The History of Hot Springs Village, Arkansas
Early on, in preparing to launch this podcast, I asked Dennis (my co-host and co-conspirator in this project) to record a show where he could educate me (and our entire audience) on the history of Hot Springs Village, Arkansas. Today we have that history lesson to answer these and other questions:
a) When was Hot Springs Village established?
b) Who founded Hot Springs Village?
c) Why was it started?
d) Why wasn’t Hot Springs Village incorporated as a town/city?
e) What was the relationship between the developer of Hot Springs Village and the POA (property owners’ association)?
We hope you find it informative and inspiring. It helps to have a guide and teacher as knowledgeable as Dennis, a longtime resident of the Village and a native from the state of Arkansas.
Enjoy!

P.S. Be sure to check out all the terrific places you could stay inside the Village through Airbnb or VRBO. Check out the places Dennis has on Lake Desoto by visiting his website, D&D Property.
The History Of Hot Springs Village, Arkansas
Transcript of today’s show
Dennis: [00:00:00] Hey, it’s time for another episode of hot Springs village inside, out, or HSV inside out.com with my good buddy, Mr. Randy Cantrell in Dallas, I’m here in hot Springs village. I am not by the lake because we keep getting, I am by the light, but I can’t show you the lake behind me cause I keep getting washed out.
Randy: [00:00:16] So the lake, the lake trumps you
Dennis: [00:00:17] uh, in every way in every way as, as Teresa, Diane, my lovely wife says you have a face for radio Dennis. So, you know, when you, when you drag me onto video, I’m like, okay. Okay, Randy. Okay. Okay.
Randy: [00:00:31] But you’re for the, for the audience, for the audio audience, you’re gonna have to check out the YouTube channel because he, this is, he looks, he looks perfectly human to me.
Dennis: [00:00:39] Yeah. Very human. I think that’s good, yeah. Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah. Blatantly human, probably
Randy: [00:00:45] I’ve asked you to dive into a topic that I, I know you’re eminently qualified for because as a guy, as the outsider who hopes to one day be an insider Lord willing and we’re working on it, um, I’ve [00:01:00] I had a strong interest.
I came last year during the pandemic, and I know it was the 50th anniversary of the place. And I began to look a little bit about the history of the place because I had no idea about the beginnings of the place. So that’s what we hope to talk about today. And I reserve the right to have questions,
Dennis: [00:01:20] please, please.
Lots of questions. Lots of questions. Um, in late 1969, uh, Mr. John A. Cooper, the first who wasn’t a west Memphis attorney who by his own volition said his own admission said that he wasn’t that great an attorney. And he knew he really wouldn’t get to get rich making, uh, you know, being in the courtroom, but he thought that he could use some of his abilities in land title services and land stuff.
And he had already by 69, you have to pardon me with my sinuses today. But he had already, by 1969, he had already had a Cherokee village, uh, in Northwest Arkansas by Harris break in some areas there. And they built it across the [00:02:00] county line, just like they did hot Springs, village hill, two different counties.
They had some small lakes. Um, but by Mr. Cooper’s own admission too, they made some significant mistakes. Uh, what they would do is they would, they would perimeter, you know, they would take the entire land that was around that and say,