In our June issue, we introduced William Hope “Coin” Harvey, a visionary, author, and political crusader who dreamed of building a resort paradise in the Ozarks. After personal tragedy and political defeat, Harvey turned his attention to Monte Ne, Arkansas, hoping to create a world-class destination fueled by mineral springs, grand hotels, and unconventional ideas. As Part Two of his story unfolds, we pick up in 1904 when Harvey’s plans take shape in the form of log palaces, gondola rides, and one man’s unwavering quest to leave a legacy. Read Part 1 at DoSouthMagazine.com.
In 1904, the year after William Hope “Coin” Harvey lost his beloved son Halliday in a train accident, he pushed ahead with his plans to make Monte Ne the resort town he’d envisioned. Already, the Monte Ne Hotel was in place, and he’d secured a train to carry guests to the resort. At the train’s unveiling, lawyer and politician William Jennings Bryan spoke. Maybe as a favor, since Harvey had campaigned for Bryan’s failed presidential campaign before coming to Arkansas.
Now, Harvey needed a superb architect, and he found one in A.O. Clarke, of St. Louis.
A.O. Clarke was forty-five years old at the time. In St. Louis, he’d worked under renowned architect J.B. Legg, before leaving to start a firm with two other co-workers. Some historians believe Harvey was introduced to Clarke at the 1893 World Columbian Exposition, in Chicago. At the same expo, there were gondolas and singing gondoliers, which garnered their share of attention. It’s possible Harvey noticed them, too, because in 1901, he brought Italian gondolas to Monte Ne to transport visitors from the train, across the canal he’d created by damming up some of the springs, and on to their destination.
Clarke moved to Rogers to work with Harvey, and during his long career designed some of the most iconic buildings in the state. At the time, Clarke was known for his Classical Revival designs, which incorporated ancient Greek and Roman influences (think the Pantheon and Coliseum), so it would be easy to assume that his Monte Ne designs would be all stone arches and carved columns.
That was not the case.
Missouri Row, the first hotel Clarke designed for Harvey, became the world’s largest log building, made of 8,000 logs and 14,000 cubic feet of cement. The kingly cabin in the woods, which fit Arkansas’ natural esthetic, opened in 1905. By then, Clarke was working on plans for a second, three-story club/hotel, where his signature classical design was evident, but a dispute over workers’ pay sidelined the project. In 1909 or 1910, Oklahoma Row, with a design similar to Missouri Row, was completed. It had forty rooms, eleven of which had bathrooms. It also had a ballroom, where grand dances were held.
For more than two decades, visitors from across the United States came to Monte Ne. Some spent entire summers there, often to escape the heat and noise of the city. Or they came to bathe in the mineral springs, which they believed could heal what ailed them. “Taking the waters” was the term enthusiasts used for the holistic treatment.
The resort had the first golf course in Northwest Arkansas, a newspaper, a bank (also designed by Clarke), an auditorium, the state’s first indoor pool, and tennis courts. Entertainers performed, guests fell in and out of love, got well or didn’t, and Harvey was allowed to realize his dream.
Although it was not a perfect dream. His wife Anna left Monte Ne early on, taking daughters Mary and Annette with her. Their son Tom is thought to have left Monte Ne in 1908. And Halliday, by all accounts his father’s favorite, had died a young man in 1903.
The Harveys finally divorced in 1929. William “Coin” Harvey remarried. Anna did not.
The wheels of invention were turning fast. In the beginning, Harvey needed the train to Monte Ne because in the early 1900s, travel of any distance was difficult, and horses were the main form of transportation. In 1913, when automobiles were becoming popular in the area, Harvey organized the Ozark Trail Association to promote well-constructed roads, knowing they would be essential to Monte Ne’s success. He even proposed a turnpike from Monte Ne to Muskogee.
It was not enough.
By the mid-1920s, the unshakable “Coin” Harvey appeared to have finally given up. He believed our society was doomed. While he couldn’t save the U.S. from collapsing, he could do something. He’d build a 140-foot-high concrete pyramid, which would be surrounded by an amphitheater. Inside the pyramid, which looked more like an obelisk, would be Harvey’s writings on the matter, a warning for those in the future, a cautionary tale of all our worst mistakes. Newspapers across the country carried the story of this self-made prophet in Arkansas declaring that the end was nigh.
The amphitheater was built of rock and cement. The obelisk was never created.
By the late 1920s, most of the resort was either sold or in foreclosure. Both Missouri and Oklahoma Row hotels were purchased by a theology school, and devout students claimed that part of Monte Ne as their campus.
Harvey moved on to the next chapter. In 1931, at the age of eighty, he announced he was running as the presidential candidate for the Liberty Party, an entity of his own making. His presidential convention was held in Monte Ne. When election day rolled around, Franklin Delano Roosevelt won. Harvey received about 54,000 votes. Only two of those came from Benton County.
In February 1936, William Hope “Coin” Harvey, age eighty-four and suffering from intestinal influenza, died a pauper in his beloved Monte Ne. His second wife, Maye Leak Harvey (and longtime secretary), was at his side. His body was placed in a concrete mausoleum alongside his son Halliday, who had broken his father’s heart when he died too young.
Harvey’s son Tom came from West Virginia to attend the funeral. Harvey’s daughters did not. Six years later, when Tom, an Ohio attorney and realty dealer, died by his own hand, he left instructions. There was to be no sermon, no prayer, no flowers, no music. And absolutely no burial. His ashes were to be scattered on any road his family saw fit.
As for “Coin” Harvey, he did not rest in eternal peace. In the early 1960s, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ordered his and Halliday’s forty-ton concrete tomb to be moved. They were building Beaver Lake by damming the White River and planned to flood the old resort.
It took two house moving companies nine days to move the tomb, which cracked with the effort.
Harvey’s friends, the Berry Grahams, donated the cemetery plot for the two Harvey men, not far away, an act of grace. Even so, the view Harvey planned for his final resting place disappeared. The log hotels were disassembled and moved to higher ground. Almost everything else fell beneath the waters. There are times in the summer, if the rain stops for long enough and the water recedes, when you can see the rough stone amphitheater, Harvey’s last hurrah. Remarkably, it’s the water that has preserved it so well for so long.
Harvey’s life had been forged by silver and gold. At times there was plenty. At times not enough. He won and he lost. Built and demolished. When he first saw Monte Ne, he knew he’d come across a treasure, a natural wonder. He was right, of course. The problem might have been that it was perfect the way it was, without one foundation poured, or one tree felled for its timber. But that’s another story.
