Blackville, Arkansas - Fashioned by a Former Slave: Stories from Individuals Who Remember Blackville

Blackville, Arkansas, an all-Black self-sufficient thriving community was named after its founder Pickens Black Sr., a former slave. When a young man, he migrated to Jackson County in Northeast Arkansas. While working in Jackson County, Black saved his earnings, purchased acres of land, cut the timber, sold it, purchased more acres, repeating the process. By the 1940s he owned 8,000 acres of land, comparable to twelve square miles.

His land started about fourteen miles south of Newport, Arka...