During the first few weeks, the Basin Spring was the center of attraction, but it was not long until the other springs in the vicinity were discovered and used. Streets had to be laid out and the first project was Main Street. H. S. Montgomery, with the help of twenty men, opened up the valley in August, 1879. Business openings during the first year included: Van Winkle, lumber yard; A. D. Mize, hardware; Dr. Hogue, drug store; Jefferson, saloon; Walquist, tailor shop, William Conant, livery stable. Dr. McCarthy was the first resident physician and lived on the site now occupied by the Rock Cabin Courts. The first manufacturing business was a cane factory operated by a fellow named Cook. The first postmaster was T. M. Johnson. Hugo and Herman Seidel owned and operated the first produce house which stood at the mouth of Mill Hollow.
1880 and 1881 were boom years for the new town. Cora Pinkley Call in her Pioneer Days in Eureka Springs says that in 1881 there were fifty-seven boarding houses and hotels, one bank, thirty-three groceries, twelve saloons, twenty-two doctors, one undertaker, and twelve real estate agents. Earl Newport, whose father, J. W. Newport, was one of the early business men of the city, showed me a picture of about fifty boys who were “boot blacks” in the early days of the town. Earl was one of the boys who carried a portable outfit and gave a shine for a nickel. Mrs. Annie House, the oldest newspaper woman in Arkansas, was a small girl when she came to Eureka Springs in 1879. She has been a resident of the town during the entire seventy-five years and spent forty years working on local newspapers. Charley Stehm, artist in wood and stone, came to the town as a boy in the early eighties and lived here until his death, Sept. 22, 1954.
Transportation was a problem in the early days. Pierce City, Missouri, eighty-four miles to the north, was the nearest railroad point. In 1880, the Eureka Springs liverymen established a stage line that connected with the Butterfield stage at Garfield.
Eureka Springs was incorporated February 14, 1880. Elisha Rosson was the first mayor, but he did not remain in office but a few months. The second mayor, Mr. Carroll, took a census in May, 1881, and the population to said to have exceeded 8,000. In 1882, Eureka Springs was declared a city of the first class and ranked as one of the six largest cities of the state. Goodspeed, writing of this “Crazy Quilt” town about 1885, said: