Petit Jean State Park

Petit Jean State Park, atop Petit Jean Mountain near Morrilton, was established in 1923 and is generally recognized as Arkansas's first state park. It takes its name from a local legend about a French noblewoman who disguised herself as a cabin boy to secretly accompany her fiancé on a voyage to the New World, and who is said to be buried on the mountain overlooking the Arkansas River Valley. The park's Mather Lodge, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, is considered one of the earliest lodges purpose-built for a state park and became an influential model for park lodge design nationally. Cedar Falls, a roughly 95-foot waterfall, is one of the park's best-known natural features.