Mountain Home is a city in and the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...

of Baxter County,

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States. It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma ...

, United States, in the southern

Ozark Mountains The Ozarks, also known as the Ozark Mountains, Ozark Highlands or Ozark Plateau, is a physiographic region in the U.S. states of Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, as well as a small area in the southeastern corner of Kansas. The Ozarks cover ...

near the northern state border with

Missouri Missouri (''see #Etymology and pronunciation, pronunciation'') is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it border ...

. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 12,448. A total of 41,307 persons lived within the city and micropolitan area combined, which encompasses the majority of Baxter County.

History

Founding and early days

Mountain Home was originally known as Rapp's Barren. The land was owned by Simeon "Rapp" Talburt, who built the first home in the area in the early 1830s. Rapp and many of his family members are buried in a small cemetery in the Indian Creek subdivision of Mountain Home. The original cabin was found in 1990 and is on display in Cooper Park in Mountain Home with other homes of historic value. The name of the town was changed to Mountain Home in 1856. A post office was established in 1857. The Mountain Home Male and Female Academy was opened in 1853 and provided much needed education in the absence of accessible public schools.

The Courthouse

When Baxter County was incorporated on March 24, 1873, Mountain Home was named as the county seat. Court was held in a local store and prisoners were held in the homes of respected citizens until a proper courthouse could be built. A former boardinghouse was purchased for the purpose, but was deemed unfit for county business during the renovation process, so a new wood-frame building was built on a donated lot in the middle of the town square. This building burned to the ground in the 1890s and was replaced with a stone courthouse. It was suspected that an arsonist set fire to the building due to the location of the start of the fire and the timing. In just a few days, the fireproof safe would have been completed and all county records, including indictments, would have been protected from fire. In 1912, a local town, Cotter, was booming while growth in Mountain Home had slowed, and there was talk of moving the County Seat to the riverfront town. Mountain Home added a third floor to their existing court house due to an Arkansas law that prevented county seats from being moved away from a three-story building. The current court house was completed in 1943 and is still in use today.

Civil War

Mountain Home men participated in the war on the confederate side. No major battles were fought in Mountain Home, but because of its proximity to

, members of the union army would often raid the area for supplies and both sides participated in

guerilla warfare Guerrilla warfare is a form of unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military, such as rebels, partisans, paramilitary personnel or armed civilians, which may include recruited children, use ambushes, sabotage, terrorism ...

. During this time, the Mountain Home Male and Female Academy was closed. In October 1862, the 14th regiment of the Missouri State Militia was ordered to advance to

Yellville, Arkansas Yellville is a city in and the county seat of Marion County, Arkansas, Marion County, Arkansas, United States. Yellville is located in the Ozark Mountains along the banks of Crooked Creek (Arkansas), Crooked Creek, and neighbors the small town of ...

a town not far away, to attack confederate troops stationed there and to take any supplies they could along the way. When they heard that a larger force of confederate soldiers were also heading for Yellville, and facing the rising waters of the White River, they decided to content themselves with stealing approximately 50 horses and other supplies from local settlers in the Mountain Home area and then retreat. The rear guard was cut off by a battalion of confederate soldiers and a skirmish ensued where the Union Army lost no soldiers and the

Confederate Army The Confederate States Army (CSA), also called the Confederate army or the Southern army, was the military land force of the Confederate States of America (commonly referred to as the Confederacy) during the American Civil War (1861–1865), fi ...

lost approximately 10. In April 1864, Mountain Home was again involved with Civil war violence when a group of

jayhawkers Jayhawker and red leg are terms that came to prominence in Kansas Territory during the Bleeding Kansas period of the 1850s; they were adopted by militant bands affiliated with the free-state cause during the American Civil War. These gangs were ...

attacked the town. Much of the town was damaged or destroyed, including the Mountain Home Male and Female Academy.

Post Civil War through the 1920s

In 1893, the Mountain Home Baptist college, known as "The Gem of the Ozarks", opened. It operated for 40 years, offering education in French, Greek, Shorthand and typing as well as teacher training. Most of the money required to open it was raised locally. It closed occasionally due to lack of funds. In 1901, it became part of the

Ouachita Baptist University Ouachita Baptist University (OBU) is a Private university, private Arkansas Baptist State Convention, Baptist university in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. The university's name is taken from the Ouachita River, Ouachita (pronounced WAH-shi-tah) River, ...

system. In 1916 it became the flagship of the schools operated in Arkansas by the

Southern Baptist Convention The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), alternatively the Great Commission Baptists (GCB), is a Christian denomination based in the United States. It is the world's largest Baptist organization, the largest Protestant, and the second-largest Chr ...

