An afternoon in Little Rock, Arkansas

I arrived this morning in Little Rock, Arkansas for a 2 day conference called AER:Lift. I have free Internet access compliments of the bar in the Hotel across the street. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell there is no wireless in the hotel. Not that I looked hard once I found the other connection. I’m staying at the Peabody Hotel. Upon arriving I was greeted by the March of the Peabody Ducks, of course.

Since registration doesn’t start until this evening, I had a chance to aimlessly wander around Little Rock and I wanted to share some of my meanderings and findings. First, I must say that for the first time ever I found myself actually wishing I had a camera on me. The area is just beautiful. But, to be honest, it has more to do with the car show I stumbled upon walking down the street.

In the little car show I came across a Dodge Viper, AC Cobra, Chevy Corvette, and a 1938 Ford 85 pickup truck with a Corvette engine in it! So that was a nice treat.

I also came across a company called Heifer International. I still need to do a little more research but they recently built their international headquarters here in Little Rock and created a Platinum rated LEED certified building. Heifer’s mission is to end hunger and poverty around the world. No small goal. Their approach appears to be to help small communities around the world create sustainable farming and economic systems. What I found interesting is how many of the strategies being used looked like strategies I read about in "The Omnivore’s Dilemma", which I finished reading recently. While I was receiving a tour of their headquarters I found out that they actually do use those same strategies in some parts of the U.S. as well. They had a small gift shop in the building which included some books. Some of the titles that jumped out at me were Food, Inc., The World is Flat, and The Omnivore’s Dilemma. I’ve read two of those and watched the movie version of Food, Inc. This certainly caught my attention.

Also, very worthy of mentioning is the Witt Stephens Jr. Central Arkansas Nature Center. This was an excellent little nature center with plenty of information on the history and wildlife of Arkansas. They have a variety of live fish and turtles for you to see as well as a video to watch and information on computer kiosks. The fellow manning the desk was very helpful and we talked about public hunting areas owned by the State instead of the Fed and where they were. I learned a bit more about the general topography of the State and, in general, had a great time learning.

Not bad for a little stroll down down President Clinton Ave in Arkansas. I would have gone to the Clinton Presidential Library, but I’m cheap and it was $7 to get in.

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