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Home for the Holidays at Lakeport Plantation
Join us for a free Christmas Open House,
Saturday, November 30, from 1 pm – 4 pm!
Bring your family to explore Lakeport, make an ornament,
try your hand at festive games, sample historic sweets, and
take advantage of our Gift Shop sale to find that perfect gift!
For additional information, check out our Facebook Event.
Home for the Holidays at Lakeport Plantation
Join us for a free Christmas Open House
Saturday, November 30th, from 1pm-4pm!
Explore Lakeport, make an ornament,
try your hand at festive games, sample historic sweets, and
take advantage of our Gift Shop sale to find that perfect gift!
For additional information, check out our Facebook Event.
19th December Calendar
This December calendar, found behind Lakeport’s North Parlor, lines up with dates in 2018. The calendar is most likely late 19th century. Possible years are 1906, 1900, 1894, 1883 or 1877.
History for the Holidays: Book Signing & Author Event
Saturday, December 8, 1 pm – 4 pm
Pick up a holiday present for your history buff on December 8 at the Lakeport Plantation. Local and regional authors will be on hand to sign copies of their books. Authors include:
Mark K. Christ of Little Rock, AR
Mark Spencer of Monticello, AR
Jim Woodrick of Ridgeland, MS
Woody Woods of Madison, MS
Princella Nowell of Greenville, MS
Robert Fulford of Dermott, AR
Blake Wintory of Lake Village, AR
Please bring cash or check. See books and prices below. Prices include tax. Hope to see you then!
Titles for Mark Christ:
Civil War Arkansas, 1863 ($22)
“This Day We Marched Again”: A Union Soldier’s Account of War in Arkansas and the Trans-Mississippi (ed. by Christ) ($24)
A Confused and Confusing Affair: Arkansas and Reconstruction (ed. by Christ; chapter by Blake Wintory) ($22)
Jim Woodrick:
The Civil War Siege of Jackson Mississippi ($24)
Woody Woods:
A Delta Diary: Amanda Worthington’s Civil War Diary ($22)
Delta Plantations: The Beginning ($22)
Princella Nowell:
Washington County, Mississippi (Images of America Series) ($24)
Mark Spencer:
Monticello (Images of America) ($24)
Mark will have other titles available, including– A Haunted Love Story: The Ghosts of the Allen House
Blake Wintory:
Chicot County (Images of America) ($24)
A Confused and Confusing Affair: Arkansas and Reconstruction (ed. by Christ; chapter by Blake Wintory) ($24)
Robert Fulford:
Growing Up on Yellow Bayou Book 1 ($12)
Growing Up on Yellow Bayou Book 2 ($12)
Dark Days of the South ($12)
Hiram E. Wetherbee Timeline
The Wetherbee House, built around 1873 for Hiram E. and Dora Wetherbee, is the oldest and last remaining home in downtown Greenville. Wetherbee, a Kentucky-born Union Civil War Veteran, returned to the Delta after the Civil War and founded a prosperous hardware store in Greenville. The home was added to the National Register in 1977. Today, it is under renovation to become Wetherbee’s, a retail space.
1842 — Hiram E. Wetherbee is born in Boone County, Kentucky.
1860 — Wetherbee, an 18 years-old farmer, is living in Golconda, IL along the Ohio River. He and six siblings are in the household of his father, T. W. Wetherbee, a wagon maker.
1862, August 16 — Wetherbee enlists at Golconda in 120th Regiment Illinois Infantry Volunteers, Company E as a teamster/wagoner. A younger brother, Wesley O. Wetherbee, joined the 29th Illinois Volunteer Infantry in 1864.
1862-1865 — The 120th IL Infantry transfers to Memphis, Tennessee. The 120th participated in the siege of Vicksburg (May-June 1863) and spent time in Old Greenville.
1865, September 10 — Wetherbee is discharged from the Union Army at Memphis.
