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Welcome to Fort Smith

Fort Smith is a community that cherishes its past, knowing that history is an important component of a bright future.

In the late 1800s Fort Smith was the last law and order stop on the way West, and today more Deputy U.S. Marshals are buried in the region than anywhere else in the nation. Second and third generation descendants of law officers and outlaws reside in the Greater Fort Smith Region. They remember the stories their grandparents told and know the grit and determination necessary to achieve an objective—even when the odds are against them.

Today, Fort Smith is Arkansas’ leading manufacturing community and is home to the University of Arkansas—Fort Smith, an institution of higher learning dedicated to preparing business majors, engineering students, as well as artists and historians to be successful in their fields of endeavor.

While lawmen used Fort Smith as a base of operations to bring justice to the West, the railroad in the late 19th and early 20th centuries brought attorneys, engineers, teachers and their spouses to Fort Smith. Immediately, these professionals began to infuse arts and cultural activities into the rough and tumble society.

Fort Smith is home to Arkansas’ oldest orchestra and the oldest all-volunteer Little Theatre. The Fort Smith Art Center is a haven for artisans in the region to work and to showcase their pieces.

During spring and summer months, weekend nightlife along Garrison Avenue in downtown Fort Smith provides a variety of live music—from blues to rock and from jazz to country—as well as decadent cuisine.

Garrison Avenue is the heart and soul of Fort Smith. It’s where community members gather to celebrate the annual Old Fort Days Rodeo parade, and also serves as a gathering spot for honoring fallen military personnel and law enforcement officers.

Thousands will line the avenue to pay tribute to the memory of fallen heroes and their families as funeral processions roll by.

Many a Fort Smith couple has fallen in love on Garrison Avenue. They might leave for a time but most choose to come home to raise their families.

Fort Smith is home to Arkansas Best Freight Systems, the nation’s leading transportation and logistics company. Brand names like Whirlpool, Rheem, Trane, Planters, Hiram Walker, Gerber and others rely on Greater Fort Smith Region workers to provide quality workmanship for the products they ship worldwide.

The nation’s oldest law enforcement organization—the U.S. Marshals Service—recently engaged in a highly competitive nationwide search for a city worthy to showcase the Service’s 218 years of history. The Service selected Fort Smith as home to its national museum. Members of the site selection committee repeatedly said, “When you experience Fort Smith, you love Fort Smith.”

Perhaps that’s why so many young people who fall in love on Garrison Avenue return to their roots and celebrate our quixotic heritage of law and order and arts and culture, all embracing the future with the same determination as our ancestors who bravely tamed the West.