By Cody Berry 

After seeing the news about all the damage caused by Hurricane Helene in the past few days, I was reminded about an entry I wrote in graduate school about another natural disaster. On September 13, 1978, a large rainstorm brought record-setting amounts of rainfall to Central Arkansas. 13 people lost their lives in the Flood of 1978: three of them died in Benton.  

The National Weather Service reported that 8.10 inches of rain fell on September 13 alone, a record second only to the 8.81 inches recorded on April 9, 1913.¹ The evening edition of the Benton Courier reported that a small child had been confirmed dead in Benton. Gray Street in Benton was said to be under eight feet of water at one point and the Hidden Valley subdivision was under more than three feet as creeks had risen to block the covered bridge there.² 

Coleman Creek on UALR’s campus in Little Rock flooded so heavily that it trapped students in the Student Union building until the water subsided. A school bus in Garland County was swept 300 feet down a creek and came to a stop after hitting a tree. The bus driver, Robert Hartman, saved 21 children by pulling them through a window onto the roof. Benton’s schools were locked down and in Haskell, students were escorted home by military and fire vehicles. Boats from Congo Marine were used to evacuate residents from a mobile home park on Highway 5. The U.S. Weather Service reported that the Saline River would crest at 28 feet by midnight.³ 

Of the deaths in Saline County, two were young boys named Darren and Paul McCutcheon. The boys had been swept away by a flooded creek and later found dead; their mother and sister were saved by the police. On September 16, the Arkansas Gazette reported that more than 15 inches of rainfall was recorded at the Alcoa plant in Bauxite. The Red Cross said that by September 16, 500 homes in Pulaski, Saline, and Cross Counties had been destroyed or otherwise damaged.  

On September 19, federal officials announced that three disaster relief centers would be closing, “having served their purpose.” One of them was set up at the Saline County Fairgrounds in Benton. The Red Cross received 1,325 applications for relief in Benton and Little Rock combined. On September 20, a column in the Arkansas Gazette blamed much of the damage on poor and outdated drainage systems in Arkansas cities. The Flood of 1978 affected Arkansans in at least 57 counties and caused tens of millions of dollars in damage.⁴ 

In my quest to organize and digitize the Gann Museum’s collections, I have found some photographs of Benton during a flood. They give us some idea of what Benton looked like that September. The footage I’ve seen coming out of Asheville, North Carolina, and parts of Tennessee, is devastating. We will remember them as we remember those who lost everything here in September 1978. 

Citations:

¹ Cody Lynn Berry, “Flood of 1978,” CALS Encyclopedia of Arkansas, https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/flood-of-1978-14061/#:~:text=On%20September%2013%2C%201978%2C%20a,in%20Benton%20(Saline%20County), accessed 10/1/2024.  
²Cody Lynn Berry, “Flood of 1978,” CALS Encyclopedia of Arkansas, accessed 10/1/2024. 
3 Cody Lynn Berry, “Flood of 1978,” CALS Encyclopedia of Arkansas, accessed 10/1/2024. 
4 Cody Lynn Berry, “Flood of 1978,” CALS Encyclopedia of Arkansas, accessed 10/1/2024.