Biohazard and Pathogen Disinfection in Black Rock, AR

Black Rock is a city in Lawrence County in northeast Arkansas, situated on the west side of the Black River at the eastern edge of the Ozark Mountains.

Black Rock reportedly takes its name from black rocks found in the area.

Black Rock was little more than a few houses and cleared farmland before construction of the Kansas City, Fort Scott, and Gulf Railroad through the area in 1882 transformed it into a timber boomtown.

Black Rock incorporated on October 23, 1884, with a recorded population of 277, and by 1890 it had about ten sawmills.

The 1890s brought shingle mills, planing mills, a furniture factory, a handle factory, a wagon felloe factory, a stone quarry, and the Southern Queensware Company, established in 1896 to produce porcelain, earthenware, encaustic tiles, and enamel brick.

Black Rock's population grew from 761 in 1890 to 1,400 in 1900 during its timber boom, before declining over the following century.

In 1897 residents began harvesting Black River mussels after Dr. J. H. Myers found a fourteen-grain pink ball pearl, launching a pearl rush on the river.

Myers and partners N. R. Townsend and H. W. Townsend established the Black Rock Pearl Button Company, reportedly the first button factory in the South, after shipping mussel shells to Nebraska for button manufacture in 1899.

The last button factory in Black Rock closed in 1954 as plastic buttons replaced shell buttons, though mussels are still harvested from the Black River and shipped to China for use in cultured pearls.

The 2020 census counted 590 people in Black Rock, and the city covers 3.29 square miles of land along the Black River.