H I S T O R Y  O F  H E R E P a r t 188 By: James F "Jim" Barrett A Moment to Do Something Different      Before we conclude our chat concerning The Shepherd of the Hills Farm and Theater I'd like to interview the remaining members of the theater's founding folks, the Mark Trimble family. I also intend to interview some of the people who have made the Shepherd of the Hills play so famous and popular for many years. Bear with me then, friends, until I can get that wonderful, personal information for you to complete the Farm and Theater story. In the meantime, we'll look at a closely allied situation. I know how you friends love good old maps. So, let's look at one that was very important and popular about the time that little Lizzy McDaniel was selling her valuable interests up in Springfield and buying the Ross property on Inspiration Point. As you'll recall, she made that purchase in 1926, and then moved into the cabin where she lived for ten years.      This one is courtesy of the Powers Museum, Carthage, Missouri. At one time, friends, there was a very powerful tourist oriented organization that spread from the Joplin area through our area, down towards Little Rock and up towards the Lake of the Ozarks. It was called The Ozark Playgrounds Association. Someday I'll find a history book, or set of documents, or something which will tell me the story of the OPA. I'd like to know who founded it, the premise and so on. I only know I keep stumbling over its ghostly remains often as I research the Mid-Ozarks Region. I even found a place where they had a bulletin out that gave travel instructions involving my beloved Wilderness Road. But that's for another time. Now let's take a look at this map of theirs and see what it can tell us and what fun we can have reviewing it. Click Here To See A Copy Of OPA Map.      This somewhat condensed OPA map reaches only from Galena south nearly to the Arkansas line. But it contains a lot of very interesting information. As always, on maps such as this, the controlling points are the highways and the rivers. From these, people can orient themselves in relation to what they know of THEIR position in time and place. So, let's look at the rivers and the roads. The White River, running from left to right about the middle of the map, is easily spotted. The James River, the next largest river on the map, is a little harder to trace from Galena down to where it joins the White. But, taking a bit of time and carefully following the path, we can see where it runs and what it passes by. Each and every one of these points is historically important, folks.      Starting at Galena, let's follow the James south. Gentry Cave, Arnold Lodge, then around the unmarked McCord's Bend, then south to Taylor Camp, Carr Ford, Jenkins Ford and finally to a note "1 day Float from Galena." So, what does all of that mean? I'm not familiar with Gentry Cave and I wonder if it still exists? Nor do I know the history of Arnold Lodge. But the river fords are very much still there, wide rock ledges where the James runs shallow and fast when the lake is low and the river heavy with recent rains. And the last note, about the Float? As we go on down the James, and then the White, looking at notes and comments we will soon see that the OPA marked out a typical fishing or recreational float trip from Galena to the Branson/Hollister area. Float fishing was very popular in those days, as were float trips strictly for sight seeing, relaxing and scenery appreciation.      Then we go by Bear Den, Virgin Bluff, Miller Springs, Long Bend Bluff, Cole's Ford, Buttermilk Springs and end up at Jackson Hollow where a note tells us this is the end of a 2 day float from Galena and a 1 day float from Bear's Dean. The springs and fords here are now all covered by Table Rock Lake, but the bluffs and the locations are very much there and well known today. Much of what the floaters and fisher folk of 1925 would have seen and enjoyed is now far beneath the waters of our shining Table Rock Lake. But - BUT! I have discovered a gentleman who often floated the James with his father and recalls the trips in great detail. I also know a personal friend who was a hostler on such trips, not a guide but a grunt, who worked to see that the trips went well, folks were fed, bedded down in camp and that the boats were clean and properly operated.      Perhaps, one evening, at our Wilderness Road Historical Dinner Theater at RT's Family Restaurant, we'll get these two gentlemen together to tell us stories of the float trips and the fishing trips on the James and White Rivers fifty or more years ago. Wouldn't that be fun and interesting? Well, we'll see if I can make it happen for you dear reader friends.      The next thing along the trip of great interest is where the James flows into the White. But, just a bit before it does so, we can see an interesting mark and comment. You'll have to look carefully, for the roads and the river are about the same marking size and equally crooked and black. Look to your right and you'll see a heavy road-marking going from north to south. It's labeled 43, for 43 Highway. This was the original, state built and maintained major road that used to run from Galena to 85 Highway down in Arkansas. MoDot was very proud of that highway, for it took a lot of money, time, persistence and dynamite to build it. Today it's been replaced by 13 Highway, which has taken some new and better-traveled bits in its present route.      From old 43, just south of the note concerning Fairy Cave (now Talking Rocks), you'll see a road heading southwest that hits our James River just before it merges with the White. That road is the James River Road of today. And I think you'll see why it was called the James River Road, for you can see it crossing the James. And if you'll look carefully you'll see another note that shows an arrow pointing to the crossing labeled "bridge." Yes, folks, at one time there was a bridge where the James River Road crossed the James River, and the road then crossed the old Joe Philibert and Perninah Yocum Philibert farm and ranch at this point. Then the road went up the steep hills to join the main road running from Bear Den south to Baxter. Pretty interesting stuff, huh?      If we stay with our floaters and drift on down the White River we soon come to the next points of interest, Camp Thomas and Kimberling Park, on the north and south side of the White, respectively. These were at the site of the old Kimberling Ferry crossing and the ford where the old Wilderness Road used to cross the White before the ferries were built. Also, at that point we'll find the note, "End of 2 day float from Bear's Den. End of 3 Day Float from Galena." And here, just below where we'll camp at one of the two camps, we can see the new iron Kimberling Bridge, an Ozark marvel of its day. Just up the slough (Fisher Creek), we see the little town of Radical. This was the site of the local general store and post office. You'll have to dig out some of my earlier articles to learn how it got its name and who ran all the facilities there. But, much later in time, on the bluffs above Radical, John Q. Hammons saw fit to build another town, which we call Kimberling City.      Just on down the White we come to White Rock Bluff, still very much there and visible today. Then Log Way Bluff and Tibbets Ferry, neither of which appear in my research over the years. I assume the bluff is there, but the ferry, of course, is beneath Table Rock Lake. Up on the peninsula we see Marmaros. This is where the town moved to after the original Marmaros of Marble Cave (Marvel Cave) ran out of bat guano and gave up the ghost there.      A bit further down the White on our trip, look closely and you'll see the note, "The Last Night's Camp." This is the end of the fourth day from Galena and the third from Bear's Den. The next day we float down the White and put up at Branson or Hollister, to be picked up in Model T trucks, loaded and quickly driven back up 3 and 43 Highways to our waiting vehicles parked at Galena. So you see, it's taken us five leisurely, lovely days to float from Galena to Branson. Just as it had taken folks for many years previously and for many years to follow - until Table Rock Dam and Lake ended it all.      Well, we've run out of time and space once more, reader friends. I hope and trust that you will take a lot of time to study the enclosed 1925 Ozark Playgrounds Association map. You'll find tons of fun and interesting notes, comments, instructions and so on - all over the place. See you folks next time here in The Message Tree. And I'll see you in our Historical Dinner Theater when we reopen the evening of the 8th of January.