. By 1927 there were 265 students and a 7000 volume library. In 1927, funding was withdrawn to support a more centralized school in Conway and by 1933, the school was closed. The library was donated to the local public library and public schools and the dormitories became housing for the Dam builders. In 1901, the Baxter Bulletin was established and continues to operate today.

The Great Depression

The Great Depression hit the area hard, causing many local farmers to lose their land and leave. A series of natural disasters also caused hardship in the area including the Flood of 1927 and the drought of 1930–31. Cotton had been one of the main crops in the area before this, but the drought ended production of cotton in Baxter county and it never truly resumed. Residents received some relief from

New Deal The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...

programs such as the Federal Emergency Relief Agency (FERA) and the

Civilian Conservation Corps The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a voluntary government unemployment, work relief program that ran from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men ages 18–25 and eventually expanded to ages 17–28. The CCC was ...

. The

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; from 1935 to 1939, then known as the Work Projects Administration from 1939 to 1943) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to car ...

transformed transportation in the area throughout the 1930s and 1940s.

The New Deal

The programs of the New Deal era allowed Mountain Home to modernize its courthouse. The decision to do this was hotly contested and in a vote to decide if the funds should be approved, 731 voted for the new courthouse and 592 voted against. Most of those against the new courthouse were from the Cotter area which had tried several times to move the county seat to their town. The current courthouse was completed and dedicated on August 13, 1943, the old building having been destroyed two years earlier. The WPA also built two dams in the area during this time. The

Norfork Dam Norfork Dam impounds the North Fork River (Missouri - Arkansas), North Fork River in the U.S. state of Arkansas, creating Norfork Lake. The large reservoir is maintained by the United States Army Corps of Engineers and spans Baxter County, Arkans ...

was built in the town of Norfork about 18 miles south east of Mountain Home. This dam was completed by 1944. An average of 815 were employed building the dam, providing a much needed economic boost to Mountain home and the surrounding area. In addition to flood control, the Norfork Dam boosted tourist interest in Baxter County and made Mountain Home a more attractive destination than Cotter for the first time, and Mountain Home began to surpass its riverfront neighbor in population and industry. A second dam had been built in the town of

Bull Shoals Bull Shoals may refer to: *Bull Shoals Dam, a concrete gravity dam on the White River in northern Arkansas *Bull Shoals Lake, an artificial lake formed by the Bull Shoals Dam *Bull Shoals, Arkansas Bull Shoals is a city in Marion County, Arkansa ...

in nearby Marion County. This meant Mountain Home was situated between two large lakes and within an easy drive to one of the most famous destinations for fishing in the country at that time. Tourism would shape the economy of Mountain Home moving forward. President

Harry Truman Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884December 26, 1972) was the 33rd president of the United States, serving from 1945 to 1953. As the 34th vice president in 1945, he assumed the presidency upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt that year. Subsequen ...

was the keynote speaker at the dedication of the dams on July 2, 1952. The construction of these two dams was a time of tremendous growth for the formerly isolated community of Mountain Home. Streets were paved and Electricity became common in average households. A trout fishery was built at the base of the Norfork Dam, attracting still more tourists.

Geography

Mountain Home is located in northern Arkansas at (36.336248, -92.382279). It is the center of the Twin Lakes area, with

Norfork Lake Norfork Dam impounds the North Fork River in the U.S. state of Arkansas, creating Norfork Lake. The large reservoir is maintained by the United States Army Corps of Engineers and spans Baxter County, Arkansas, Fulton County, Arkansas and Ozar ...

15 minutes to the east and

Bull Shoals Lake Bull Shoals Lake is an artificial lake or reservoir in the Ozark Mountains of northern Arkansas and southern Missouri, United States. It has hundreds of miles of lake arms and coves, and common activities include boating, water sports, swimming, ...

20 minutes to the northwest. It is located within the

Ozarks The Ozarks, also known as the Ozark Mountains, Ozark Highlands or Ozark Plateau, is a physiographic region in the U.S. states of Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, as well as a small area in the southeastern corner of Kansas. The Ozarks cover ...

mountain range, in the Salem Plateau region. The city is located within 15 to 20 minutes of three rivers: the

Buffalo National River The Buffalo National River, in Northern Arkansas, was the first National River to be designated in the United States. The Buffalo River is long. The lower flow within the boundaries of an area managed by the National Park Service, where the s ...

