She's My Texarkana Baby

 Are you a Texarkana Baby?

The song Texarkana Baby was recorded by Eddy Arnold in 1949. It was one of the first 45 RPM records issued by RCA. We don’t hear it as often now as we did in the fifties.

I can’t say I’m a ‘genuine’ Texarkana Baby because “My pappy came from Arkansas and my maw from Louisiana.” But, I am a real “Texarkana Arkansas” native! Born and bred here!

When Odis and I dated in 1958, he teased me that I was his ‘Texarkana Baby.’ He said I was his precious thing that had him “twisted round his finger like a little piece of string.” But I gave him “lots of sugar!”

I don't know about the next line in the song: “If she hauled off and slapped me, I would never feel the sting cause she’s my Texarkana baby.” I never tried it. Lol! I never asked him if the diamond ring he was going to offer me was “with one installment pay.”

In the 50s, our little world comprised the four-state area, Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma.

Today, we are such a mobile society. It’s easy to go to the Texarkana Regional Airport and hop a plane to Dallas. Then the world is within our reach.

Texarkana is unique in so many ways. We are a city with two city governments in two different states, but share a water department and a post office. We are the only city with a border city exemption from state income tax for Arkansas residents.

You can stand in one place and have one foot in Texas and one in Arkansas. It’s the only small town that was featured in the new Elvis movie. It has been the subject of Smokey and the Bandit, and The Town That Dreaded Sundown. Texarkana has been mentioned on numerous television shows.

Jet airplanes and the internet have opened up new horizons and some Texarkana natives cannot wait to leave and find their dreams elsewhere.

For those of us who stay or moved here and love it, Texarkana really is “Twice As Nice.”

***Check out my books on Amazon. 

On Loan From God For Twenty-Four Hours, 

My Love Story In A Nutshell (Revised) and 

Growing Up In The Fifties.

P.S. On October 15th, 2023 my 1960 Arkansas High School Class held our 60th class reunion. If you are a class member and didn't attend, please message me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.