Chicago Tribune Finding a VoiceIn 1954, Kathryn Loring, a reporter for the Chicago Tribune visited the Fordyce Bathhouse, “the best looking house of the eight handsome ones on Bath House Row.” Her bath attendant was “Myrtle, a great and pleasant Negro woman whose face was covered with great droplets of perspiration.” Myrtle assisted Loring through the entire bathing experience at Hot Springs. While her illustration of the bath shows anxiety on the reporter’s face, she admitted her time at the bathhouse “felt pretty darned good.” Myrtle was a supporting caricature in Loring’s experience at the national park. But if we center the story on Myrtle Cheatham, we allow her voice and story at Hot Springs National Park to take center stage. Ms. Cheatham was an African American woman who worked at the Fordyce Bathhouse for 16 years beginning in the 1950s. She not only detailed her role in the bathhouse, but explained why she sweated through 48 hours a week in the bathhouse with four kids under the age of 16 in 1950: “We worked to give our children their education, because we didn’t want them to have to wash the bathtubs.” 
Hot Springs National Park Archives.
70 years after Ms. Cheatham stood and posed outside the Fordyce Bathhouse, her daughter returned to the same spot and gave an oral history interview with the national park. Iola Matson remembered her mother fondly like sneaking into the basement of the Fordyce so she secure candy money from her mother. In her interview, Ms. Matson wondered "how in the world we were all able to go to college... Somehow our folks had enough money for the house and food" for her and her siblings. Hot Springs National Park’s ongoing oral history projects centered on African American bathhouse attendants and massage therapists will continue to bring historical depth to this integral part of the park’s fascinating history. |
Last updated: November 2, 2024