Stage Line Established from Altus to Fayetteville

Not long after an Arkansas stage line was proposed to be started between Altus and Fayetteville, Dudley Emerson Jones, a Little Rock trustee of the Arkansas Industrial University (University of Arkansas), sent a letter to the Arkansas Gazette exhorting people along the stage company's route to support the company. The Gazette published the letter on August 19, 1875:

TO REACH FAYETTEVILLE.

Little Rock, August 16.

Editor Gazette — I notice the card of Messrs. Hodgens & Woolum in your last issue. It seems these enterprising gentlemen have established a daily line of stages from the end of the Little Rock and Fort Smith railroad to Fayetteville — making the time from this city in two days.

I understand the arrangements are to meet the cars at Altus, the present terminus of the road, go eighteen miles to Mr. Hill's, the first evening, stay over night there, and go to Fayetteville the next day. This is a good arrangement, and will be a great convenience to the traveling public, especially to the students of the university. The gentlemanly officers of the Fort Smith railroad company have agreed to continue the old half fare arrangement for the students, and the new stage line have been applied to and will no doubt extend the same favor. it is to be hoped the public will patronize the new line, and sustain it, as nothing is of more importance than a quick and sure means of communication between parents and children.

If the citizens of Fayetteville and residents along the line will take sufficient interest to sustain the line, it will be kept up; but if, as was too much the case before, the citizens rig up their own teams, or hire livery conveyance, let the coaches run empty, the company will give up the stages and take the mails on horseback. This would be a sad blow to the university. Application will be made to the Cairo and Fulton railroad, and the Memphis road, and the stage lines running to the southeast, for half fair tickets.

Respectfully,
D.E. Jones,
Trustee A.I.U.

• A related letter was published in the Arkansas Gazette a month and a half later.