About Fort Smith National Historic Site
Fort Smith National Historic Site is a 75-acre National Park Service unit on the Arkansas River in downtown Fort Smith, Arkansas, with a small proposed viewshed area across the river in Oklahoma. It covers almost 80 years of frontier history, from the founding of the first Fort Smith on December 25, 1817, at the confluence of the Arkansas and Poteau Rivers, to the last days of Judge Isaac C. Parker's federal court in 1896. Congress authorized the site on September 13, 1961, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966.
Two forts stood here. The first (1817-1824) survives only as stone foundations. The second fort, built between 1838 and 1871, left behind the circa-1838 Commissary, which the Park Service describes as the oldest building in the city of Fort Smith, and a barracks building that was later converted into the federal courthouse and jail. From that courthouse Judge Parker presided over the Western District of Arkansas, with jurisdiction over Indian Territory, for 21 years. Between 1873 and 1896, 86 men were hanged at Fort Smith, and a reconstruction of the gallows stands on the grounds today. Parker's own standard for the court, "permit no innocent man to be punished, but let no guilty man escape," is quoted on the park's website.
The site also interprets the Trail of Tears. Between 1831 and 1845, removal routes for Native nations passed by the fort, and a walking trail along the Arkansas River carries wayside exhibits on that history. The park recorded 106,953 visitors in 2025 and offers a Junior Ranger program for children.
Collections and Research Services
This is an interpretive park rather than an archive, so there is no public reading room or genealogy desk. What the site offers researchers is context: exhibits in the restored courthouse and the "Hell on the Border" jail, the Commissary, the gallows, and the river trail. The park's online History & Culture section includes pages on the men executed at Fort Smith, the deputy marshals who rode into Indian Territory, the Trail of Tears routes, and the 1904 Frisco train station nearby. If an ancestor appears in Parker-era court records, start with those pages, then use our guide to free family history research for the federal court and census sources, and how to find where someone is buried for Fort Smith's historic cemeteries.
Planning Your Visit
The visitor center is at 301 Parker Avenue. Under the summer schedule posted on the park website it is open 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. daily, closed on New Year's Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day; the gallows and Commissary are open 9:15 a.m. to 4:45 p.m., and the grounds are open from 30 minutes before sunrise until 11:00 p.m. Admission is free, and no entrance pass is required. Hours change by season, so confirm the current schedule at nps.gov/fosm, which also has a park map and accessibility details. Phone (479) 783-3961. The site shows up on this directory because its courthouse and jail are among the best-preserved federal frontier buildings in the region; it is the only Arkansas entry in our directory so far, and we welcome submissions of local societies across the state.
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