, the White River and the North Fork River, which features the world-renowned

Norfork Tailwater The Norfork Tailwater is the segment of the North Fork River below Norfork Dam in north central Arkansas. The Norfork Tailwater is about long and stretches from the dam below Lake Norfork to the White River at Norfork. The community of Salesv ...

. These make the Mountain Home area one of the nation's top freshwater fishing destinations. According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the city has a total area of , all land.

Climate

Mountain Home has a

humid subtropical climate A humid subtropical climate is a subtropical -temperate climate type, characterized by long and hot summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between ...

(

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...

''Cfa''), with cool to mild winters and warm, humid summers.

Transportation

Highways in Mountain Home: *

US 62 U.S. Route 62 or U.S. Highway 62 (US 62) is an east–west United States Highway in the southern and northeastern United States. It runs from the Mexican border at El Paso, Texas, to Niagara Falls, New York, near the Canadian bo ...

US 412 U.S. Route 412 is an east–west United States highway, first commissioned in 1982. U.S. 412 overlaps expressway-grade Cimarron Turnpike from Tulsa west to Interstate 35 and the Cherokee Turnpike from east of Chouteau, Oklahoma, to west of th ...

U.S. Route 62 Business * Arkansas 5

Highway 5 * Arkansas 101

Highway 101 Highway 101 was an American country music band founded in 1986 in Los Angeles, California. The initial lineup consisted of Paulette Carlson (lead vocals), Jack Daniels (guitar), Curtis Stone (bass guitar, vocals), and Scott "Cactus" Moser (drum ...

Highway 178 * Arkansas 201

Highway 201 * Arkansas 201S

Highway 201 Spur The city is served by

Ozark Regional Airport Baxter County Airport , is a county-owned public-use airport located four nautical miles (5 mi, 7 km) northwest of the central business district of Mountain Home, a city in Baxter County, Arkansas, United States. It was known a ...

, a county-owned, public-use airport with a few commercial flights. No railroads pass through Mountain Home, but the

Missouri and Northern Arkansas Railroad The Missouri & Northern Arkansas Railroad, LLC is a Class II Regional Railroad in the U.S. states of Missouri, Kansas, and Arkansas. The company is headquartered in Carthage, Missouri. It is not to be confused with the Missouri and North Arka ...

passes through the nearby community of Cotter, Arkansas to the west. The line encompasses 506 miles of track from

Pleasant Hill, Missouri Pleasant Hill is a city in Cass and Jackson counties, Missouri, United States. The population was 8,777 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Kansas City metropolitan area. Pleasant Hill is home for the National Weather Service Kansas City/Ple ...

to Diaz Junction, Arkansas. The line has about five trains a day, with most being mixed freight or empty coal trains.

Media

Print

The local newspaper is ''

The Baxter Bulletin ''The Baxter Bulletin'' is a twice-weekly newspaper serving Mountain Home, Arkansas and Baxter County, Arkansas, and surrounding areas. History ''The Baxter Bulletin'' was sold to Multimedia in 1976 and Gannett Gannett Co., Inc. ( ) is ...

'', published since 1901. It also publishes "Living Well Magazine."

Radio

KTLO AM 1240 was established in 1953. Others include KTLO Radio (which includes 99.7 FM The Boot, KCTT Classic Hits 101.7 FM, and KTLO 1240 AM Real Country) and Twin Lakes Radio (which includes KOMT The Eagle 93.5 FM, KPFM Country 105.5 FM, and KKTZ Hit 107.5 FM. KCMH 91.5 FM (a Christian radio) is also licensed to the city of Mountain Home. Several other stations are licensed to surrounding communities and serve Baxter County.

Television

K26GS-D operates KL7 in Mountain Home on public access and provides local interest pieces and news. Mountain Home is part of the Springfield television market.

Theater

Mountain Home has a live theater known as the Twin Lakes Playhouse, which opened in 1971 and has operated continuously since then.

Demographics

2020 census

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 12,825 people, 5,851 households, and 3,225 families residing in the city.

2010 census

According to the 2010 census, the population of Mountain Home was 12,448.

2000 census

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2000, there were 11,012 people, 5,175 households, and 3,151 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 5,612 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 97.69%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0.18%

Black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.47% Native American, 0.37% Asian, 0.03%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...

