# Annover, Cleveland, Arkansas in the 1910s

> A small postal crossroads in timber-and-cotton Cleveland County, with railroad power and county business concentrated at Rison.

- Place: Annover, Cleveland, Arkansas (35.421, -92.710)
- Years: 1910 to 1919
- Page: https://yorehistory.com/place/annover-cleveland-arkansas/1910s
- Step into it (interactive): https://yorehistory.com/?step=Annover%2C%20Cleveland%2C%20Arkansas&at=35.4215,-92.7096&year=1915

## Looking around

You stand at a place the federal gazetteer later records as Annover, a populated place in Cleveland County[1], not at the northern coordinates supplied, which point to Cleveland in Conway County[2]. The ground is low South Arkansas country, about 229 feet above sea level[1]. Around this crossroads are farms rather than a town with a census count, and the county world is shaped by corn, cotton, timber, and lumber mills[5][4]. The nearest strong pull is Rison, where the railroad station and county seat[5] concentrate trade, courthouse business, and shipping. Mail has reached Annover since the late nineteenth century through a post office listed in 1895[3], though no railroad is named for it. The public facts left online are thin: no surviving description found here of houses, stores, church buildings, or schoolrooms at Annover itself.

## Work: Farms before mills

The ordinary economy around Annover belongs to corn, cotton, timber, and lumber mills[5][4]. Across Cleveland County, farmers still outnumbered sawmill workers[5], even as timber employment had become important.

## Law & power: Rison held the county

Court, records, and county authority pointed to Rison, the county seat after 1891[5]. In 1911, the old timber-frame courthouse there gave way to a brick courthouse[5], a visible sign of county power.

## Roads & news: Mail without rails

Annover had a post office listed in 1895[3], but the same shippers' guide summary names no railroad[3] for the place. Wider news and freight moved most strongly through the railroad station at Rison[4].

## Money: Cotton and lumber shipped

Cash came through commodities that could leave the county: cotton and lumber products[4] shipped by rail from Rison. A smaller place like Annover likely lived in that market's shadow, because no separate town census appears for it.

## What people feared: Race, war, accident

Cleveland County carried the memory of late-nineteenth-century lynchings of African Americans[5]. In 1917, danger also became national when 1,070 county men aged twenty-one to thirty-one registered for the draft[5].

## Who lived here: A rural county

The county held 13,481 people in 1910[4], then fewer, 12,260 in 1920[4]. The sources describe the county population chiefly through farmers, timber workers, and sawmill settlements[5][4], not through Annover by name.

## In the air: War and prohibition

By 1917, local public talk would have included a proposed National Guard company at Rison[5] and draft registration and Red Cross committees[5]. Statewide prohibition, adopted in 1915, made liquor a public moral and legal question across Arkansas.

## Home & table: The houses disappear

The most honest local fact is absence: no opened online source describes Annover's houses, stores, churches, school, or inhabitants in the 1910s. The county setting, however, was rural and tied to farm and timber work[5][4].

## Year by year

- **1911** (nearby): A brick courthouse replaced the earlier timber-frame courthouse at Rison, the Cleveland County seat.[5]
- **1913** (nearby): Rison had rebuilt after its 1906 Main Street fire and counted thirty-seven businesses.[4]
- **1914** (the world): World War I began in Europe, a war that would reach Cleveland County households after the United States entered in 1917.
- **1915** (the country): Arkansas adopted statewide prohibition, closing legal liquor traffic before national prohibition arrived.
- **1917** (nearby): Cleveland County began organizing for war with a proposed National Guard company at Rison and Red Cross committees forming.[5]
- **1917** (nearby): More than a thousand Cleveland County men aged twenty-one to thirty-one registered for the World War I draft by early June.[5]
- **1918** (the country): The influenza pandemic spread across the United States and would have been feared in rural Arkansas as in the rest of the country.
- **1920** (nearby): Cleveland County's census population stood at 12,260, down from 13,481 in 1910.[4]

