sand.