1867-1870 — Wetherbee likely arrives in new Greenville. He initially farmed and worked as a tinsmith. In the 1870 Census, he has $1000 in real estate and $700 in personal property. His neighbor is Samuel Elliot, an Indiana-born hardware dealer who was appointed Greenville’s postmaster in 1868.
1871 — Wesley O. Wetherbee, Hiram’s younger brother and a Greenville blacksmith, marries Belle V. Elliott.
1873 — Wetherbee purchases land from Mrs. Blanton Theoblad, where he would build his home.
1874, October 3 — Advertisements for Wetherbee & Brown Hardware appear in The Greenville Times. Records suggest the hardware store was located on the now lost Mulberry Street parallel to the Mississippi River. In 1885, the store was relocated to Walnut Street.
1874, October 28 — Wetherbee weds Dora McCoy at Golconda, Illinois. The couple raise three children: Harry Lon (1875), Edna (1877), and Ethel (1895).
1878, September 30— Wesley O. Wetherbee, Hiram’s younger brother and a Greenville blacksmith since at least 1871, dies. His death coincides with the yellow fever epidemic. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
1905 — Wetherbee dies and is buried in the Greenville Cemetery. Wetherbee’s son, Harry, takes over the hardware store.
1911 — Dora Wetherbee dies and is buried in the Greenville Cemetery.
1950 — Wetherbee Hardware Store claims to be the oldest in the state of Mississippi.
1957 — Wetherbee Hardware Store is sold to new owners. It closed in 1966.
1973 — Ethel Wetherbee Finley is the last Wetherbee to live in the home.
1973 — The Council of Greenville Garden Clubs purchases the home. Under an architect’s supervision, the house is restored to its 1870s design and used as a clubhouse and museum.
1977 — The Wetherbee house is added to the National Register “as a rare example of the modest cottage type of domestic architecture common…in the post-Civil War decades” in Greenville. The Wetherbee carriage house is believed to be pre-Civil War.
Note: In addition to the National Register nomination, Mrs. Robert M. Harding’s 1978 article, “The Historic Preservation of the Wetherbee House,” published by the Washington County Historical Society is a good source of information on the Wetherbees and the home. Other sources consulted include U.S. Census records, Greenville Times, Delta Democrat-Times, Hiram Wetherbee’s pension file at the National Archives, among others.
Children’s Cemetery at Lakeport Plantation
Just behind the Lakeport house is a small children’s cemetery with post-Civil War burials of Lycurgus and Lydia Johnson’s children and grandchildren. Unprotected for many years, markers had been lost–some apparently drug into the field by tractors. Before restoration, the small crypt was the only for sure burial. Parts of four small markers were eventually discovered and ground penetrating radar revealed that there are at least two other burials and likely a third.
Of the four markers, only two have initials: “C.J.” for Cable Johnson (b. March 15, 1865; d. August 5, 1867) and “L.J.S.” for Lydia J. Starling (b. October 19, 1879; d. 1882). The third and fourth markers do not have any visible initials. Those markers are likely for Julia J. Johnson (b. July 12, 1860; d. November 1, 1869) and Lucie C. Worthington (b. January 8, 1880; d. June 5, 1881).
However, a recently discovered record suggests there is a fifth child buried in the cemetery.
Emma Peak and Walter Johnson married at Grand Lake, Chicot County on January 7, 1886. Emma, writing in 1937 in an unpublished memoir, stated, “Shortly afterwards we moved north to Wilton [Iowa] to be near Mr. Johnson’s business.” In a chapter titled, “Baby John,” she writes about the loss of her first child: “My first baby was a plump little boy with lovely large light blue eyes and red curls. A baby with lovely disposition. He loved people and would go to everybody who held out their arms to him….Little John stayed with us for fourteen months a baby loved by everyone.”
According to Iowa, County death records, 1880-1992, John P. Johnson, 13 months old, died on July 25, 1888 in Wilton Junction, Iowa. The record shows he was buried at Lakeport, Arkansas, very likely with his cousins behind the Lakeport family home.
