Big Buffalo Valley Historic District AKA Boxley Valley Historic District - Deer AR - U.S. National Register of Historic Places on Waymarking.com

From Buffalo National River marker: Boxley Valley
Preserving a Way of Life— Buffalo National River —When establishing Buffalo National River in 1972, Congress recognized the need to preserve the valley’s culture as well as its free-flowing river. Here in Boxley Valley, a traditional farm community is being perpetuated within the borders of Buffalo National River.

To do this, the National Park Service and local citizens created a long-term plan to keep the valley privately owned to retain its historic integrity. The community spirit that has endured for more than 150 years is now preserving Boxley Valley for generations to come.

Boxley Valley is entered on the National Register of Historic Places, not only for its more-recent cultural heritage but also for the evidence the valley has yielded of 12,000 years of human occupation.

Captions:
Descendants of the valley's 19th-century settlers still work the land of their forefathers.

After the Civil War, frame dwellings began to replace log homes.

From Arkansas National Register of Historic Places/National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination For-Federal Properties-Description: DESCRIBE THE PRESENT AND ORIGINAL IF KNOWN) PHYSICAL APPEARANCE.
The Buffalo River flows eastward through the heartland of the Ozarks and is one of the region's finest natural rivers. It traverses northwester Arkansas across Newton, Searcy, and Marion counties before joining the White River near Buffalo City.
The three counties adjacent to the Buffalo River are rural and sparsely settled. The first 16 miles of the river lie within the Ozark National Forest, which contains the headwaters of the Buffalo's major tributary streams. The remaining 132 miles of
the Buffalo River and over 90,000 acres of adjacent land constitutes the Buffalo National River managed by the National Park Service (NPS). The parks major resource is the clean, free-flawing river that provides opportunity for pleasurable boating,
swimming, and fishing. Buffalo National River contains significant natural and historic resources including geologic, vegetation wildlife, prehistory, and land. Sparse bottomland and upland ridges confines the cleared acreage. These open fields ate used primarily to graze cattle and raise hay. The land does not
produce sufficient income to sustain a large population, and there is little indunstry. In the early 20th century, the forests were cut, but have regrown since that time.

The Boxley Valley contains roughly 8,000 acres in the upper portion of Buffalo National River. It averages about two miles wide from the boundary on one side to the other and is approximately seven miles long. The boundaries follow section lines approximating the valley width, The valley floor is 1,000-3,000 feet wide, averaging about 1,500 feet across, It contains about 1,500 acres of bottomland terrain, and about 1,500 acres of upland lands are in slopes gentle enough for agricultural
uses.

The valley provides a rural cultural landscape of agricultural lands, forested bluffs and side slopes, scattered single family dwellings, barns, outbuildings, church, grocery store (nonoperating) , community hall, and grist mill (nonoperating).
(There are several viewpoints located along Highway 43 where motorists may get characteristic views of the Boxley Valley. See attached Viewpoint Map-)

The characteristics of its evolving agricultural pattern are similar-sized farm plots, of open space subdivided by either boards, wire, and stone fences or hedges contiguous to each other, These farm plots form a linear pattern bounded by the
river and the road on one side and steep slopes and forested mountain uplands on the other side. Low upland benches and mountain tops with less severe elopes remain open for cattle grazing. Two arteries, one natural and one man-made,
form the backbone of the linear development: the Buffalo River and Highway 43-

Moat developed land use occurs on the valley floor where building sites form clusters. Each cluster include several agricultural structures, barn, and residence. Twenty residential structures in the valley remain occupied while 30 more are vacant. In addition, there are about 200 related structures, a church, a former schoolhouse, two community buildings, former stores, and two
mills. Some of these are vacant and unused.


Historica1ly, the principal cash crop was livestock, primarily cattle, and today,
the largest single land use in the valley remain agricultural--hay and pasture (grazing) land. Grazing traditionally occurs only on hillside fields. The only lands strictly used for haying are NPS-managed lands under special-use permits. There are five hay land permits for a total of about 150 acres. Traditional grazing
practices under scenic easement with the NPS account for the rest of the permits. Other than restrictions imposed by the NPS land acquisition program, there are no controls on land use in Boxley Valley.

The National Park Service conducted a survey and evaluation of the cultural values of the valley's farmlands, buildings, and other features, The survey assigned a building number to each structure based on a system, adapted from Robert Melnick's
earlier work in Boxley (see bibliography). This system placed each structure in one of five categories of historic/architectural significance (see Appendix 1 for additional information). Structures with NPS legal interest and that are considered
to be culturally significant are designated in category 1, 2, or 3. The structure in these categories are entered on the NPS List of Classified Structures. Structures of category 1 or 2 contribute to the values of the historic district and arc therefore specifically acknowledged in the National Register of Historic Places form.
The five significance categories used in the survey are defined as follows:

1. historic structures of individual outstanding architectural and/or historical value and that make an importation contribution to the skeletal pattern of the Boxley Valley Historic District ;
2. historic structures at least 50 years old that do not possess individually outstanding or unique characteristics but do contribute to the architectural and/or historic character of the district. These structures retain cultural distinctions and are consistent with the local building traditions in terns of scale, style, material, setting, and form;
3. structures less than 50 years old that may not possess individually outstanding or unique characteristics but do contribute to the architectural and/or historic character of district. These structures retain cultural distinctions, are consistent with the local building
traditions in terms of scale, style, material, setting, and form and will be managed the same as if category 2. (In the these structures will be- 50 years old and should be considered for reclassification to category 1 or 2.

4. non-historic structures of no architectural significance, possessing modern materials (post World War II) or commonplace suburban charactericts , but serve as the spatial envelopes for living socio-cultural functions. If these structures are not in continuing use, they may fall into the fifth category; and

5. structures that are intrusions; that is, modern structures that do not contribute to the district's historic scene, An intrusion is a structure that detracts from those qualities, tangible and intangible, that make Boxley Valley eligible for the National Register of Historic Places.

End of page 2, the total number of pages are 6 and then in the Significant section are 5 pages.

Street address: Arkansas State Highway 43 Deer , AR USA 72626 County / Borough / Parish: Newton County Year listed: 1987 Historic (Areas of) Significance: Architecture/Engineering, Event Periods of significance: 3000-4999 BC, 1925-1949, 1900-1924, 1875-1899, 1850-1874, 1825-1849, 1749-1500 AD, 1499-1000 AD, 1000-2999 BC, 1000 AD-999 BC Historic function: Agriculture/Subsistence,Domestic,Industry/Processing/Extraction Current function: Agriculture/Subsistence, Domestic, Landscape Privately owned?: yes Primary Web Site: [Web Link] Secondary Website 1: [Web Link] Secondary Website 2: [Web Link] Season start / Season finish: Not listed Hours of operation: Not listed National Historic Landmark Link: Not listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   09/23/2021 Don.Morfe visited it