Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Argenta on the rise
A place to go
OPINION
Tommy Foltz
This is a dramatic over-simplification, but here goes: Arkansas is a tale of two states. There’s northwest Arkansas, which deservedly makes top 10 lists for best places to live, work, play, etc., in America.
And there’s central Arkansas, undeservedly viewed as dying on the vine by comparison to the great northwestern Ks, where there’s more crime in Little Rock and the schools aren’t as good, but there’s a lot of good going on here.
According to Moody’s, Little Rock gets credit for having a diverse economy, with manufacturing, business services and finance all growing. And we can’t forget the medical community. If you’re going to get sick, you should plan it for the capital city, where UAMS, St. Vincent’s, Ortho Arkansas, Baptist, Arkansas Children’s, CARTI and the Heart Hospital are.
Granted, being 60 and single, I may be jaded, but in my mind, the disparity between the two regions has more to do with the “fun disparity” than anything economic. It just seems like people make a mad dash to get out more than in Little Rock. As a result, they stay seen to stay younger longer.
Sure, Fayetteville has Hog football, basketball, baseball, Dickson Street and scads of establishments between Fayetteville and Bentonville.
But the Little Rock area is trying to keep up with its numerous neighborhood-adjacent entertainment areas. Arguably the best (no offense SOMA, East End or River Market) is North Little Rock’s Argenta Arts District.
I was there after a Hog basketball game at Simmons Arena a few weeks ago. The Hogs had just mailed in an early season blowout and afterwards we walked to Skinny J’s (about 15 minutes). It was packed to the gills and brimming with life. A combination of laughter and clinking knives, forks and beer mugs filled the air. Meanwhile, some dude whistled as loudly and relentlessly as possible to bounce the shrill off the walls and invade every nook and cranny. It was glorious.
It reminded me of a couple of years ago. Tedeschi Trucks was at Simmons and as the call time got closer, we left assuming everyone would follow because, let’s be real, if you’re going, man, you go. Nary a soul followed. Why? Because they weren’t there for the show. They were there to have a great time in a cool entertaining area. Simmons and Dickey-Stephens Park provide guaranteed traffic from events year-round (basketball, baseball, high school graduations, festivals), but Argenta doesn’t rely on those things.
One of the movers and shakers behind Argenta’s development is Greg Nabholz, who’s been a friend since college. I don’t see him often, but having known him for about 40 years, his efforts and success don’t surprise me.
I sat down with him for coffee a couple of weeks ago at Blackberry Market in Argenta to discuss things. Nabholz moved to Argenta in 2007, back before it was cool. Around that time, Argenta was beginning to become Argenta, and Nabholz was there to help push it along. Frankly, back then, I wondered if central Arkansas (No. 81 largest U.S. metro area) could support it, given all that was going on with Clinton Library-related development south of the river.
Apparently, we can.
Argenta’s now home to restaurants like Capo, Flyway Brewery, Draft and Table, Brood and Barley, Reno’s Cafe, Blackberry Market, and others. And, for good measure, it’s still home to the oldest pharmacy (Argenta Drug Co.) west of the Mighty Muddy.
The future looks even brighter. Thanks in part to a Nabholz-related investment, ground was just broken for a new 96-room Aloft Hotel. And that comes on the heels of a Hilton-related entity acquiring the old Greyhound station where a 130-room hotel will be built.
One of the attractions Nabholz seems most interested in, however, was the ATG Pavilion, which, as a music lover, interests me too. According to its website, the pavilion is a “contemporary sculptural addition to the Argenta Plaza.” According to me, it’s a place where people can see a number of busts of famous Arkansas musicians from the past.
Among the first to be displayed are Sister Rosetta Tharpe (Cotton Plant), Al Green (Forrest City), Levon Helm (Marvell), Glen Campbell (Delight), Scott Joplin (Texarkana), Howlin Wolf (West Memphis) and Albert King (Osceola), but there’ll be more to come.
Mother Nature has always provided activities like hunting, fishing, canoeing, hiking and mountain biking as a reason to visit Arkansas, but sometimes man has to take matters into his own hands and build something worth seeing.
Nabholz and his Argenta colleagues are doing just that, and in the process may be playing a role in accelerating our slow recovery from covid, which has created a nation of hermits for the past five years. Hopefully, for the dreamers out there, the pavilion will also remind us that “if little ol’ Johnny from little ol’ Arkansas can do great things, maybe I can too.”
The bottom line is, people need to leave the house more, but sometimes that requires having a place to go. Argenta is such a place where people can mingle in the actual physical presence of friends, neighbors and strangers, if for no other reason, to celebrate life with the pleasant side-effect of equalizing the fun disparity.
The world needs more Argentas, and the Greg Nabholzes of the world deserve thanks for creating them.
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Tommy Foltz is an editorial writer for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.