Lycurgus and Lydia chose to bury their children who died before the Civil War in Frankfort, Kentucky and would eventually join them in 1876 and 1898. Unlike their parents, the Johnson daughters, Annie Starling and May Worthington, as well as Emma and Walter Johnson and chose their childhood home, Lakeport, as the place to bury their children–even sending little John Peak Johnson all the way from Iowa.
Notes (updated December 12, 2018):
The cast iron fence was added around the cemetery was added in 2008. A gift of Annie Paden, a descendant of Mary (May) Johnson Worthington, the iron fence surrounded Annie Taylor Worthington Spencer’s home on the Glen Allan Plantation in Glen Allan, MS.
Lydia Starling (1879-1882) was the daughter of Annie Johnson Starling (daughter of Lycurgus and Lydia Johnson) and Charles Hensley Starling. Nine-year-old Julia J. Johnson died in November 1869 about eight months after her brother, Cable. Lucie Worthington (1880-1881) was the daughter of Mary (May) Johnson and Isaac M. Worthington, Jr.
A copy of Emma Peak Johnson’s unpublished 1937 memoir, Growing Pains are Heaven, is on file at the Lakeport Plantation.
John P. Johnson’s death is indexed as “John P. Jackson,”https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XVQR-BM4 but it is clear in the original that it is “Johnson.”
Also see this post from 2012 —
Home for the Holidays – Lakeport Plantation Open House
Visit Lakeport Plantation for free during the Thanksgiving Holiday. The house will be open to explore with toys and games, Christmas tree decorating, and gift shop sale!
Bring your family for a visit!
November 23-25
Gift Shop Discounts and Explore the History at Lakeport
- Thanksgiving, November 22– Closed
- Friday & Saturday — Open House — 10 am – 3 pm
- Sunday — Open House — 12 pm – 4 pm
See updates on Facebook event page
Lakeport Legacies · September 27 · Casqui and Hernando de Soto’s Cross: Is Parkin the Place? · Dr. Jeffrey Mitchem (Arkansas Archeological Survey)
Casqui and Hernando de Soto’s Cross: Is Parkin the Place?
Dr. Jeffrey Mitchem
(Arkansas Archeological Survey-Parkin Research Station)
Thursday, September 27
Refreshments & Conversation @ 5:30 pm
Program @ 6:00 pm
On July 5, 1541, the Hernando de Soto expedition erected a large wooden cross atop the main ceremonial mound at Casqui. That site is believed by archeologists to be the Parkin Site in Cross County, Arkansas.
In 1966, archeologists discovered the remains wooden post atop in the main ceremonial mound. While samples taken in 1966 dated to the post to between (1515-1663). A new excavation of the post in 2016 holds the promise of precision and a date closer to de Soto’s arrival in what is now eastern Arkansas.
Please Register for this FREE event.
(by phone, email or online)
870.265.6031 ·
601 Hwy 142 · Lake Village, AR 71653
Lakeport Legacies · September 27 · Casqui and Hernando de Soto’s Cross: Is Parkin the Place? · Dr. Jeffrey Mitchem (Parkin Archeological State Park/Arkansas Archeological Survey)
Lakeport Legacies · September 27 · Casqui and Hernando de Soto’s Cross: Is Parkin the Place? · Dr. Jeffrey Mitchem (Parkin Archeological State Park/Arkansas Archeological Survey)
Join us on Sept 27 for Dr. Jeffery Mitchem’s presentation on recent excavations at the Parkin Archeological Site. The excavations revisit the remains of a large wooden post, first seen by archaeologists in the 1960s, embedded in a Native American mound at the site. Archeologists have theorized the wood might be the remains of the cross erected by Hernando de Soto in 1541.
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Recent Posts
- Life on the Mississippi Reading Retreat – April 13, 2024
- “A Weary Land” Book Signing with Dr. Kelly Houston Jones
- Literature at Lakeport – “Barracoon” and “The Last Slave Ship” Book Discussions
- Arkansas Archeology Society Cistern Screening, February 18, 2023
- Lakeport Plantation’s 15th Anniversary Weekend, September 2-4, 2022
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