About three and a half years ago I read an article by an Arkansas resident that scared the hell out of me. I was selling everything that wouldn’t fit in the home made camper that I would pull behind my jeep. I bought a 20’x30’ tent and everything that I would need to live in the woods for a month. I read this Article just after having sent the down payment for my land to the realtor.  I planned on living in the woods for the rest of my life, I had a hand built wooden trailer that was bolted to a steel frame. The roof was bolted on and it was coated with mobile home sealant. It was designed to be unbolted and lifted up and re-bolted once a new section was built on top of the lower section, making it tall enough to stand up in but keeping it low enough that I wouldn’t have to worry about any overpasses. . I had a king sized bed in the trailer and once the trailer was reassembled there would be enough room to sleep and a little extra room if the weather got really bad.

The article that I read scared the hell out of me because many people around the country have this unrealistic notion Arkansans are uneducated backwoods hicks. Having done my research, I knew that this wasn’t a realistic interpretation of the Arkansans. This article brought images of the banjo playing homosexual rapists from the Deliverance movie to my mind and I just couldn’t shake those thoughts. It made me think that I was wrong about the people of Arkansas and that the woods were full of these stereotypical hicks. I started thinking that the stories that I had heard in other parts of the country about the education level in Arkansas just might be true.

Here is the picture that I saw of the original Article. It is from the Arkansas Democrat Gazette. It was published on Monday April 16^th  2007. (This image is available in many locations out in cyber space)

This is a text of the article. It is easier to read then the blurry picture.

“Daylight Exacerbates Warning

You may have noticed that March of this year was particularly hot. As a matter of fact, I understand that it was the hottest March since the beginning of the last century. All of the trees were fully leafed out and legions of bugs and snakes were crawling around during a time in Arkansas when, on a normal year, we might see a snowflake or two.  

This should come as no surprise to any reasonable person. As you know, Daylight Saving Time started almost a month early this year. You would think that members of Congress would have considered the warming effect that an extra hour of daylight would have on our climate. Or did they?
         Perhaps this is another plot by a liberal Congress to make us believe that global warming is a real threat. Perhaps next time there should be serious studies performed before Congress passes laws with such far reaching effects.

Connie M. Meskimen”

When I first saw the article it was on a website dedicated to humorous pictures. There were no explanations, no comments, just the article. I didn't take the time to research it for two years, so for two years after I got here, I had images of real people like this existing here in Arkansas. It made me think of hearing banjos while floating down the river. I envisioned squealing like a pig at the hands of people like Connie M. Meskimen (who is a man, by the way), with no Burt Reynolds to save me from their probing southern charm.

Luckily, I found out, just as I would like the rest of America to find out, that Arkansas is nothing like the Scene from the Movie Deliverance and the Arkansans are nothing like Connie M. Meskimen portrays them to be.

Fortunately a little research proved that it was a letter from an attorney known for his sarcastic wit. According Snopes.com, a website that is well known for debunking myths, the article was meant to be a joke.

Arkansas already has a reputation for illiteracy, unfortunately thanks to Mr. Meskimen and his letter, the number of people that believe that Arkansans are all uneducated hicks has grown.  I give Mr. Meskimen a big thumbs down.

When you have a state like Arkansas that is already plagued with misconceived notions about the literacy of its residents, doing anything that could exacerbate America’s perception of the citizens of Arkansas isn’t very nice.

For all of you out there that aren't from Arkansas let me try and give you a little glimpse of what its people are really like. I will attempt to paint you a picture of Rural Arkansas.

 Imagine that you were alone and hungry in one of Americas major cities. Let’s take New York City for example, In New York City, if you were hungry, alone and down on your luck, you would remain alone and hungry. You would probably end up sleeping under a bridge.

In Rural Arkansas you would probably have someone invite you to have dinner with them, not just a “pop it in the microwave” TV dinner but an actual warm apple pie and biscuits kind of dinner.

If you needed help getting on your feet there would undoubtedly be someone around to help you do that too. The only thing is that they would expect you to work your butt off to stay on your feet because they work their but off to survive and they have little tolerance for people that don’t take responsibility for themselves. If you turned out to be a druggy or some other kind of criminal you wouldn't get another hand up and you would probably be made to feel unwelcome.

Due to unforeseen circumstances I moved out of the woods and in to town, when my wife left me she took the only working vehicle and I lost the land. I had to walk over a mile to college and back carrying about 40 pounds of books in my back pack. People I never saw before, or ever again, stopped while I was walking and not only gave me a ride, they drove me right to the college.  It wasn’t just one person, there were many people that stopped to pick up a stranger, they showed him kindness. My college advisor helped me get a job at the college. The people of Rural Arkansas are amazing, and thanks to their hand up, I got back on my feet quickly.  I now have two properties, one is paid off and the other is a quarter of the way paid off. My girlfriend and I just bought a second house trailer to go on our land and we have several vehicles including a BMW, a 1968 Mustang that we are rebuilding, and a motorcycle, not to mention a couple 4 wheel drives for horsing around in the dirt and mud. We have goats, rabbits and chickens. If I would have taken my little financial stumble in the city somewhere I would be sleeping under a bridge tonight.

The wonderful people of Arkansas deserve to have a better portrait painted of them then the one that CONNIE M. MESKIMEN painted of them with his article. Even though it was meant to be a joke when he wrote it, I believe that it has set America’s perception of Arkansas back by 20 years.