, 0.26% from other races, and 0.99% from two or more races. 1.20% of the population were

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race. There were 5,175 households, out of which 19.9% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 49.3% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 9.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 39.1% were non-families. 36.3% of all households were made up of individuals, and 22.8% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.02 and the average family size was 2.59. In the city, the population was spread out, with 17.7% under the age of 18, 5.9% from 18 to 24, 18.8% from 25 to 44, 21.5% from 45 to 64, and 36.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 53 years. For every 100 females, there were 78.2 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 74.3 males. The median income for a household in the city was $26,869, and the median income for a family was $34,895. Males had a median income of $26,800 versus $19,702 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the city was $16,789. About 7.5% of families and 10.6% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 14.6% of those under age 18 and 7.1% of those age 65 or over.

Education

ASU – Mountain Home

Arkansas State University-Mountain Home is a public, open-access, two-year campus of

Arkansas State University Arkansas State University (A-State or ASU) is a public university, public research university in Jonesboro, Arkansas, United States. It is the flagship campus of the Arkansas State University System and the second-largest university in the st ...

located on a campus on the west side of the city. The campus became part of the ASU system in 1995. The campus architecture is styled after the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson and contains his The Lawn, Academical Village, a World H ...

Mountain Home school district

Mountain Home Public Schools has seven campuses and owns . It serves more than 4,000 students from kindergarten through 12th grade. The school plays in the 6A/7A East Athletic Conference in basketball, football, baseball, softball, track and field, soccer, wrestling, cross country, volleyball and swimming. The cross country teams won multiple state championships and the swim and volleyball teams competed for state championships. Jennifer Wiseman

The school band marched in the 2006 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the 2010 Citrus Bowl Parade, and competed at Disney World in 2019. The Jazz Band performs shows in Branson, Missouri. The robotics program placed in the top three of the FIRST Championship (FRC) multiple times, and won the FRC world championship in 2012.

Notable people

* Richard Antrim, rear admiral in the U.S. Navy; World War II veteran. * Charles L. Gilliland,

Medal of Honor The Medal of Honor (MOH) is the United States Armed Forces' highest Awards and decorations of the United States Armed Forces, military decoration and is awarded to recognize American United States Army, soldiers, United States Navy, sailors, Un ...

recipient during the

Korean War The Korean War (25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953) was an armed conflict on the Korean Peninsula fought between North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea; DPRK) and South Korea (Republic of Korea; ROK) and their allies. North Korea was s ...

. * Mike Koch, racing driver *

William U. McCabe William U. McCabe (1880 – May 5, 1931) was an attorney and politician from Mountain Home, Arkansas. He served in the Arkansas Senate from 1921 to 1924, and the Arkansas House of Representatives from January 1931 until his assassination on May 6 ...

, represented Baxter County in the

Arkansas Senate The Arkansas State Senate is the upper branch of the Arkansas General Assembly. The Senate consists of 35 members, each representing a district with about 83,000 people. Service in the state legislature is part-time, and many state senators have ...

from 1921 to 1924, and in the

Arkansas House of Representatives The Arkansas House of Representatives is the lower house of the Arkansas General Assembly, the state legislature of the US state of Arkansas. The House has 100 members elected from an equal number of constituencies across the state. Each distr ...

in 1931 until his death * Stetson Painter, Member of the Arkansas House of Representatives *

Gaylen Pitts Gaylen Richard Pitts (June 6, 1946 – October 10, 2024) was an American professional baseball player, manager and baseball coach. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Oakland Athletics, and coached in the St. Louis Cardinals organi ...

, Major League baseball player; manager and coach * Jennifer Wiseman, Senior Project Scientist of the

Hubble Space Telescope The Hubble Space Telescope (HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation. It was not the Orbiting Solar Observatory, first space telescope, but it is one of the largest and most ...

, astronomer, discoverer of Comet Wiseman-Skiff * C. D. Wright, poet * Ron "Wolverine" Bata,

Power Slap Power Slap is an American slap fighting promotion company owned by Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) chief executive officer Dana White. Power Slap first gained notoriety by producing a reality television show titled ''Power Slap: Road t ...

Light heavyweight Light heavyweight is a weight class in combat sports. Boxing Professional In professional boxing, the division is above and up to , falling between super middleweight and cruiserweight (boxing), cruiserweight. The light heavyweight class has ...

champion