## What the sources say

- Annover is recorded as a historical populated place in Cleveland County, Arkansas, at 33.773438° N, 91.993194° W on the Cornerville USGS quadrangle. (from the sources)[1]
- The supplied map point, 35.4214685° N, 92.7096079° W, is Cleveland in Conway County, Arkansas, not Annover in Cleveland County. (from the sources)[2]
- TopoQuest gives Annover's elevation as 229 feet above mean sea level. (from the sources)[1]
- A later gazetteer summary says Annover had a post office in 1895 and that no railroad was mentioned for the place in that shippers' guide entry. (inferred)[3]
- No separate census population for Annover has been found online; it appears as a populated place or post-office locality rather than an incorporated town. (not known)
- Cleveland County had 13,481 people in the 1910 census and 12,260 in the 1920 census. (from the sources)[4]
- Across Cleveland County, settlers and residents were mainly farmers, with corn, cotton, and timber described as staple products and lumber mills operating through the heavily forested county. (from the sources)[5][4]
- Timber work had grown by 1900, when the county had more than 350 timber-related employees, but farmers still outnumbered sawmill workers. (from the sources)[5]
- Rison became Cleveland County's county seat after a state supreme court decision on April 11, 1891, and its original timber-frame courthouse was replaced by a brick courthouse in 1911. (from the sources)[5]
- Rison existed because the Texas and St. Louis Railroad was surveyed through Cleveland County, creating a station there in the early 1880s. (from the sources)[4]
- By 1913, after a 1906 fire had destroyed most wooden buildings along Rison's Main Street, Rison's businesses had grown to thirty-seven. (from the sources)[4]
- Rison's economy in the period depended on the railroad for shipping cotton and lumber products from surrounding sawmill country. (from the sources)[4]
- The Cleveland County Herald newspaper was established at Rison in 1888. (from the sources)[4]
- Cleveland County's public life in the 1910s was governed from Rison, where county court business centered after the courthouse replacement of 1911. (from the sources)[5]
- In April 1917, Cleveland County began organizing an Arkansas National Guard company to be stationed in Rison, though no record of the unit actually forming has been found. (from the sources)[5]
- By early June 1917, 1,070 Cleveland County men aged twenty-one to thirty-one had registered for the World War I draft, and Red Cross committees were being formed. (from the sources)[5]
- Cleveland County's known late-nineteenth-century racial violence included at least three lynchings of African Americans, including Goode Gray taken from the Rison jail on July 4, 1898 and hanged from a railroad bridge over the Saline River. (from the sources)[5]
- No online source opened here gives a street-level description of Annover's houses, stores, churches, school, or inhabitants in the 1910s. (not known)
- A county history names Rison, Kingsland, and New Edinburg as the county's other towns, while Annover appears only as a smaller post-office or locality name in the sources found. (from the sources)[5][3]
- Arkansas voters adopted statewide prohibition in 1915, so legal liquor sales would have been barred in Cleveland County during the later 1910s. (inferred)

## Sources

1. Annover (historical), AR. TopoQuest. https://www.topoquest.com/place/arkansas/populated-place/annover-historical/60979
2. Cleveland Populated Place. MyTopo / U.S. Geographic Features. https://geo.mytopo.com/feature/arkansas/conway/populated-place/76637/cleveland/
3. Annover (Cleveland County, AR) - Mentions and References. RoadsideThoughts, 2026. https://roadsidethoughts.com/ar/annover-xx-cleveland-mentions.htm
4. Cleveland County. Encyclopedia of Arkansas, 2026. https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/cleveland-county-757/
5. J. W. Calaway House. Arkansas Historic Preservation Program. https://www.arkansasheritage.com/arkansas-register/j.-w.-calaway-house

## Nearby, about the same time

- [Little Rock, Pulaski County, Arkansas in the 1930s](https://yorehistory.com/place/little-rock-pulaski-county-arkansas/1930s/md) (84 km)

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Researched by Yore's AI historian (gpt-5.5) on 2026-10-24 from the sources listed. It is about the place and the time, not about any person. Statements marked "inferred" are conclusions, not records. Cite as: Yore, "Annover, Cleveland, Arkansas in the 1910s", https://yorehistory.com/place/annover-cleveland-arkansas/1910s