[nicievans]

Jonesboro is a decent town, just over 50,000 folks and has the best nearby shopping; it's about 55 - 60 miles West of Blytheville. Between Jonesboro and Blytheville are several smaller towns - Lake City, Monette, Manilla, Leachville - Manilla may be the nicest of those. Closer in to Blytheville you have Gosnell (to the North), Armorel (East), and Osceola (South). Then there are nearby Missouri towns: Cooter, Steele, Holland, Rives, Hornersville, Arbyrd, Senath, Kennett. Across the river the nearest Tennessee towns are around Dyersburg / Newbern. I live in Paragould and commute to Blytheville for work everyday - it's about 55 miles and takes an hour and 10 - 15 minutes to drive (flat straight country roads).

We are thinking about moving in closer to Blytheville because my husband wants to also find a job there, and we would like to lessen the amount of driving we are doing. (We just had to replace all of the struts and bearings in my car, but bless its heart, it's over 8 years old and has more than 140,000 miles on it.)

I don't know about how racist Blytheville is, but it is pretty segregated - many rural southern towns still are. It isn't as bad as parts of Louisiana where you literally have one 'white' town followed by a 'black' town, but folks don't tend to hang out in very diverse crowds away from work.

Housing is EXTREMELY affordable - side effect of all of the population lost first from the air base closure, then from the limp economy. If you want to check on some housing prices, look up mod cutor any of the other real estate offices in town.

[kdb05f]

Governor Beebe just announced that a new $billion plus steel mill will be built in Mississippi County (where Blytheville is). It will employ over 500 at average salary of more than $70,000 plus about 2,000 construction jobs. Maybe it will have an impact on the community and make it better.

[nicievans]

The new steel mill is going in at Osceola. They expect 2000 temporary workers for the constructions, then around 500 permanent to keep it running.

[Luvvarkansas]

[quote=nicievans;27989936] It isn't as bad as parts of Louisiana where you literally have one 'white' town followed by a 'black' town, [quote]

Where would those parts of Louisiana be? I've never seen them. (This is a serious question, not an argument.)