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History of the Crater of Diamonds State Park
People first began to suspect that diamonds might occur just outside of the town of Murfreesboro, Arkansas, when the precious stones were first discovered in the peridotite soil of Kimberly, South Africa. Arkansas State Geologist John Branner knew that there was a field of peridotite soil just west of Murfreesboro, and he gave the place a thorough surface search in 1889. He found no diamonds during his searching.
The first diamonds would not be found here until August 8, 1906, when John Wesley Huddleston, the farmer who then owned the property, found two stones on the farm that he had purchased for $100 and a mule. The story goes that John had been slopping his hogs when he saw some shiny specks in the dirt. When he washed the dirt off the flakes to see if they were gold, the shiny specks floated away since they were mica. However, in the gravel in the bottom of the washing pan, Huddleston saw two unusual crystals, one yellow and one white, which were different from anything that he had ever seen. He took the stones to a grinding wheel and tried to grind them. To his amazement, the stones wore grooves in his grinding wheel, a wheel that supposedly could grind anything.
Huddleston took the diamonds to town and showed them to the bank president who, in turn, sent them to a jeweler in Little Rock. From there, the stones were sent to Tiffany's in New York where they were certified as gem quality diamonds, a 3.0 carat white and a 1.5 carat yellow [NOTE: A carat totals 100 points.] Shortly after the discovery of those two diamonds on his land, Huddleston sold the property to three Little Rock men for $36,000. His reasoning was that there were six people in his family, and pauper. $6,000 each would support them throughout their lives. Unfortunately, Huddleston died a pauper.
Basic Geology of the Crater
The story of the Crater of Diamonds begins over three billion years ago. Then, the earth was not as we know it now. Instead of seven continents spread over the globe, there was one huge landmass that scientists refer to as Pangaea, a name that means "all lands."
The outer surface, or crust, of the earth is divided into great segments called plates. Since the layer below the plates is made of hot, easily flowing material, the plates move atop atop it. Imagine a jelly sandwich where the top slice of bread moves around because the jelly is so gooey.
The process of the continents moving on their plates away from each other is called continental drift. This process is ongoing though gradual movement, and sometimes it is jolting resulting in earthquakes. As the plates move, they collide with one another. The stress of two plates pushing one another often causes mountains to be created. Picture a tablecloth on a table. When you push the tablecloth together, it bunches up in folds much the way mountain ranges will do on a continent. Another change that happens when two plates push together is that through the stress, one plate must go below the other. The lower plate continues its journey down deep into the earth, where it becomes hotter and hotter until the rock making up the plate becomes liquid or molten like lava.
This process is what happened in what its today Arkansas. Plates pushed together to make the Ouachita Mountains, the state's southernmost mountain range, and one plate slipped below the other. Back 300 million years ago, most of Arkansas was under water except for the Ouachita Mountain range. In fact, 135 million years ago in the Ouachitas, lowering plants and trees began to appear that were important for the emerging animal life of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and insects. Dinosaurs roamed here until about 70 million years ago.
It is estimated that 100 million years ago, the continents finished the majority of their movements. However, those last movements formed cracks in the earth's crust allowing some of the hot lava from deep in the earth to escape. This is what happened at the Crater of Diamonds site. The volcano that erupted here under the ocean that then covered the area had the exact amounts of heat and pressure to allow the carbon atoms to bond tightly to form diamonds. The perfect combination of heat and pressure in that volcanic pipe is why there are diamonds at the Crater of Diamonds. Park visitors search over a 37 ½-acre plowed field that is the eroded surface of this ancient, gem-bearing volcanic pipe that is the world's eighth diamond reserve in surface area.
The Diamond Rush
A diamond rush developed as soon as word of the find got out about the diamond discovery at what is today Crater of Diamonds State Park near Murfreesboro. The Conway hotel in Murfreesboro is said to have turned away more than 10,000 people who could not be accommodated in just one year. The tent city of Kimberly was established between Murfreesboro and the diamond field, but nothing remains of it today.
The men who bought the Huddleston property began the Arkansas Diamond Company. However, there were 40 acres of diamond bearing-soil that had not been owned by Huddleston. M. M. Mauney owned that land and refused to sell. Mauney tried to mine his property, and even allowed visitors to search it for a fee. Finally, he sold a 3/4 interest in the property to Horace Bemis, who organized the Ozark Diamond Corporation. However, Bemis died soon after and his heirs were not interested in diamond mining.
Austin Millar and his son Howard bought Bemis' share. The Millars tried to buy out Mauney's 1/4 share, but failed.
The Millars built and operated a small commercial plant that was successful until the entire installation was destroyed by arson on January 14, 1919. The Millars were never able to rebuild.
In 1949, the first real attempt was made to open the diamond deposit to the public. The land was leased from the Millars and opened as the Diamond Preserve of America. Later, the name was changed to the Crater of Diamonds and was successfully run by Millar and his wife. The adjacent property had passed through various owners and was owned by Mrs. Wilkinson at the time. She opened her property to the public as The Big Mine, and a fierce battle of the billboards began.
In 1969, General Earth Minerals of Dallas, Texas bought both properties. The company never operated the site as a commercial mine, but continued it as a private tourist attraction until 1972, when the State of Arkansas bought the land for inclusion in the state park system for $750,000.