Monte Ne - After Harvey

After Harvey

The bank building was bought in 1944 by D. L. King of Rogers, who remodeled it and made it home to his Atlas Manufacturing Company which produced poultry equipment. However, King moved the business back to Rogers the next year. The building then stood idle, becoming victim to vandalism. All of its windows were smashed and it became covered in graffiti. Eventually, it was nothing more than an empty, roofless, cement shell.

In 1944, both Missouri and Oklahoma Row were sold to Springdale businessmen Roy Joyce and Jim Barrack. Missouri Row was torn down and sold in small lots. The roof tiles were bought by a Little Rock law firm. By 1956, the building had collapsed, leaving only a small section standing.

Oklahoma Row continued to provide lodging, although it was run and managed by several different people. In June 1946, Company G of the Arkansas State Guard held camp at Monte Ne for field training, using the hotel facilities. Access to Monte Ne improved a bit in August 1947 when the state highway department blacktopped 1.4 miles (2.25 km) of the Monte Ne road. In January, six Monte Ne men were arrested for grand larceny, charged with stealing doors from Oklahoma Row and 500 feet (152 m) of pipe from the swimming pool. A resident of the area, Iris Armstrong opened up a girls' camp just east of the amphitheater in 1922. She named it Camp Joyzelle after the Maurice Maeterlinck play of the same name. The camp made use of the amphitheater for plays and its cabins, named after Greek goddesses, dotted the hillside. Oklahoma Row was used in 1945 for lodging people who had come to visit the campers. It was used for this purpose up until 1962 as well as for social events and activities such as plays and campfire ceremonies. The camp also used the ticketing section of the old railroad depot for its main lodge and crafts building. In 1955 Dallas Barrack, a Springdale antique dealer, bought Oklahoma Row, and renovated it into an antique store called the Palace Art Galleries. He was to have carried "some of the finest antiques in the area" and believed that "the splendor of the old hotel only adds to their value."

A Baptist church was organized at Monte Ne under the sponsorship of the Benton County Baptist Association as a result of a series of revival meetings conducted there. The Monte Ne Baptist Church is still active. For a time in the summer of 1946, the Rogers Intermediate Girl Scouts held a camp at the Hotel Frances (old Hotel Mont Ne). Although it was not as active as it once was, the old filling station and store in downtown Monte Ne continued to serve the local population.

The Monte Ne Inn, two to three miles (3 to 5 km) away from where the resort was on highway 94, opened in 1972 and is still in business.

In 1948, W.T. McWhorter purchased Harvey's former log home and office and the amphitheater nearby and turned it into a restaurant serving chicken, steak, and fish. There was also a concession stand at the amphitheater that operated until 1957, selling drinks, candy, souvenirs, and pamphlets about Harvey.

In January 1957, the Tulsa Daily World reported that 30,000 tourists visited Monte Ne annually to see Harvey's now deteriorating dream. The Arkansas State Historical Society held its 1960 annual meeting at Monte Ne and gathered at the amphitheater to hear Clara Kennan, a Rogers native and school teacher who had been fascinated by Monte Ne her whole life, give a talk on Harvey and his Pyramid project. Her oral history and interviews provide some of the best information on Harvey and Monte Ne.