Blytheville, Leachville and Arkansas Southern Railroad Depot, Leachville Arkansas
- Categories:
- Arkansas
- Railroad Facility
- Passenger Station
- Cotton Belt RR
The Blytheville, Leachville, and Arkansas Southern Railroad Depot in Leachville is significant for its association with a small, entrepreneurial railroad line that sought to improve access to larger markets for local farmers in Arkansas's Mississippi Delta region.
Leachville's relatively central location within the rich, agricultural lands of northeast Arkansas combined with its propitious location between some of the major ports on the Mississippi River to make it a relatively important railroad intersection in the last years of the nineteenth and into the early years of the twentieth century. The first rail line to be built through Leachville was the Jonesboro, Lake City and Eastern, which constructed an east-west line in 1900. This line attempted to take advantage of Leachville's existing status as a central trading location for local Arkansas farmers who were beginning to experience a significant period of prosperity during this period. For the same reasons, the Blytheville, Leachville and Arkansas Southern Railroad constructed its line to intersect with the former rail line in 1910, and constructed this depot as part of that effort.
The Blytheville, Leachville and Arkansas Southern Railroad Depot in Leachville was constructed in the Plain Traditional style circa 1910 by the Blytheville, Leachville & Arkansas Southern railroad company, which was acquired by Cotton Belt in 1929. The white, single-story frame structure is covered by an asphalt-shingled hipped roof with wide projecting eaves. The basically rectangular plan is broken by a three-sided telegrapher's bay. The novelty-sided walls are fenestrated by four-over-four double-hung windows that were commonly used during that time period. Two brick chimneys rise through the ridge, and the structure rests upon a continuous cast concrete foundation.
The eastern elevation is lighted with a row of five four-over-four wood sash windows at its southern end, and is accessed via a single freight door at the northern end. The western elevation opposite is also fenestrated with four-over-four wood sash windows, including two on the front face of the projecting telegrapher's bay and one on each side, and accessed via a single-leaf door with a transom to the south of the projecting bay and a larger freight door at the northern end of the elevation.
The southern elevation is fenestrated with three symmetrically-placed windows, and the northern elevation is fenestrated with one central freight door.
The building, being designed in a plain, unornamented style, is devoid of noteworthy ornament as such, the only features of note being the broad, spreading eaves and the multi-colored asphalt shingle roof.
View from southwest (1991)
