The picture is of our herb gardens. Members of The Herb People Club assisted in developing period herb gardens.

High ceilings, quilts on narrow beds, light pouring in big windows, illuminating stones and wood...

Peach trees in bloom, fragrant herbs, speckled cows, vegetables in jars...

At the Overstreet-Kerr Historical Farm, visitors may tour the elegant, 106 year-old home, as well as a barn and original outbuildings. Visitors may also view rare breeds of livestock and poultry that the Farm is preserving. In addition there are displays of antique farm equipment and an orchard of heirloom varieties of fruit.

The Kerr Center acquired the two-story home and the remaining 140 acres of the Overstreet Ranch in 1988 from the Overstreet-Short Mountain Foundation. Restoration of the home and outbuildings was completed in 1991. The restored home includes period rooms with antique furniture, original woodwork, and four hand-carved fireplaces. In addition, many Overstreet family photos, records and furnishings are on display.

The outbuildings– barn, smoke house, chicken house, potato house– were essential to a farm of this era, and several of the original outbuildings on the Overstreet farm are still being used. The thick-walled stone potato house stays cool during hot weather and was an ideal place to store the potatoes that the Overstreets raised and then floated by barge down the nearby Arkansas River to Ft. Smith to sell. Every farm had a chicken house for the family flock and the Overstreet farm was no exception. Many farms also had a smoke house to preserve hams and other meats in this era before refrigeration. The Overstreet smokehouse still has a delicious smoky smell. Behind the house, the big white barn was, and is, used to house draft animals and livestock.

The farm participates in a nationwide effort to preserve rare breeds of livestock and poultry. Pineywoods cattle, Choctaw Ponies, Spanish goats, and endangered poultry such as the Brown Leghorn and Dominique ("Dominicker") chicken, America's first chicken, have a home at Overstreet-Kerr. (For more information on endangered populations of farm animals go to the Livestock Breeds Conservancy web page).

Farm implements have changed drastically since Tom Overstreet's day. On display are plows and planters that were once pulled behind draft animals such as horses and mules, as well as grain and haying equipment pulled by tractors. In addition, there is a draft-powered sorghum mill and an open-air sorghum cooker with a copper pan. Both are put to good use during the farm's annual Fall Farm-Fest.

The Wallace Zieschang Memorial orchard contains antique varieties of peaches, plums, and apples. In earlier days when sprays were not so widely available, farmers tried to plant fruit varieties that were well-adapted to the local climate and had some disease resistance. The orchard is a tribute to Mr. Zieschang, who had a great interest in heirloom fruits, and the trees were donated by his family.